MAIN -- SONY -- MICROSOFT -- NINTENDO -- PC -- E3 BUZZ 
Morality on the 40th Day
Product: Army of Two: 40th Day
Company: EA Games
Date: 06/10/2009
Avaliable On:

With Army of Two: The 40th Day, EA Montreal is emphasizing the idea of choice, not just in the weapons you take into battle, but in your actions throughout the game. The 40th Day finds Salem and Rios in charge of their own private military company, T.W.O., and stuck in the middle of Shanghai as the city is torn apart from the inside.

The lawless city plays an important part of The 40th Day’s concept of choice. The city is more vibrant than anything experienced in the first game; people are running through the streets, buildings are collapsing all around you and troops are enforcing strict marital law. As the masked mercs wade through the chaos, they have more choices than simply killing everyone. The duo can now surprise opponents and bind their arms. It’s a much more humane option and plays on one of The 40th Day’s core questions, “When faced with chaos, how would you react? Would you allow the lawlessness to consume you, or stand against it and try to regain order?”

This idea is best illustrated in one of the new quick-reaction, moral decisions found throughout the game. During what appears to be a raid on an abandoned building, Salem and Rios stumble upon a weapons cache. As the two celebrate their newfound arsenal, a frightened security guard approaches them from behind, gun drawn, and orders them to return the weapons. At this point, a prompt offers the choice to return the weapons or take them. The developers hope these situations will force players to discuss the impact of their choices, particularly when playing co-op with a friend.

During my demo session, the audience chose to take the weapons (I was out-voted 13 to 1). The decision led of a sequence where Salem tried to calmly reason with the guard. As he attempted to remove the gun from the guard’s hand, it fired, causing the bullet to ricochet off a wall and strike the guard in the head, killing him. The sequence then switched to a watercolor-like dream sequence where we saw the guard’s funeral and his now fatherless child. The EA rep teased that players will have to learn to live with their choices, so it should be interesting to see what sort of long-term impact they will have on the game.

Even with the new focus on moral choices, The 40th Day is still about co-op gameplay. The duo has a new set of combat tactics at their disposal, adding new strategic options. At one point in the demo, Salem and Rios came across a large wooden door with a group of enemies holding hostages on the other side. At this point, the two split up; Rios jumped atop a nearby building to get a better look and relayed the information back to Salem’s HUD. This caused red silhouettes to appear, indicating where the enemies were. The two were then able to pull off a dual sniper kill.

Again, morality will seep into these sections as well. The pair could have easily killed everyone in the area -- hostages included -- but chose the harder route. Saving hostages will earn more money in the long run, so there’s a tangible reason to not waste everyone.

Another new tactic is the ability to perform a fake surrender. When approaching guards, one or both characters can hold their hands up in surrender. Once the guards let down their guard, they can pull off a quick-draw tactic and kill the guards. Or, if you want to be a nice guy, you can catch them off-guard and bind their hands. A variation on this tactic involves stealthily shooting a guard in the leg. When his friend moves to heal him (enemies heal each other now) you can hold up the enemies and bind their hands or dispose of both.

Choice also plays a bigger part in the revamped weapon’s system. Described as “Gun LEGOs” by the EA rep, you can now pair any gun parts with other parts. This gives you the ability to create any sort of gun you want by cobbling together various stocks, barrels, clip types and other accessories. Each part affects the gun’s overall stats and battle function. Getting the right balance between Salem and Rios will be incredibly important. If Salem’s gun is built for close-range combat, you’ll want Rios to have a long-range gun. The system will also offer players a chance to express their own play style in the online portion. In addition to a wider range of weapon parts, new bling options are also available.

The original game was an experiment in co-op play. With The 40th Day, it feels like the experimentation is done, allowing EA Montreal the chance to build on the original experience. Army of Two: The 40th Day is slated for a Winter release.

Starscream aka Ricky Tucker

GameVortex PSIllustrated