Sony, Microsoft launching new consoles in 2014?

What we heard: If the rumor mill is to be believed, Nintendo will hold a dominant presence at this year's Electronic Entertainment Expo in June with the announcement of a successor to the 85 million-unit-selling Wii. Should that speculation prove accurate, Nintendo may be pleased to know that the rumor mill does not expect the publisher to be in competition with rivals Microsoft and Sony.
Kotaku reports today that it has heard from a variety of sources that neither Sony nor Microsoft plan to release a new console until 2014. "Both [Microsoft] and Sony are telegraphing to each other that they're delaying, to milk the current [generation] and fill in previous craters better," a source told the website.

The Xbox 360 and PS3 may be Microsoft and Sony's flagships for three more years.

A source also indicated to Kotaku that while 2014 is the target date for both companies, either could push the launch date forward to 2013 if they feel "pushed."
Of Microsoft's plans, the website claims that the publisher has yet to even decide the exact nature of its next console. According to Kotaku's source, Microsoft is still "wrestling with whether to be profitable on day one" for the next Xbox, similar to how Nintendo was said to have made money off of every Wii sold. Conversely, the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 were reportedly initially sold at a loss by Microsoft and Sony.
The official story: Neither Microsoft nor Sony had responded to requests for comment as of press time.
Bogus or not bogus: Considering the dearth of leaks concerning Microsoft and Sony's next consoles, it seems highly unlikely that either will pull a surprise announcement at this year's E3. Additionally, by Kotaku's sources' own admission, much remains in flux surrounding the companies' new consoles, so 2014 seems at this point to be not much more than a target.

Patapon 3 Review

The Good

• Delightful audio and visual presentation  
• Lengthy and varied campaign  
• More than 20 different playable Patapons  
• Loot, loot, and more loot  
• Impressive multiplayer options.

The Bad

• Pause option not available from outset  
• You can use gear rather than strategy to beat many levels  
• Leveling characters outside of your core team can be a chore.

If you're familiar with previous Patapon games, it might come as some surprise to you that in Patapon 3 you don't get to command an army. You're still a deity worshipped by the titular tribe, and you still get to issue the little guys orders by rhythmically tapping on sacred drums mapped to the PSP's face buttons, but the army has been turned to stone, so you have far fewer units at your disposal. All is not lost, though; not only have you been summoned into the body of a reincarnated hero, but there's so much emphasis on loot and leveling this time around that your small band grows more powerful practically every time you play. They can get so powerful, in fact, that where previous games have generally required careful strategizing to succeed, here it's often possible to forgo defensive and evasive moves in favor of an all-out offense. Still, there's plenty of challenge to be found in the colorful combat zones of Patapon 3, and even as you're decimated by a dragon or digested by a demon it's hard not to be won over by the game's quirky presentation and succumb to its just-one-more-try gameplay.

Mashing a button to escape a monster's jaws can be tricky when you're trying to keep a rhythm going.

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After picking one of three Patapon heroes to play as (would you prefer a bow, a spear, or a sword and shield combo?), four training missions do a good job of familiarizing you with most of the commands in your repertoire. There are only seven initially, including "onward," "attack," "defend," and the like. Each command is issued by hitting a different sequence of four drum beats in time with the music; you press circle, circle, square, circle to attack, for example. Those four beats compose one musical measure, and after you enter them it takes another measure for the Patapons to carry out your order. It's an unusual and satisfying way to command your forces as they march across the screen, and it's made less intimidating for newcomers by both a list of the correct inputs at the bottom of the screen and a flashing border that makes it easier to keep in time. String together a number of well-timed orders, and your units go into a fever that makes them significantly more powerful. Hit an unrecognized sequence of drums or miss the beat completely, and your troops just stand around looking confused. Patapon 3 is less punishing than its predecessors where the timing of your drum beats is concerned, but it also rewards you for perfectly timed beats by having them trigger your hero units' powerful special moves.
Although your chosen hero is accompanied on all missions by three other combat units, heroes are so powerful that it often feels like the other guys are just marching in the wake of your one-man army. This is certainly true early in your adventure, but as you unlock additional unit types and they gain access to more abilities and equipment, you definitely can't afford to ignore them. There are 21 unit types in Patapon 3, plus hero variants of all of them, and while it's possible to stick with the same team for extended periods of time, you inevitably encounter challenges that require a different approach. You might choose to replace a healer with an archer for a mission in which you're not taking a lot of damage, or replace all of your ranged units because their projectiles are falling short in an oncoming wind, for example. It's fun to experiment with different formations, and because leveling up units that you don't use regularly unlocks abilities that are shared with those you do (you can even change the direction of that wind), you handicap yourself if you stubbornly stick with your favorites. Unfortunately, leveling up units that you don't use regularly can be a chore if you leave it until late in the game to try to catch them up. Yes, you can give them high-level equipment, group them with your most powerful hero, and run them through missions that would normally be beyond them, but they still don't gain levels quickly.

Multiplayer bosses like this one can be taken down solo using leveled up units and the correct gear.

The occasional need to grind unit levels is at least acknowledged; missions that incorporate story events can't be replayed once you've beaten them, but typically upon beating said missions, you unlock one or two more in the same locale that can be replayed as much as you like. These missions even have descriptions that let you know whether they're particularly well suited for leveling or for collecting currency and crafting materials for use at the gear-upgrading blacksmith. Playing through most levels you also collect treasure chests that are dropped or even thrown at you by large enemies. You get to open treasure chests only upon completion of a level, but their coloring and a numeric value at least give you some indication of how good your loot is going to be when you pick them up. That's good to know when you're fighting your way through one of the new three- or five-floor dungeons, because at the end of each floor you have the option to either retreat to your hideout with your loot and start the dungeon over or proceed and risk losing it. Any loot that you don't think is worth keeping can be dismantled at your armory to gain more crafting materials and currency, though you shouldn't rush to get rid of any weapons and armor just because they're not immediately useful. Weaker items in your inventory might occasionally be needed for specific levels because they offer a resistance to or are highly likely to cause effects like burn, sleep, freeze, and poison.

Monster Tale Review

The Good

• Endearing setting and visual design  
• Well-tuned 2D action adventure gameplay  
• Fun monster-raising elements  
• Clever boss fights.

The Bad

• Too much backtracking  
• Not as many places to explore as in similarly styled games.

It's a difficult market out there for original game intellectual properties, especially those by smaller developers and publishers that don't get a big advertising push. So it's something of a small miracle that a game like Monster Tale even came to market--it's a 2D side-scrolling DS game from a startup developer, released around the same time as the 3DS launch, featuring an unfamiliar cast of characters and a cutesy visual style. But it's a miracle you should be thankful for, because Monster Tale is a delightful action adventure game that's bursting at the seams with charm.
Monster Tale puts you in the role of Ellie, a young girl who finds a strange bracelet and is transported to a new world filled with monsters. She also finds a mysterious egg from which a hungry little beast emerges, which she names Chomp. Ellie soon learns that she's not the only child to stumble into this world, but the other children have selfishly abused their power and status in the monster world to subjugate its citizens. As it turns out, it was prophesied that the wearer of Ellie's bracelet and the "legendary monster" at her side would save the world, and it's up to you to guide Ellie and Chomp to cut the other kids down to size.

A heartwarming tale of kids, their pet monsters, and epic boss smackdowns.

Monster Tale's progression resembles that of Metroid and many of the modern Castlevania games. You guide Ellie through a contiguous world. As she acquires new abilities and key items, she can return to various places to reach previously inaccessible areas or destroy once-impenetrable obstacles. Exploring and gradually unlocking and discovering new locales is a lot of fun, and each new region of Monster Tale's world brings with it new visuals, enemies, and gimmicks. The environments have a bright, cartoonlike charm to them that makes every new area you venture into interesting and distinct. Still, Monster Tale's exploration feels simplified, since there aren't as many secret areas and hidden goodies to sniff out and discover as you might expect.
But the mildly disappointing exploration aspect of Monster Tale is heavily overshadowed by the game's great monster-raising mechanics. Chomp can be shifted between the top and bottom screens of the DS. When he's on the top screen, he helps Ellie attack out-of-reach foes, clear away obstacles, and perform special attack and assistance skills as commanded. However, his health drains gradually, and he eventually needs to rest. When you send Chomp to the bottom screen, he is in his "monster sanctuary," recovering health and enjoying any monster toys and tasty snacks you may have collected. Chomp can't attack directly from the monster sanctuary unless an enemy infiltrates it, but some of the toys he plays with have effects on the action happening in the top screen. Finding and giving Chomp fun stuff raises his experience by various amounts, and as he gains levels, he eventually begins to morph into several different forms with differing traits. There are numerous "evolutionary trees" to explore, and each form is worth investing time in because special attacks and abilities learned in one form can be carried over to other forms, making Chomp an especially interesting and versatile companion.
Much of the fun comes from acquiring and fighting with new abilities you gradually learn, and as Monster Tale progresses, Ellie becomes one heck of a combat machine. She can eventually whack and juggle enemies in multi-hit combos, blast a rapid-fire series of painful power waves, and chain strikes and shots into varied attack patterns, among a myriad of other skills. It's enjoyable to find new and interesting ways to use both Ellie's and Chomp's attacks. They need all of these skills too, because there are lots of cute but deadly foes roaming the monster world, and some of them require specific methods to be defeated. The beasties aren't too tough to start with, but the going becomes considerably more difficult about two-thirds of the way through the game. The boss battles are especially fun and memorable, because you take on the other kids with their own oversized pet monsters and special attacks. These fights challenge you to use your learned skills and Chomp's assistance for both offense and defense, and they showcase just how well Monster Tale's mechanics come together. While experienced action fans shouldn't have too many problems adjusting to the fluctuating difficulty, the younger audience Monster Tale seems to be targeting might find it a bit frustrating.

Big bad beasties require equally big blows to beat.

Monster Tale isn't without a few flaws, though, and the biggest issue is the amount of time that you have to spend running to and fro across the map. There are no warp points in Monster Tale that aren't tied to a puzzle. If you have to get to a faraway area to pick up the next skill or fight the next boss, you have to travel on foot to get there every single time. As a result, you cover a lot of the same ground as you run from place to place, which gets a bit grating after a while. There are also some odd points where it's easy to get stuck. For example, in one area, there's a blockade that you can't remove with any of your skills. As it turns out, you need to grind for a bit of money and pay a nearby shopkeeper to help remove it, but the game never gives a strong hint that this is the solution to the puzzle. And, although it's a minor quibble, the way the game freezes the action to play a fanfare whenever Chomp gains a level can be annoying in a heated situation.
Despite its flaws, Monster Tale is a great little adventure. While it may seem like a disposable kiddie game at a quick cover glance, players who go beneath the surface will discover a fun, engaging action game with an endearin

Warhammer 40,000 Space Marine Hands-On Preview

The universe of Warhammer 40,000 wasn't the first to give us the Space Marine, but its particular brand of off-world warrior, the bulkily armoured 40K ubertrooper, is a hefty touchstone for the trope. Though the proliferation of the Space Marine in games has made the term itself all but generic, Games Workshop, the publisher of the original tabletop wargame, has the trademark on it. James McDermott, marketing manager at Relic Entertainment, also traces latter-day Space Marines such as Marcus Fenix and Master Chief back to their 40K roots. "They all have a lot of the same tones and emotional appeal that I think stems originally from Warhammer 40,000. [40K] Space Marines are the original archetypes."

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As maker of the Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War strategy games, Relic has plenty of experience with the gameworld, if not with third-person action shooters such as this one. But the studio is raring to bring the archetypal interstellar infantry to an up-close, not top-down, adventure. "Violent, visible death," is the phrase McDermott repeats in the presentation ahead of our hands-on: Relic's mantra for a burly, bloody, melee-heavy romp around in the world of 40K.
The game is set on a Forge World, a factory planet given over to war machine production. Our hulking hero, Captain Titus of the Ultramarines Chapter, is brought in to purge the planet when it is invaded by Orks--green-skinned, brutish hordes queuing up to meet Titus' chainsword (chainsaw sword), bolter (assault rifle), and grenades. The bolter pistol, plasma gun (with a single and charged shot), and grenade launcher also appeared in the demo; the latter launched five remotely detonated sticky grenades that could be triggered individually or en masse.
Space Marine is emphatically not a shooter with the odd edged-weapon execution. The combat system is a melee-shooter hybrid that is intended to balance gunplay with hack-and-slash action from the centre of a pack of baddies and allow quick switching between the two. We're also told melee isn't intended as a defensive last resort, as is sometimes the case, and it is powerful enough--and ammo seems scarce enough--to keep it from being so.
Titus swings his chainsword with a light or heavy attack, conjuring gore and severed limbs wherever it makes a kill. The light attack is fast and targets a single foe; the smallest enemies can be swatted into a bloody cloud with one such hit. The heavy attack is slow but strong, tearing through a number of targets. Though the chainsword is the only melee weapon we spent time with, the power axe and thunder hammer apparently featured later in the game. Kills fill up Titus' fury meter, which, when full, lets him perform a fury strike--a sweeping area-of-affect melee maneuver enacted in cinematic slow motion. Or he can perform ranged fury, which slows down time for more easily picking off targets when shooting.
Titus feels as weighty as he should, being a several-hundred-pound supersoldier; we're told having him "firmly planted in the world" was a focus for the feel of the controls. His momentum is tangible when he picks up speed--there's a convincing ramming sprint attack--and for the most part, the sense of weight is achieved without making him feel sluggish. That said, slower melee attacks leave Titus mightily cleaving thin air for perhaps a moment too long when they don't make contact. There's no cover system for you or your enemies, though there is a dodge move, and those enemies without ranged weapons close in fast. But even without a cover system, Gears of War comparisons are unavoidable and apt, which Relic acknowledges. McDermott says they take the "Gears of Warhammer" label "as a real compliment."
Our demo, which was composed of four segments from an eight-to-10-hour game, led us through a mix of environments on Forge World. We took in a factory complex, a destroyed city, and a desert canyon, where we met the game's second enemy faction, the forces of Chaos. This faction has been stage-managing the Ork invasion for its own ends. Described as the Sith to the Space Marine's Jedi Order, the Chaos forces include corrupted humans and demonic warriors. We encountered a psyker--a psychic, shamanic type, who summons red-skinned, teleporting bloodletter demons.

When you absolutely, positively got to kill every Ork in the room--accept no substitutes.

The factory levels were the most impressive in design, with a part sci-fi, part gothic, part industrial style. Attention to detail in the environment was most apparent here, with skulls adorning the walls and switches of the towering, cathedral-like factory chambers. But Titus' blue-and-gold power armour was the real design showpiece, painstakingly detailed and pleasingly larger than life.
The code we played for our preview was pre-alpha, with a smattering of obvious bugs that will be no doubt remedied. Time will tell whether other niggles will change before launch. Those aside, Space Marine might be an action adventure to do justice to the archetypal Space Marine. Keep an eye on the site for more on the game--and its so-far unseen multiplayer--ahead of the game's summer release.

Mario & Sonic sign up for London Olympic Games

Sega and Nintendo haven't won medals from critics with their Mario & Sonic at the Olympics mash-up series, but the two companies' respective mascots have seemingly transcended review scores when it comes to selling games. The series has thus far logged sales of more than 19 million units, after just two installments each for the Wii and DS.

Sonic has been known to throw the foot race events.

Today, the Japanese gaming giants announced the latest in their competitive sports-themed series, saying Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games will arrive for the 3DS and Wii. Nintendo and Sega said they plan to announce a launch date for the new title later this year. Though the past two installments in the series were released on the DS, Nintendo and Sega made no mention of this platform as part of today's announcement.
The Wii version of Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games will include a handful of new events this time out. Football (soccer for Americans) and equestrian horse-back riding will make their debut, and join a host of other Olympic sports on both the track and the field. The London locale will also be supplemented by "Dream" events that take place in a variety of environments from Mario and Sonic games.
Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games on the 3DS will feature more than 50 Olympic-themed events. As with the Wii edition, games will be playable in both single- and multiplayer modes.

Uncharted 3 Multiplayer Hands-On Preview

We've seen him avoid the flames of a burning French chateau and take on a shadowy group fronted by a woman brandishing an umbrella knife, but how well does Nathan Drake play with others? Naughty Dog has just taken the wraps off the multiplayer mode in Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception, and we were there to put the intrepid explorer and some of his friends through their paces.

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According to the game's developer, more than 2.7 million players have taken up arms to shoot friends and strangers online since multiplayer shipped with the second game in the series. Two elements are key to its continued success: bringing the spectacle of cinematic gameplay from the single-player campaign into the online mode and giving players the chance to customize the look and feel of their experience. To do this, gameplay is moving beyond simple team deathmatch (though that's getting plenty of love too) and its variants as it will focus more on objective-based matches. The studio hopes that by bringing the monkeylike climbing and scale of scripted campaign moments to multiplayer, Uncharted 3 will become the destination for PlayStation 3 owners online.
Two new modes--the often fan-requested Free for All mode and Three-Team Deathmatch--were announced at the event. The former gives everybody in the game a gun and birthright to blow away the competition; the latter offers a new buddy-based game type where you’re paired up with a friend or stranger and need to stick together to complete goals as a pair. Uncharted 3 represents a step toward more cooperative multiplayer, which we’ll get into in a moment.
Adding new modes doesn’t mean the old ones are getting the flick, and Deathmatch is set to receive a raft of improvements through the Power Play system. Essentially, it’s a battlefield event system designed to work like rubber banding in racing games; giving teams on the losing side a better chance to catch up. That’s not to say that whitewashes are out of the question, and good players will still be able to dominate their more skills-challenged counterparts. Matches with close score margins will now receive overtime at the end of a game, which means an additional minute of play has been added to stamp out deadlocks. Sudden Death goes even further and is tacked on after an overtime extension to regulation play; it limits players to a single respawn per team member, with the last man standing taking the prize. Late Join has also been added, and as the name suggests, it will now allow players to join matches already in progress. It’s a simple change and one that Naughty Dog hopes will keep games fuller and flowing better.
Taking a handful of pages out of the customization book, Uncharted 3 will let you tinker with your weapon loadout, as well as customize the look of your avatar by selecting and coloring individual items of clothing. It also includes a multilayered decal system that displays your logo on you and the environment. It sounds a bit like the custom sprays from Counter-Strike, but with fewer pictures of genitals. It’s not all purely cosmetic changes, though, with individual weapon mods able to be bought and applied that have tangible effects on your play by altering the munitions rate of fire and accuracy.
Boosters and kickbacks have been tweaked both for individual performances and co-op play, which can be bought in game using the cash earned during matches. Using them in play in turn levels them up, increasing their potency and unlocking additional functions like the ability to respawn instantly.
Killing enemies triggers a chance for them to drop treasure, which comes in the form of glowing items on the playfield that need to be collected for a reward. These disappear randomly, and it becomes a risk-versus-reward decision as to whether you stick out your neck to dash in and loot the item. Inside, there will be item sets to unlock and collect, as well as some treasures rewarding players with short- and longer-form objectives, such as making 30 kills in 15 minutes. Some begin instantly, while others will be triggered at your discretion. Completing these contracts earns you cash that you can then spend on pimping out your Drake.

Yellow sand or lush and green, take your pick.

Because Uncharted 3’s multiplayer modes are heavily geared around playing with friends, we’re impressed to see that some serious development time appears to have gone into the way it will integrate with social services and allow people to play together. Split-screen play will be supported and will also allow two different PlayStation Network IDs to be signed in on the same console at once to track each player's kills, deaths, and leveling progression. While UC2 put its eggs in the Twitter basket, UC3 is all about Facebook, allowing players to invite companions to their matches even if they’re not friends on the PlayStation Network.
Cinema mode has been expanded and now offers rewind functionality, as well as event marking for deaths and kills. This allows for simple upload of user-edited video clips and screenshots to either Facebook or YouTube while the Uncharted TV system will play clips from the community inside match lobbies. This is a little more exciting than twiddling your thumbs while you’re waiting for your next match.
We could go on for a while about the new features, but we’re guessing you probably want to know what it felt like to play. The demo included two levels: Chateau and Airstrip. Chateau was a rundown outdoor stone environment that was overgrown with vines, with nooks and crannies to crouch behind to return gunfire. Airstrip was where we spent the vast majority of our time, and we had a chance to play both sides of the faction coin. Set to a 20-minute timer, Airstrip opened with a sandy vista and a thick, black path that a cargo plane was running along. The good guys (multiple versions of Drake and Sully) began on board and needed to defend against waves of militia attempting to hijack the vehicle as the rear door slowly lowered. Though it initially seemed that the raised position and cover provided an advantage to holding their position, on subsequent plays as the other team, we found side doors that could be accessed and put us directly behind our opposition for quick executions.
As the plane became airborne, everybody jumped aboard the trucks in pursuit and the fight moved on to an airbase. Shipping containers provided excellent cover to peer out from behind, while climbing stairs or shimmying up onto raised platforms provided an elevated vantage (and shooting) point. A poorly armored machine-gun nest on one platform gave us the tools to mow down our opponents, but we found it easy to sit back and take pot shots with our assault rifles from a distance with good effect. Because you’re matched with a second player, you can either stick together or, less in the spirit of cooperative play, you can go it alone. Communication will be essential to success, but if you do manage to get separated during the barrage of gunfire and die, you can quickly spawn to your mate’s location by tapping the triangle button.
As matches continued, different Power Play modes were randomly introduced and helped give the gunplay some much needed variety. Marked Man was a VIP protection mode and rewarded players additional points and cash for either defending or killing the marked target. No Respawn meant that anybody who was killed in combat while active would stay dead until the end of the timer.
Melee combat felt like it might still be going through tuning, and almost every time we went toe-to-toe with someone on the opposing team, we would both knock each other out on the second melee strike.
From our first hands-on taste of Uncharted 3’s multiplayer mode, it’s already looking great and playing nicely. A move away from boring old vanilla team deathmatch is a welcome change, and we’re eager to see the developers deliver on sharing the set piece moments from the single-player campaign online with friends. PlayStation 3 Plus subscribers and those who pick up Infamous 2 will get early beta access from the end of June, whereas everyone else will be able to jump and swing with Drake from July 5. There's still plenty more to find out about Uncharted 3 ahead of its November release date, so stay tuned for more info on this exciting game.

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SOCOM 4: U.S. Navy SEALs Review

The Good

• Well-balanced squad command mechanic  
• Forty Five is a refreshingly authentic female soldier  
• Enjoyable cooperative mode  
• Soundtrack creates a sense of place and purpose  
• Weapon improvements are persistent across every mode.

The Bad

• Stealth action has some hitches  
• Intermittent network issues  
• Occasionally wonky AI.

Though it has a long history of bringing tactical third-person shooter action to Sony systems, the SOCOM series' debut on the PlayStation 3 failed to fully capture the excitement of its predecessors. Yet while SOCOM: Confrontation disappointed, SOCOM 4 delivers. The substantial campaign makes good use of setting and characters to create an engaging tour of duty in which squad tactics play a nicely balanced role. The online cooperative mode lets up to five players band together for stand-alone missions that can offer a serious challenge and engender a good sense of camaraderie. Those looking for competition will find plenty to like in the online multiplayer, where up to 32 players compete on large, well-designed maps in a variety of game types, including tense variants with the classic SOCOM rules that disallow respawning in the middle of a match. Both single- and multiplayer do have some issues, including imperfect stealth action, visual oddities, and intermittent network problems. Fortunately, these limitations don't spoil the fun, and SOCOM 4 makes it exciting to experience what each mode has to offer.

The squishy impact noise means you just scored a headshot. Nice work.

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The campaign plays out in Southeast Asia and centers on the Strait of Malacca, a major shipping channel. You and your two Marine squadmates fight your way through the tropical countryside and into larger towns as you hunt a militant revolutionary leader who is planning to cripple the vital waterway. Early in the campaign, you link up with two Korean NATO soldiers who join your team, forming a second two-person squad. The story is fairly standard, following a typical narrative where not everything is as it seems, and offers few intriguing twists. Your team is made up of three unremarkable characters and two main protagonists who generate most of the story's appeal. The first is the American Ops Commander: the story behind his single-minded focus on the mission is an interesting facet, and you're not always sure whether you want to be on his side. The second is First Lieutenant Park Yoon-Hee, aka Forty Five: a confident and capable ally who mirrors the hard-nosed stubbornness of her male peers without losing her female identity. During intense conflicts, she isn't afraid to let the expletives fly, and her sparing use of four-letter words adds immediacy to these exchanges without turning her into another foul-mouthed stereotype. She's charismatic and expressive, offering a grounded portrayal of a female officer that stands in sharp contrast to those in comparable games. In both cutscenes and gameplay, she stands out while fitting right in (down to the occasional cliche one-liner), and this authenticity livens up the otherwise generic plot.
These two characters also reflect the two different styles of play that you encounter in the campaign. As the Ops Comm, you can command both two-person squads as you make your way through each level. Your allies do a decent job of following you, taking cover when under fire, and shooting enemies. They do commit blunders, like walking in front of you or taking cover on the wrong side of an object, and while this can sometimes mess up your stealth plans, these navigation issues aren't a big impediment. Still, your squads aren't truly effective unless you are issuing orders. Sending them to cover positions can help you ambush an incoming patrol or quietly surround an encampment, and ordering them to advance in the heat of combat can help put your enemies on their heels. Orders are easily issued with the directional pad and are limited to "move there" and "shoot that guy." You can also create a plan of attack by queuing up orders, or scrap any orders you've given by telling your squads to fall in, bringing them into a loose group around your position.
Though you can get away with just having allies in tow during some sections, your enemies don't make it easy. They are great shots and advance aggressively when they feel they have the advantage. You have to pull your weight when it comes to fending them off, using a variety of assault rifles, shotguns, machine guns, submachine guns, and sniper rifles, as well as a few different types of grenades. Though your arsenal lacks the auditory impact of many other modern shooters, it gets the job done quite well. Furthermore, you level up your guns as you use them in any game mode (cooperative and competitive included), unlocking better sights, suppressors, and underbarrel attachments. Yet despite your battlefield skill, you aren't deadly enough to go it alone. You might be able to get away with some cavalier tactics in the early going, but it isn't long before leaving yourself exposed to enemy fire will send you back to a checkpoint in a hurry. These squad-based missions strike a good balance--they spur you to issue squad orders but don't require you to micromanage. Incorporating your team into your attack plan is empowering, and it's very satisfying to fight your way through the tough skirmishes and ambushes.

Forty Five does not appreciate your chauvinistic remarks.

The other style of campaign mission casts you as Forty Five. In these stealth missions, you must silently infiltrate and navigate enemy strongholds to gain intel and plant explosives. With two silenced weapons and the ability to stealth kill from behind, Forty Five must kill her enemies quietly or evade them silently. If one enemy raises the alarm, you fail the mission. Slinking through shadows and shrubbery provides some enjoyably tense moments, and finishing a mission cleanly is a satisfying feat. Unfortunately, there are some problems with the stealth action, including odd lighting that will occasionally show Forty Five in a virtual spotlight even though her stealth meter is pegged on "hidden." Getting a feel for exactly how silenced your silenced weapons are can also be tricky, and your ability to throw a shell casing and distract an enemy doesn't always work out the way it should. These issues can result in unwanted do-overs, but these sections are a nice change of pace, and the way they fit into the rest of the campaign is clever. After Forty Five infiltrates an area by night, you return during the daytime as the Ops Comm with a full fireteam. As you chart a new course through the environment, you recognize things from the night before, but the experience is refreshingly different. This gives the campaign a nice sense of continuity that helps build momentum throughout the eight or so hours it'll take you to complete it.