Customer Reviews:
 Dirtier than a crow's beak April 7, 2008
HWNDarkside (Wales)
9 out of 9 found this review helpful
Condemned: Criminal Origins was one of the better launch titles for XBox 360. Although plagued by some slighty dodgy hand-to-hand combat the game was one of the most disturbing and grim experiences available on any console.
The sequel improves on the original in all aspects. Graphically it's one of the dirtiest games I've ever seen - the grim and slime will be testing your HD TVs to the limit. Combat has been upgraded making things a little easier to control and more involving. Combos and upgrades have been introduced to enhance the hand-to-hand combat, but you'll still find any more than 2 enemies at a time a real challenge especially if one is armed with a gun. There's also the option to grab bits of the scenery to use as weapons with varying levels of effectiveness. When you do get hold of a firearm the ammo is extremely limited but there is a new option to replay all the levels after completing the game armed to the teeth!
Multiplayer is a new addition too. Although it won't be challenging COD4 or Halo 3 for the top spot on XBox Live there's enough varity to warrant it's inclusion.
If your idea of a good night out is getting high on crystal meth laced with LSD, drinking 5 litres of lighter fluid and picking a fight with the occupants of your local crack-house this is definately for you.
REVIEW UPDATE - I probably should have mentioned this does not include any Southpaw or Legacy controls options - naughty Monolith - so left-handers beware!
REVIEW UPDATE II - having spent a bit more time with the multiplayer I have to say it's a bit a botch job. Around 400 gamerpoints are on offer and that's probably the only reason I'll be playing it again (if at all).
very good game April 6, 2008
Mr. K. M. Manuel (UK)
7 out of 11 found this review helpful
mint game but i advise you to buy the first condemned then buy the second one you wont regret it!!
 Punch Drunk May 21, 2008
G. A. Kester (UK)
4 out of 6 found this review helpful
The synopsis of this game sums it up pretty well, so instead of concentrating on the story, the change in the central character, the oppressive tone, the graphics, sound and atmosphere et al (all superb by the way), I thought it may be more useful to focus on something more fundamental - the gameplay.
I've been a gamer since 1976, and was a professional games correspondent for seven years, and so I like to think I know what makes a fun gaming experience. It always bothers me a little when people roll onto a bandwagon and praise a game unconditionally, often on the wave of pre-release marketing hype. Condemned 2 is such a case. It's almost as if, in the clamour to praise its graphics, it's gore and adult tone, people seem to ignore that the central mechanic - the melee combat - is badly flawed, to the point in places where it feels badly broken.
The number of times you lose fights, or pound an enemy (and it doesn't seem to matter what you're armed with) without them going down, only for them to spring back and unconvincingly beat you to death quickly begins to frustrate. First person isn't the best view for fighting games, as it relies on depth perception - something impossible to depict on the 2D surface of a TV. So, often you swing at an ememy you think you'll hit only to miss, or step back to a distance you think is safe, and get clobbered none the less.
You also get combos, which aside from being difficult to execute as the controls are possibly the worst laid out of any XBox game, enemies seem to be able to break without effort anyway. Your block move is only effective if timed precisely - if you don't, enemies can unleash a series of hits on you that often proves fatal (maybe this is my fault for selecting the hardest difficulty setting, as I always do, but "hard" should never equate to "unfair" or "broken").
The fact that enemies often jump behind you or sidestep, leading you to lose sight of them as they continue to hit you is another source of frustration - it could have been fixed by a simple lock-on system, but no...
Now I'm sure the "hardcore gamers" out there are chuntering that I'm a "noob", or that I should go play Cars Mater National or something and leave games like Condemned 2 to "real gamers" - but if you saw my Gamerscore and list of achievements they would quickly revise that (and no Avatar points in sight!)
I am basing my criticism of Condemned 2 on the fact that a game should at its heart be fun - challenging is fine, but as enemies spring from nowhere and kill you with a single blow, forcing you back to one of the often stingy checkpoints, it begins to feel like work. It becomes a memory test ("oh, the guy who killed me is around this corner, I'm ready for him now"), and when a game forces you to learn the level and enemy locations to progress through it and not succeed on your skill and reactions, then it doesn't feel fair either.
There are many questionable design problems with the levels, the positioning of enemy ambushes being just one. Another is the fact that often the game will try to make itself scarier by making the screen fill with grain, judders, darkness and blurs. It just doesn't work, and again frustrates, as it literally robs you of the clear vision you need to fight back. This becomes especially obvious when sonic creatures appear towards the end. Get caught by one, and you have almost no means of escape save random luck as the screen shudders violently and gives you little chance of getting your bearings and moving away to a safe place.
Now I'm sure that there are people who say that that's part of the "realism". If that's the case then they'd better be an alcoholic ex-detective prone to mental trauma and involved in supernatural investigations - if not, then how do they know? All I know is that it's a MacGuffin, and one that alienates me as a player.
One last quibble - the gunplay is actually quite good. Once the game is beaten you unlock the chance to play through it as a traditional FPS, which is great, and if you got a gold on the last level you also get inifinite reloads. But in standard mode, to force you into melee as often as possible, when you find ammunition you can only carry as much as your gun can hold, even when there are several boxes available. If we were trying to be truly realistic, I would have made a way the character could use his pockets and stuff them full of bullets!
Avoid if you don't like losing both randomly and often.
A NOTE ABOUT BUGS: These may be fixed with a patch in the future, but at several stages severe bugs hampered gameplay. During the final shootout in the lodge, I stepped backwards and fell through the floor into a grey void, dying in the process. During the bum fight arena setpiece, two of them actually merged into one hilarious eight-limbed thrashing mutant hobo; and during the final boss fight, if the sub-enemies attack each other Dorland appears to freeze and becomes invincible, forcing you to reset.
 Fun for little Timmy and all his friends. April 15, 2008
peterkayisatwat (uk)
3 out of 11 found this review helpful
Poor little Timmy, he cries so if he can't get to play his computer games. I bought this game for him at the market. The nice man said it was fine for the under 5's. I very much adopt the hands off parenting approach, I can't understand these continual queries about age ratings and whether this game or that are suitable for youngsters. This is his favouritist game, he laughs so loud when he can control the 'naughty man' on the television screen. It keeps him occupied for hours and hours. He doesn't pay any attention to his pet anymore. Poor little mousey.
When he has his little friends from the playgroup round they are sometimes as quiet as little mousey, all busy as little bees making the 'naughty man' do his funny dance. Sometimes I hear screams and the sound of children weeping from Timmys' bedroom. I turn the tv up as I find the noise unpleasant and disturbing plus it interferes with Eastenders and Corrie. Little ones can be so demanding sometimes.
Poor little Timmy, his game is his only friend now, the others have stopped coming now since both sets of neighbours were clubbed to death in the alleyway behind our house, children are strange that way I guess.
I found poor mousey dead today, I don't know how he died but his face was all that was left in his cage. Old age I suppose, poor mouseys face looked frozen with fear, we are all scared of getting old I guess.
I am worried that little Timmy is missing too much school again, he is playing his nice game all night. He has not missed this much school since I bought him a pumpkin mask and kiddies film about halloween for his birthday. He watched it for days and days in his room. He only really stopped when those teenagers living upstairs were all mysteriously slain, at the end of October I think it was. Oh well I expect he will soon catch up with the others.
I think I have to go away for a while, there is too much unpleasantness here. I am a strong believer in responsible parenting so will leave out plenty of games and dvds Timmy likes to keep him entertained. I am going to a remote little hostel Timmy told me about in Eastern Europe. Little Timmy says he learnt it from the television and wants to go and live there. Such an intelligent boy, of course age ratings are pointless little Timmy.
fun fun fun April 4, 2008
the one sober(ish) scot (scotland)
2 out of 10 found this review helpful
this gamee is very very scary although if you have yet to complete the first one then it will all be greek to you.
so by condemned one then buy this yo will not regret it i promise
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