Mercenaries 2: World in Flames

Author: Joe Martin
Published: 9th September 2008
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Poor Port

One of the biggest problems with the PC version of Mercenaries 2: World in Flames is the fact that it is incredibly obvious from the off that it’s a fairly poor port of the Xbox 360 version.

The immediate response to that is to question how exactly we know it’s a port of the Xbox 360 version. The answer is simple.

When you get offered a new mission in Mercenaries 2 a little box pops up on the screen. A mission summary scrolls along and you are given a choice; accept or decline. You make a decision and plant your cursor over whichever option you favour.

You click, but nothing happens – this is because you have to press the spacebar to actually press the button. The spacebar is bound to the jump command. On the Xbox 360 version the jump command is set to A, which is also the logical choice for selecting an option. Somewhere at Pandemic is a developer who couldn’t be bothered to remap the game to take sensible mouse controls at this window. That person should be shot. Out of a cannon. Into space.

Once you get past a few of these irritations and issues though, the game itself is fairly straightforward and not overly console-y. You, the Merc, run around completing missions and exploring the huge sandbox environment. You collect weapons and you airlift out the absolutely massive bundles of cash which can be found lying around, unguarded and unpilfered for a reason we don’t understand because it’s completely idiotic.

Mercenaries 2: World in Flames Mercenaries 2: World in Flames - Gameplay

Every now and then you complete a mission, get money and take a step forward with a particular faction. You build alliances and rivalries, you progress closer to your final goal and you slowly build an armoury. Along the way you go through some training exercises and mini-games with your support team. If you die then you get medevacced out to safety and have to start your latest mission again.

Fine, OK, good – but where Mercenaries 2: World in Flames starts to fall down is in the details and the suspension of disbelief. Why exactly is there a man-sized block of undisguised money sat by the roadside ready for airlift? How come you can’t take twenty steps without stumbling over an unguarded weapon of mass destruction?

More critically, why is it that most of the vehicles have such poor handling that they feel like trying to drive a cement truck with no wheels or engine through a swamp using only a greasy broomhandle and oversized gloves stuffed with grapes?

Most methods of transport beyond the utterly boring sedan are totally unenjoyable to use. The motorbikes move at impossible speeds and accelerations, but require the entire sandbox just to do half a U-turn. Trucks and tanks are the polar opposite, with boats being the most laughable.

Mercenaries 2: World in Flames Mercenaries 2: World in Flames - Gameplay

There are two types of boat in Mercenaries 2; the really slow and pointless tankers that are already out there, or the motorboats you’ll first have to punch twenty times until they fall in the water. Just pray they don’t capsize – or you may end up driving them sideways, as happened to me once and left me crushing two speedboats beneath; the gunners still filling me with holes.

That last point brings me nicely onto two of the most important, though completely separate, failings of Mercenaries 2; the punch and the enemies. The punch is your last resort melee attack, useful for one-hit takedowns and kidnappings. It’s also handy for knocking over tanks and huge chunks of building. I’ve personally charged unarmed into battle against two tanks and managed to defeat them by punching them over cliffs. If I didn’t feel like laughing at Mercenaries 2 then I’d cry for it.

Then there’s the enemy AI, which is something we can’t actually fault that much on a tactical front. The baddies make good use of cover, vehicles and so forth and stand up pretty well despite an occasional wont to shoot you at point blank range with an RPG. What makes them awful though is the limited, looping sound set they use. They constantly shout the same inane, vague and incorrect directions.

“He’s behind that tree,” ten of them shout at each other as you drive in front of them in a jeep. The inanity, regularity and volume of their cries makes having your ears pecked off by crows a more preferable auditory experience after the first few hours.

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