Mobile Suit Gundam: Crossfire [PS3]

What's a new console launch window without a few sweeping generalizations? Here's one: there's never been a truly good Gundam game. We'll follow that up with something more specific: Crossfire, the series' PS3 debut, does nothing to change that. Only the most blinkered Mobile Suit fetishist could love this clunky battle sim, which trades speed, finesse, and depth for...well, nothing, really.

In Crossfire, you can take control of either the Federation (good guys) or Zeon (bad guys) in the battle for the fate of the Earth. What that means is that for a 15-mission stretch, you can pilot ugly but morally upright Mobile Suits, then turn around and walk on the dark side for an additional fifteen runs through the giant jungle with slightly cooler looking suits.

In either case, there's really no story, just a string of battles with fairly poor briefings before each. The voice acting is hilariously dreadful -- dispassionate to the point of mediacated. Whatever they're feeding the person who monotonously intones 'unfortunately, we've lost', we want some for the next console launch period.

Back in the days when (geek alert!) we spent entire weekends on a single BattleTech campaign, we dreamed of a video game that would bring such giant battles to life. With that in mind, or with any appreciation of quality fun instead, this next-gen debut is a massive disappointment. Like so many other Gundam games, you'll run around in slow, unwieldy machines, shooting frantically at enemies who are doing exactly the same thing. Shoot first, or slightly more often, and you get to do it again. (Don't put too much stock in the melee attacks, which are as difficult to land as they are devastating.)

Then there are the customization options. Using these menus to upgrade your suits is like building a wall by laying only one brick per day. You can put points into attack, weapon and defense categories, but only once per 'day'. Then you'll have to back out, tell the game to advance to the next day and do it again if you want more modifications. It's like the short bus version of a turn-based strategy game.

That would be less infuriating if the system weren't so bloody necessary. Get five missions into either campaign and any refusal to suffer the upgrade process will result in thirty seconds of battle that leave your Suit mangled like country roadkill. You'll want to put the same effort into the support suits as your own, but don't expect the friendly AI to help much.

At least, with upgrades to some of the game's better weapons, you can snipe an enemy in the knees or simply take his head off...wow, wouldn't it be cool if there were other games where you could do that? Oh. Wait. This is what it's like to watch a series cross the finish line after absolutely everyone else.

There'd be some consolation if Gundam looked as good as Genji, but it doesn't. Not only do the menus and mission breakdowns look like something out of an SSi PC game circa 1992, the only vaguely impressive in-game elements are the Mobile Suits -- everything else looks rather rudimentary. If there were a lot more of the suits, and more missions to pilot them through, this could at least quality as shovelware. Instead, it's just launch lineup filler.