Monday Night Combat Review

Monday Night Combat is a shooter set in a TV game show and for many it is one of the most eagerly anticipated XBLA releases this year. Should the show be commissioned for a full series or be cancelled after the pilot? Read on to find out.

The action takes place in a third person view where you take control of a human player in one of six classes. The classes include your usual fare with Assault, Sniper, Support (Medic) and Gunner, along with Tank and Assassin to complete the roster. Each class have their own strengths and weaknesses. Assault is your all rounder with decent weapons and skills for attack and defense. Support has relatively underpowered weapons, instead they provide assistance with the ability to heal other players, repair and hack turrets, and to call in air strikes. The Gunner is a beast with very heavy and deadly gunfire, he is slow moving but a few rounds from his upgraded dual gun will stop most enemies in their wake. The range of classes offer a great choice of gameplay tactics from all out Rambo style attacks through to sneaking around the map assassinating unsuspecting opponents.

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Monday Night Combat has an interesting levelling up system. Unlike many other shooters where your upgrades are kept over games, you instead start with a clean slate at the start of every game. This allows for a level playing field with no overpowered ‘level 50’ opponents to worry about. Each class comes with four skills that can be upgraded from the easy to access in game menu with any money earned during the game. At the end of the game some money will be carried over as your career earnings and can be used to purchase new custom class slots. You can choose a class and add three perks, these include faster firing rates, more armour and larger ammo clips. The career money can also be used to purchase any of the 300+ ProTags which are unlocked as you play, for example with a number of kills via the Assault Rifle. The ProTags are seen by your opponents when you kill them, much like the emblems used in Modern Warfare 2.

The first of the two game modes is Blitz which can be played in either single or multiplayer with up to three other friends. Your goal is to defend your Money Ball from the waves of enemy robots. Spending money collected from the dead robots, turrets can be built upon to provide extra defences, there are four turret weapons to choose from including a basic laser gun and rockets.  This mode is clearly inspired by the Tower Defense genre, the action is split between attacking the robots and in between waves upgrading your turrets. The number and type of robot in each wave scales depending on the number of human players, it presents a good challenge and at times panic! There are are number of difficulty levels to choose from, the final is a survival mode which increases in difficulty as you progress. It is great fun playing in single player, even more so with a few friends and a plan of action to keep the robots at bay.

Crossfire is the main event of the game. Up to twelve players battle it out online to destroy their opponents Money Ball while defending their own. As with the Blitz mode, towers can be built, upgraded and hacked to provide defenses for your Money Ball. Spawn pods are available to activate for a small amount of money, they will send out additional robots which you can escort to the opponents Money Ball to help destroy it. Working with your teammates is essential if you want to win, having an unbalanced team can leave you weak in areas, it is wise to pay attention to what other classes your team are using and what they are doing. If there is a build up of opponents in an area and you are a sniper then you will not be much help, change to the gunner class and mow them down!

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The action in Crossfire is non stop, there is always something to do whether it be attacking and defending, building and upgrading turrets or sending out new spawns of bots. Even during the mid game period when the mascot Bullseye wanders around the battlefield, it is a mad scramble to shoot to him earn more money! The game show commentator provides regular updates on the action such as warning you when enemies are incoming, deaths and funny sponsorship messages. I spent several hours playing Crossfire and despite there only being a small number of maps and one type of game mode, each game felt very different. As the players take on different tactics and classes they provide a new experience every time.

Graphically the game looks great, the orange and blue colour scheme will remind you of Team Fortress but this is no bad thing. The arenas look very suited to a futuristic game show with shiny structures, glass floors and barriers to provide the scenery. The characters and robots look the part, especially the giant Jackbot robot who will strike fear as he approaches your Money Ball. My personal favourite is the Bouncer who reminds me of an angry dog hunting down his prey. There were a couple of instances where the frame rate drastically dropped during very busy occasions, these last for a few seconds and I would not consider it a game breaker as everyone in the area seems to be affected.

The music is split between rock style themes and game show blasts, it works well and gets you fired up during the lobby and intro sequences, it all adds to the atmosphere. Plenty of speech can be heard from the aforementioned commentator, through to Pit Girl who provides encouragement and reminders to upgrade your skills and finally your character has a few choice words. The Support class speech when he is hacking a turret never fails to raise a smile.

So is Monday Night Combat worth the 1200 :MSPoints: ticket fee? The short answer is yes, go and buy it now! The game is immensely fun online and it never seems to get repetitive considering the small number of maps and one main game type for multiplayer. I would imagine that a map pack will be available before long to keep the game feeling fresh. There is plenty of scope for new maps and game types which would be a very welcome addition, we want a second season!

You can find more information on Monday Night Combat on the Marketplace and be sure to visit out the homepage at http://www.uberent.com/ for in depth details on the game. The demo version allows 30 minutes online play.