Mercenaries 2

(EA for Xbox 360)
By Mike Delano

Some of Mercenaries 2‘s quirks are welcome: The fact that falling from a helicopter doesn’t kill you contributes greatly to the game’s go-anywhere, do-anything mentality (and sense of humor), as does regenerating health, which means you won’t have to carefully creep through a level at a snail’s pace because you sustained major damage at some point. Other quirks aren’t so welcome: The visual quality isn’t consistent, there are some severe pop-up at times, and the big warzone of Venezuela often doesn’t feel too populated. The missions also aren’t consistently entertaining, and while the controls are fine for some stop-and-pop gunplay, they’re a little too herky-jerky to make large-scale firefights anything more strategic than spray-and-pray affairs. The sheer amount of extra content, from weapons challenges to side missions, in addition to the lengthy core story means that you’ll never be bored, unless, of course you’re looking for something more cerebral than running people over in tanks and blowing stuff up. And why would you be looking for anything more than that?
(www.ea.com)