Strangely enjoyable for a game that is not good enough for the current era of gaming
Someone once told me that a good videogame is much like a porn movie. Initially I thought this point was a little perverse (especially since we were talking about the Chinese occupation of Tibet at the time) but when pushed to elaborate he said well with both you expect a storyline to be there but it is not immensely important as no one is really paying attention to it. To me this remains a moot point as there will always be a debate over whether great games of our time have good storylines. For example, Halo. It is arguably the greatest gaming franchise in existence (calm down fanboys I said 'arguably') but how many of us really care about the storyline since essentially all it is is the ol' human vs. alien scenario? But on the flipside some people are enthralled by the sheer epic matter of the story and it has spawned a whole series of novels even though the cynics amongst us may brand this as "cashing in", however I digress. Conflict: Denied Ops seems to take this idea of a storyline does not matter and then continually swing in conscience between a storyline and nothing which makes the whole experience a little more tragic than it should be.
For example a short (and by short I mean very short) cut scene shows some generic soldiers dying in a gun fight and then a voice saying something about fighting in Venezuela then BLAM! Into the action we go. However at the start and end of each mission there is a bit of banter between the two characters you can play as, one of whom is your traditional hard nosed secret service operative and one who is an African-American gentleman who I can only describe as having a lot of "sass", those of you have played Gears of War and come across the Cole character will instantly know what I'm talking about except this fella' is far less witty and far more annoying. In any case there is an obvious conflict between these two guys but whether it is supposed to add gritty realism or an edge to the otherwise dull story I just don't know because it serves as nothing more than a minor annoyance much like the desperate attempts to add a back story to the characters. You may however be one of the aforementioned people that fall into the camp of "I really couldn't give a flying flip about the story" in which case the build up you have just read is utterly pointless so let us now dive into the good stuff…
Design - 6
I hesitate to mention the design of this game because…..err….well it seems it doesn't really have one. By this I don't mean that it has just been roughly thrown together with no forethought whatsoever but the menus are literally just that – menus. Like that of the old gaming era where a menu was just a place where you selected which game mode you wanted without any of this 3D nonsense or interactive hoo-hah and that's all it is. The game itself also seems to be lacking any true structure as it jumps from mission to mission all in completely different locations. Monastery to Kenyan City to Diamond Mine to Submarine base in the Artic to a Castle etc, etc which is random and highly irregular but strangely enjoyable. It provided me with a vague sense of nostalgia as it felt a bit like playing Golden Eye way back when on the N64 but structurally amiss the design is non-existent but still manages to be likeable in a crude way.
Gameplay - 6
Aaaaaaaaaggghhh! Where oh where do I start? Right, let's start with the basics. It's a shooter and a simple one at that. You have the two playable characters. One with the heavy duty machine gun and one with the rifle which acts as a sniper. Of course both have their advantages and disadvantages for example the sniper is effectively useless for the first few levels whilst the machine gun can't aim for toffee. Point. Squeeze trigger. Empty whole clip into enemy. Realise they are still alive. Change to sniper. Get killed whilst trying to aim. Not fun but you can overcome the aiming options by getting stupidly close to your enemy, this isn't a problem if you have difficulty set fairly low but when you unlock the shotgun attachment you will be using at every available opportunity because it blows anybody that is misfortunate to get into your sights away as they bounce comically but unrealistically away ignoring known laws of gravity for a good few seconds. You gain attachments at the end of each mission and apart from that of the shotgun none of them are really needed and I doubt you will ever use any of them except for maybe novelties sake but they are there should you fell the need to waste your time finding out what other irrelevant things your weapon can do. This game brings us absolutely nothing new as it is very simply a point and pull shooter, that's it nothing more than that. Yes you can switch from player to player but you could do that in Battlefield 2: Modern Combat where instead of being useful it was just annoying. It certainly isn't annoying here but it doesn't bring that much needed extra dimension that so many games are now lacking this being one of them and it is slightly insulting that developers are expecting us to pay £50 a pop for something that can only be described as 'run-of-the-mill'. However this averageness (yes I know that's not a word) does have a very comforting feeling when all you want to do is sit down and blow the crap out of things. A.I is poor where your enemies hide behind explosive barrels using them for cover. I may not be the greatest villain but I do know that if it says 'explosive' on it it's probably not a great idea to use it as cover in a gunfight and on that topic where the hell did all these explosives come from? I'm pretty sure monasteries and castles or wherever the hell you are do not just have random boxes of explosives lying around.
Audio - 5
I didn't think there was anything more wooden then Hugh Grants acting. Well ladies and gentlemen I have been proven wrong. Whoever was hired to do these voices clearly wasn't paid enough as there is a hint of boredom in every voice not what you'd expect form a high-octane, action packed thriller. Hell! Give me £20 and I'll redo all the voices for you and at a better standard. Also you are jetting around the world to various different locations so of course you encounter foreign individuals, No wait! You encounter an American putting on a piss poor accent, sorry easy mistake to make. It seems fairly obvious to me that if you are putting in African characters you hire an African voice actor but I'm not in the games industry so what do I know? Having said that, at least they tried.
Visual – 6
Nothing much to say here. You can tell what everything is but it doesn't have much texture and it doesn't have the pristine, shiny quality you expect of today's games.
Multiplayer - 7
As I said it is just a simple shooter but multiplayer does have it's quirks because as one of you has the sniper and the other the machine gun you are forced to work closely together. Some may criticise this others may revel in it but in either case it does limit what you can do but it doesn't really build much on the single player experience.
Longevity - 6
Once you have completed this game I can't see you going back for more but it isn't one you are just gonna toss away after the first level and if you want the achievements you may be inclined to go back. The thing is you can't replay just a single mission until you have completed the game first which is a bit annoying if you're trying to get some of the achievements but if there is a particular level you like you may want to give it another go as they do occasionally have their moments.
Achievements – 7
The achievements mostly rely on you completing certain objectives in the levels but they are relatively low yield so you may not be to bothered if you miss some out. You also get points for completing the game on different difficulties but once you've completed it once you probably won't have the desire to do it again however if you do complete it 7 unlock the "replay mission" section you may want to go back for one or two of the easier achievements but nothing really for you to sink your teeth into here.
Overall – 6.5
It is all in all an average game but I feel it has a certain level of enjoyment in it that can not be justified by a 6 at the same time it is not worth a 7. If you really want to try it rent it but even then I wouldn't recommend it but whatever you do for the love of god do not piss away £50 on this, £10 yes, £15 probably, £20 pushing it but £50! NAH! So many good games will be hitting us in a very short space of time and will continue until we are black and blue with enjoyment so just be patient and wait it out.