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I recently picked up Army of Two by EA.  I had really been pumped for it when it was first announced, but after some delays I was unsure.  If you don't know, the game is focused on co-op shooting.   You play as a pair of mercenaries who tackle missions throughout the world.

When I first got home with the game, my roommate was at happy hour.  I booted up Army of Two and started off on a solo campaign.  The game was fun, but a bit annoying.  Shooting worked well, customizing weapons and armor was neat, and the levels were well designed and interesting.  The main issue I had was with the AI partner I was saddled with.  It's not that the AI is bad, it's just in the wrong game.  You see, Army of Two uses a system called Aggro.  Basically, it allows one player to draw attention from the other player by firing at enemies.  If the other player doesn't fire, the enemies become less aware of their presence and they can sneak around.  This is pretty key to gameplay.  It's hard to understand without an example, so here's one.  You are in Afghanistan trying to fight an enemy whose armor is weak on his back.  The best way to tackle this is to have one guy go into Aggro, drawing the enemies attention, while the other player sneaks up behind him for the kill.  However, plans like this are beyond the AI.  The AI partner would be fine if the game didn't have the aggro system, but in this game it doesn't work as well as one would like.  For instance, you and issue a command to the AI player to stay where he is in an aggresive manner.  One would assume that this means stop where you are, get behin cover, and fire.  However, after issuing this command, the guy will still move out of cover and get blasted to hell.

So, the single player is fun and playable, but it leaves a bit to be desired.  When my roommate got home we fired up co-op mode.  The co-op mode is a different story.  The co-op allows players to come up with various strategies for tackling the battlefield that are complex and interesting.  You feel like you really are not tied to one specific way of doing things.  Co-op is also good because both players don't have to be good at shooting.  I am a big shooter fan and am pretty descent at them, but my roommate is not.  However, in Army of Two, this work perfectly.  My roommate can sit behind cover, trying to pick people off and attracting aggro.  While he does this, I can start sneaking around and working on ways to finish the job.

I haven't yet tried the online modes, but with co-op being co much fun, online should be a blast.

The bottom line is this:  If you have a friend to play with, buy this game immediately.  If you don't, consider buying the game for the descent single player and the online co-op.  If you don't like lots of violence and adult situations, skip this one.

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