Battlefield 2: Modern Combat [X360]

Hot from a release last year on the PS2 and Xbox, the 360 version of Battlefield 2: Modern Combat is ready. Being a prettied-up port of the older versions, it shares their advantages and shortcomings -- that is, it's full of high-budget action both on foot and in vehicles, but struggles a little with vehicular controls and AI. FPS shoppers aren't exactly hard up for choice on the 360, but Modern Combat holds its own in a genre that's just as competitive as the firefights in its own multiplayer mode.

Fire up the game, and you'll see it checks all the right next-gen boxes -- we especially liked the way brass shell cases pile up next to you when you're in a heavy firefight. Explosions come with a cool-looking (but rather silly) screen warping effect that can sometimes make you wonder if you're firing rockets or some kind of futuristic time-bending projectile. Regardless, it's a fine-looking game: maybe not a vast improvement over its current-gen cousins, but hardly disappointing.

You'll also notice the vehicle controls are a touch on the odd side. For example, the Humvee has acceleration, braking, and steering all mapped to the left thumbstick -- hardly a recipe for agility. Helicopters are perhaps the hardest to get to grips with, but then so are the real things, by all accounts. As evidenced by the performance of other players, it's possible to become extremely good with them, but most players will be happier with their feet on the ground.

Like the other versions of Modern Combat, the 360 incarnation has a neat solution to one of the perennial problems of class-based single-player shooters. What do you do if you're playing a regular combat class, with an anti-personnel weapon, and an enemy tank rumbles around the corner? Most games don't let you grab weapons from fallen comrades, so you're left doing a comical dance around it, trying to lob grenades without getting crushed or shot.

However, Modern Combat lets you switch control to one of your teammates at the tap of a button. All you need to do is locate a nearby anti-armor guy, face him, and after a split-second camera zoom on his position, you're him. It sounds spooky, but works beautifully -- no more concerns about being on the wrong side of the map and missing the action, or running out of ammo, or falling off the side of a boat and facing a long swim back to the fight. In other words, no more worrying that the AI characters are having more fun than you are.

It's also pressed into action in one of the more unusual of the game's numerous challenges, which makes you switch -- or, as the game calls it, "hotswap" -- between soldiers spread out across a large map, aiming to reach a specific soldier in a given time limit. Unlike the rest of the game (but just like the standard Xbox and PS2 versions) you're restricted to line-of-sight when hotswapping in this challenge mode.