My first copy was definately a bad press. Loadtimes that stretched into minutes, famerate hiccups that made co-op nearly unplayable, and crashes...crashes...crashes. I wrote them off assuming my Xbox to be at fault, but regardless I wasn't loving the game even when it did work. The first couple episodes of Story mode were crapshoots, spastic run and gun affairs through lackluster environs. Online cruised at such a blistering pace that it made Quake feel sluggish. Mired in the bugs, I just assumed Doak et al. had completely lost touch.
But forget all that. This game really is fun! The campaign picks up tremendously in the Russian level. Charming, occasionnally hilarious, and filled with a variety of objectives that although never reach the tactful pseudo-freedom of a 007/PD mission, do make great use of the zany weaponry and settings. (The train sequence, most of the haunted house, and that Perfect Dark-esque security building all were awesome!) There was a new patch that seemed to have slowed online play a notch, more to the level that my eyes can process, and though the minigames are a hodgepodge of crap to fun, unlocking 150 of these characters is addictive.
Some issues remain. Auto-aim pretty much eliminates any chance of scoring head-shots, took me awhile to figure out that it exists and was defaulted to on. Explosive weaponry such as rockets, nades, and any other hugely gratifying killing instruments LACK any sort of splash damage. You pretty much hafta aim pixel-perfect here to get that lovely flying carcass effect. It is -really- frustrating tossing a couple 'nades into a cluttered group of monkeys and only one dies because the blast radius is so tinny. In fact there is also a HUGE discrepancy among the quality of weaponry here, much of the 30+ guns are more Klobb than RC-P90, making a noticeable imbalance in multiplayer matches. Finally, many of the online/DM maps are either WAY to big or too convoluted in maze-like corridors to be at all memorable or enjoyable for split-screen fragfests. Nothing here stands up to the best from yesteRARE. (The Mapmaker is a nice touch, but the few top-rated ones I tried out weren't all that)
Still, I can't stop playing this game...even Grandia 3 got tossed to the wayside this weekend. Co-op campaign is a blast(though -way- too easy on Hard mode).