SUPER SMASH
BROS. BRAWL

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SPANKED BY A TANK

Recently, I sat down, relaxed and blew the hell out of some enemy tanks on my Nintendo DS. No, I wasn’t playing Advance Wars: Dual Strike ; it was an early version of Tank Beat , a game being published by O-3 Entertainment. Even though players don’t get to fly airplanes or control infantry, this title’s excellent graphics, exciting real-time combat and unique control setup created an explosive experience, both offline and online.

Luckily, I got to practice in single-player before entering the online arena, because it took about 15 minutes to get used to the controls. At level start, my tank appeared on the top screen in gorgeous 3-D. On the bottom screen, a portion of the map was displayed. By tapping on the player icon and dragging the stylus, a line was drawn that my tank immediately started moving along. This let me focus on firing weapons while my tank was on “auto-pilot.”

To use my tank’s main weapon, I held down L a nd tapped the target (usually an enemy tank icon) on the touch screen, causing the tank’s turret to aim and fire. Since there are over 20 different tanks in the game (based on both real-world and fictional vehicles), some have extra-powerful weapons mounted on immovable turrets. These tanks require the entire vehicle to move toward the target, since the turret won’t swivel. There are also mobile weapons platforms, like the deadly but vulnerable rocket launcher, which offer a nice variety. Most vehicles have a secondary weapon as well; you simply tap it on the touch screen to make it the active weapon. Many main weapons have a short cool-down period between shots, so it’s smart to fire the main weapon, then quickly switch to the secondary weapon and fire again. By the time the secondary weapon’s ammo clip is depleted, the main weapon should be ready again. Make this tactic second nature to achieve maximum firepower!

When the game session began, I found out that my competitors would be Tank Beat testers. Great, time to get spanked. Fortunately, an O-3 public relations representative was also playing, so I wouldn’t be the only wildebeest. I chose a medium-sized tank and jumped into battle against three other players (online gameplay supports up to four players and features free-for-all deathmatch, called Battle Mode ). As my tank lumbered along the path I drew, I realized that tapping a spot on the map would turn the camera toward it so I could scan that area for enemies. In order to align the turret with the camera, I had to hold down L and tap the screen. It’s always a good idea to have the tank’s turret pointed in the same direction the camera is facing, in order to minimize the time it takes to line up a shot. This is crucial, since getting the first hit on an enemy often means the difference between victory and a burning pile of molten steel.

After getting blasted from all sides several times, I discovered that I could lessen the chance of being hit from the side by hugging the wall wherever I went; this also made me harder to see. A good tank commander should be able to figure out how to “lead” moving enemy vehicles directly into gunfire. Players can also use elevated areas to their advantage, and blast unwary rivals from above! In addition, rainy and snowy conditions can be a hindrance or a benefit, depending on the player’s actions. When my session was over, I had scored some kills, but I didn’t win any rounds.

While I love Advance Wars: DS , Tank Beat is more my style due to the real-time combat and gorgeous visuals. The only problem was trying to watch the top screen action while controlling it on the bottom screen. This was a minor quibble, though, and shouldn’t deter budding tank commanders from checking out this unexpected gem.

FREEZE MY ASS OFF IN LOST PLANET

Now that Lost Planet: Extreme Condition has been out for a few months, gamers worldwide have had the chance to traipse through the frozen tundra of planet E.D.N. III with trusty rifles strapped to their backs. But no amount of artificial intelligence can realistically mimic the unpredictability of real players, so the real challenge comes from this excellent title’s various online multiplayer modes. Sure, I played the online demo when it was released late last year, but that offered only a small taste of Lost Planet ’s explosive warfare.

Although there is no cooperative online campaign, four action-packed game modes offer enough variety to satisfy any action gamer, so let the storyline be damned! Elimination and Team Elimination are self-explanatory, while Post Grab and Fugitive are not. Basically, Post Grab is just like Battlefield 2 ’s conquest mode, but players activate beacons instead of capturing flags. Fugitive tasks the game’s host with evading all other players (hunters) and/or killing said hunters. Of all these modes, I found Post Grab to be the most popular, while Fugitive was the least.

Jumping into a ranked game of Post Grab set in a frozen wasteland, I immediately heard the familiar “thwip, thwip, thwip” of my teammates activating their anchors. These are grappling hooks attached to rope lines that let players zip up to rooftops, over walls, across chasms and much more! Using this hook is not only extremely fun, but it also brings back fond memories of the ultra-gory Tenchu series (the grappling hook was one of my favorite features). Needless to say, it was one of the coolest abilities ever added to an action game, and gave players many options on how to traverse the environment.

While I love using the anchor, I opted instead to jump into a massive 15-foot-tall steel mech armed with a rocket launcher in place of my right limb, and a machine gun on the left. Using these weapons is as easy as pulling the Left Trigger to fire the left weapon and pulling the Right Trigger to…well…you can guess the rest. As I drew lots of attention with my explosive “arms”, my comrades flanked the enemy and started blasting them from the side. Within seconds, the entire battlefield erupted in deafening gunfire and impressive explosions while bullets and rockets zipped by me on all sides (leaving gorgeous smoke trails, I might add). Having depleted my rocket launcher of ammunition, I scanned the battlefield and spotted a giant laser rifle. Now we’re talking! This handy device sports unlimited ammo and fires deadly balls of charged energy, so I replaced the rocket launcher and moved on. Just as I started charging the enemy, I was sniped out of my mech by a well-placed shot to the head. Oh well…it had to happen eventually.

Time for some down-and-dirty infantry combat! This time I zipped up to a ledge using my anchor and hid behind a wall. Quickly realizing that this was a nice location to snipe enemies from afar, I crouched down and started pumping them full of lead. Within seconds an enemy mech was raining hell upon me with rocket and machine-gun fire, so I dove behind some cover and tried to hide. No luck; his deafening footsteps were rapidly approaching. Soon it would be over…unless I could find a powerful weapon close by. To my right was a gigantic shotgun as long as my character was tall, obviously made for mechs. Fortunately for me, Lost Planet ’s designers decided to let infantry wield any weapon on the battlefield, so I grabbed the immense shotgun and waited for the heavily-armed tin can. Carrying such a heavy weapon really hindered movement, but that only added more realism to the experience.

When the mech was almost on top of me, I ran out and started firing and strafing between each shot. Since it was a lumbering steel colossus, it couldn’t turn as fast as I was strafing, and I was able to down it with about five close-range blasts to the chassis. When the fight was over, my heart was racing, and just as I began to revel in my victory, someone blasted me to kingdom come! Oh, the humanity!

Don’t be surprised if you get…err…lost in Lost Planet ’s online multiplayer modes, because it is easy to spend hours with this game. And with a patch just released in March that adds features and fixes various bugs, it is hard to find a better online gaming experience on any console