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The worlds of Hip hop and Video games have clashed once again this time spawning 50 cent’s Blood On The Sand. Based off the popular Unreal 3 engine the game lets you take control of 50 cent & the G-Unit on a quest through a war torn country in search of a diamond encrusted skull.

Will this be another bulletproof? or have Swordfish Studios made a decent third person shooter? Read on to find out.

Story

The game opens with 50 Cent and the G-Unit performing a show in a fictional middle eastern country, after the show finishes the Unit head to the back room to collect their payment and quickly discover the club manager Anwar’s doesn’t have the funds available to pay G-Unit for the show, this news doesn’t go down well with the unit, guns are drawn and threats are made. Anwar then reveals he has something else to offer in payment for the show this comes in the form of an ancient diamond encrusted skull, once Unit set eyes on the skull they are more than happy to take that as payment for the show because we know all rappers love that ice, right.

The game then moves onto another cut scene where the Unit are heading to the airport and discover they are being lead into an ambushed by the local slum lord leader Kamal. Explosions and gun fire ensue with the skull ending up in the hands of a woman named Ladia, this is where the introduction to the game ends and the action begins.

You begin the opening level searching the area for Ladia, this takes you through a maze of back alley streets and bombed out buildings loaded with Kamal’s soldiers, near the end of the level you meet up again with Anwar who informs you of a local gun runner named Raoul, He will be your way of obtaining new weapons, taunts & extra quicktime event moves during your journey through the game. The cut scene then ends and sets up the second levels objective which is to fight your way through the maze of alleys and streets to a meeting point with Raoul.

After you have met Raoul you begin the journey of hunting down the slum lord Kamal and your diamond encrusted skull, you visit various locations ranging from grubby backstreet’s, shot up shopping malls & hillside villages.

As you can guess there’s not much story to go on its mainly go from point a to point b usually with a large amount of enemy forces to kill in between, Swordfish Studios have tried to break up the monotony of this with a few vehicle levels but those levels seem like tacked on after thoughts.

Graphics

50 Cent: Blood On The Sand is powered by the Unreal 3 engine & has similar bulky look as other Unreal games, it also has some of the same problems most notable is the famous texture pop in after each area load, Gears Of War 1 or 2 players will know exactly what im talking about. As for the characters the main models looks detailed and accurate to there real life counter parts, the supporting cast of characters don’t look shabby either but you can tell they focused most of their attention on the four members of G-Unit.

The game environments are also nicely rendered i particularly like the lens flare & lighting effects on some of the levels, overall textures quality is fine too but if i was to nit pick i would say Swordfish Studios could have tried to get some of the enviromental textures (walls, and some debris) a little bit higher resolution.

Sound

This is where one of the best aspects of Blood On The Sand come into play (assuming your a fan of 50 cents music), The backing soundtrack is like a greatest hits compilation featuring a whole selection of 50 cents biggest selling hits, if that wasn’t enough there are also 18 brand new tracks created exclusively for the game. Should you ever tire of the vocal talents of 50 cent & the G-Unit Swordfish Studios have you covered too with an option to play through the entire game with an instrumental soundtrack created by Swiss Beats & 50 Cent.

There is not much else i can say about the other aspects of the audio score other than the vocal acting is on the level of a straight to dvd movie , the r-rated taunts are worth a laugh or two and the various other sound effects used in the game sound as you would expect them to.

Gameplay

Blood On the Sand borrows a few things from other popular games from past and present, there’s stuff like a Gears Of War inspired cover system and a throw back to the good old bullet time days we first saw in Max Payne this time with the new name “Gangsta Vision”. These borrowed features are well worked into the fabric of the game and help lift the game above the average arcade shooter.

Swordfish Studios have also tried to deepen the gameplay experience a little bit by introducing challenges throughout the game, these challenges feature things like kill 2 snipers in 20 seconds or collect a certain amount of money in a certain time. They are not very imaginative and you quickly tire of them after around the 10th time you kill a certain group of enemies within the time limit. I suggest you bare with them as they help increase your overall score and help you on your way to the platinum rating for that level.

As for collectables those are present too, they come in the form of posters and hidden targets, if you find enough of them you can unlock music videos,image stills and some extra music tracks to listen to during the game.

Now we move onto the best part of Blood On The Sand its the 2 player online co-op, this feature lets you and a friend play through the entire game as 50 cent and one of the members of the g-unit stable. Co-op is built around the drop-in, drop-out style of gameplay meaning you can jump into anyone’s game no matter where they are in the story, this is a great feature and makes the jump from single player to online a lot less intrusive.

Swordfish Studios have also allowed you to use any unlocked single player weapons during co-op. This addition can be really helpful when you are helping friends play through the game on the harder difficulty levels. All in all the co-op aspect of this game is really flawless i encountered no lag playing online and had no problem finding people’s games to hop into, EA should take note for the next army of two game

Verdict

If you can look past the questionable story line and just enjoy the game for what it is, a fast paced, high scoring, arcade shooter, you’ll probably find yourself having a lot of fun. Real 50 Cent fans will no doubt enjoy the various songs and music videos. Others will have to make do with the easy achievements and the fun that can be had in online co-op.

Written By James

Fight and you may die. Run, and you'll live... at least a while. And dying in your beds, many years from now, would you be willin' to trade ALL the days, from this day to that, for one chance, just one chance, to come back here and tell our enemies that they may take our lives, but they'll never take... OUR FREEDOM!

1. Gary A Swaby says:

   February 28, 2009 at 9:52 am

   great review man, I defiantly want to pick this one up. Hell u saw me rockin g-unit on the rant lol.

   Reply
2. wordup says:

   February 28, 2009 at 10:04 am

   cant wait to get my hands on this game. i’ll enjoy it more cuz im a 50 fan.

   Reply