It's obvious that Lost Planet 2 is more than a little bit influenced by Gears of War. The art style is similar (albeit without so much brown), camera angles are exactly the same and the weaponry is all too familiar. It even has Marcus Fenix and Dominic Santiago featuring as special characters on the Xbox 360 version.
While it's true that Capcom owes a lot to Epic's sci-fi shooter, there are a few things that Lost Planet 2 does that make it a unique experience.
Multiplayer deathmatches are based on score – capping opponents works in your favour, but you also get points for activating beacons called data points. Not only do these unlock the surrounding area on your HUD map, but they also serve as respawn areas.
Players can leap around the maps as well, adding an extra dimension to the proceedings (thankfully in the sequel, you can aim upwards to counter attacks from the sky), while a grapple hook allows you to draw yourself towards structures for a quick escape. It's certainly a more fast-paced affair on E.D.N III than on Jacinto, and I wonder whether Fenix will be able to keep up with his weighty gear.
But despite all this, it was difficult at first to see what truly makes Lost Planet 2 stand out. Jumping around shooting guys in the face, in a ruined and monochrome alien world isn't exactly a fresh concept, you know? I felt like I had played this game plenty of times before, particularly with burly American dudes built like brick shithouses.
Then I found the mechs, and played some different levels. And all bets were off.
Lost Planet 2's big draw is in its huge robotic enclosures known as Vital Suits. These makeshift vehicles can make a real difference on the battlefield, and pack a real punch – so it stands to reason that there are plenty of these littered around the map, with frantic firefights for control of the best ones.
The many types of Vital Suits allow for various approaches in offence and defence. The GAH-42BS looks a bit like the walker mech from Avatar, and lets you hover across landscapes while pummelling enemies with your laser cannons. Aircraft carrier-type vehicles open up transportation possibilities for the rest of your team, who may be on foot.
My favourite has to be the GAN-3AM, which transforms from an average walker mech into a spaceship that can be piloted around low-gravity atmosphere.
Thermal Energy is required to operate these hulking great machines. T-ENG can be collected from the planet's indigenous wildlife – which range from mutant plants to supersized insects – but in team deathmatches it can be picked up around the field (or poached from a fallen player). If a friend is flying about in a Vital Suit and is running out of juice, you can throw a batch of your own T-ENG as support.
Lost Planet 2 contains a rather dramatic – some may say cinematic – storyline, told with explosive cutscenes and alien dangers threatening your troops. I accept that, as a result, the locations you fight in on E.D.N. III have to be of the dark and serious kind.
It still didn't make fighting in a scorched earth and icy caverns any more original. But I switched over to some of the other, more interesting maps and there it was. That spark I was looking for.
You see, mechs are cool and all, but they're nothing if you haven't got any good arenas to use them in – which would make it even worse on foot. So I was pleasantly surprised to find NEOS, a deathmatch stage set on a low-gravity space station. Every jump you make is accentuated to the point where you can float to a faraway platform for a vantage point.
Multiplayer deathmatches are based on score – capping opponents works in your favour, but you also get points for activating beacons called data points. Not only do these unlock the surrounding area on your HUD map, but they also serve as respawn areas.
But despite all this, it was difficult at first to see what truly makes Lost Planet 2 stand out. Jumping around shooting guys in the face, in a ruined and monochrome alien world isn't exactly a fresh concept, you know? I felt like I had played this game plenty of times before, particularly with burly American dudes built like brick shithouses.
Then I found the mechs, and played some different levels. And all bets were off.
The many types of Vital Suits allow for various approaches in offence and defence. The GAH-42BS looks a bit like the walker mech from Avatar, and lets you hover across landscapes while pummelling enemies with your laser cannons. Aircraft carrier-type vehicles open up transportation possibilities for the rest of your team, who may be on foot.
My favourite has to be the GAN-3AM, which transforms from an average walker mech into a spaceship that can be piloted around low-gravity atmosphere.
Lost Planet 2 contains a rather dramatic – some may say cinematic – storyline, told with explosive cutscenes and alien dangers threatening your troops. I accept that, as a result, the locations you fight in on E.D.N. III have to be of the dark and serious kind.
It still didn't make fighting in a scorched earth and icy caverns any more original. But I switched over to some of the other, more interesting maps and there it was. That spark I was looking for.
