As soon as I started playing Quantum of Solace I was immediately struck with how similar it was to the movies it was representing, those of course being Quantum of Solace as well as key points from Casino Royale. The game starts right where the Casino Royale movie ended and you are immediately thrown into a fire fight. Quantum of Solace is primarily a first person shooter, however, when you take cover it goes into a third person perspective and you can lean around corners to try and take out the advancing opposition. The enemy A.I. is very intelligent though. Never assume that just because you are behind cover that you are safe. The enemy can and will try to flank you so that they can get an easier shot at taking you out. There are times acting like a spy and trying to get through a level using stealth will make things a lot easier for you then if you went in guns blazing. Of course you can play this game any way you want, so if you just want to charge into a room and shoot everything in sight, you can. You will just have more enemies to deal with than if you used some stealth and quietly took out a couple of the guards.

The storyline of the game closely follows the storyline you will see in the movie. If you do not want any spoilers, I highly recommend you watch the movie before you play the game. With that being said, the game does fill in some blanks from the movie. At the end of Casino Royale it has Bond shooting White in the knee. At the beginning of Quantum of Solace they show Bond trying to get White to the MI6 Italian safe house. In the game you have to go through White’s thugs at his house before you can even worry about getting him to the safe house. Going through all of these missions Treyarch did do an incredible job of making you feel like Bond. Treyarch decided to include some of the biggest fights from the film in the game and included them as quicktime events. This goes a long way to making you feel like the bad ass that Bond is as it is very hard for you to screw it up. There is also a unique feature with your weapons that proved to be very useful. You can actually control the rate of fire on the majority of your weapons. By pressing up on the control pad you can decide what will happen once you pull the trigger. You can either have a single shot if you are trying to not alert the guards or you can put it on auto and have bullets spraying everywhere. You can also put silencers on your weapons to help take out enemies without alerting those around them. You have to be careful how you do it though. If you take out an enemy and a camera notices the downed enemy the alarm will go off no matter how quiet you are. It provides some good strategy later on in the game when you have to figure out how to quietly take someone out but then quickly disable the camera before it notices the fallen guard.

Movie based games don’t have the best reputation as they are usually rushed and released to the market before they are finished. For this game however, Treyarch worked closely with the movie studio and even visited the Bond set a few times to make sure the game had that feeling of authenticity. There are also some interesting mini games that you will encounter throughout your adventure. When you are walking over a beam you have to keep your character moving with the left joystick and balance with the right. If your guy leans to far in either direction you will fall. There is also a mini game when you are trying to get in a locked door which involves using the d-pad. In this game a light will flash on the screen in either the up, down, left or right position. You need to press whatever direction lights up, however it only stays lit up for a few moments so you need to be quick about hitting it. You can miss two times without anything happening but on the third strike you are out. Graphically this game is on the Call of Duty 4 engine so you know it looks good.

There are a few annoyances in the game however. One minor problem has to do with the cover mechanic in the game. There were certain instances where, for whatever reason, I couldn’t duck behind a piece of cover when I needed to. If I got taken out and had to replay that part, chances are I would be able to take cover without a problem. It seems that I wasn’t at the right angle or whatever to successfully take cover on those times. Now this didn’t happen a lot, but it was annoying nonetheless. Another annoyance with the game is the length. It seems to be only 5-6 hours long and that is if you play carefully and don’t just run around trying to shoot everything that moves. There was still quite a bit from the movies that they could have included in the game. The presentation of the game is fantastic, however, some of those things that they had as cinematics could have been some incredible missions. Going through the missions you will also find a bunch of explosive canisters. You will be able to immediately tell which ones are explosive as they will light up differently than the other canisters. Whether you like that or not is a matter of personal opinion. I found that it made it easier for me in some firefights but it does take a bit away from the whole immersive factor.

Of course there is multiplayer action in this title as well, featuring a variety of game types such as classic deathmatch, territory control, conflict & team conflict. There are also some special modes such as Bond Evasion. This particular mode pits you and some friends as either MI6 agents or agents of the organization. If you are an MI6 agent it is your job to help Bond escape, who is being played by one of your teammates. If you are playing as an agent of the organization it is your job to make sure Bond does not escape. It’s a pretty fun mode and can be a refreshing twist on the standard deathmatch formula. Then there is also the “Golden Gun” mode where one person starts out with the golden gun and everyone is trying to kill him. Whoever kills him, picks up the Golden Gun and is now the hunted. While the concept has been done before, it can still result in some pretty fun games. Overall Quantum of Solace is a lot of fun play. I had a great time going through the campaign and then playing online against/with my friends. If you enjoyed the movies Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace then I would definitely recommend giving this game a try.

Score: 8/10

Originally posted on Totally Gaming Network