Condemned: Criminal Origins was the unsung hero of the Xbox 360 launch lineup. While people flocked to EA's pitiful sports upgrades and Rare's wretched Perfect Dark Zero, Monolith's horror themed first person shooter lurked in the shadows. Condemned put players in the shoes of Ethan Thomas, an operative of the Special Crimes Unit (SCU), as he tracked down the serial killer-killer SKX. The game's thick atmosphere, many mysteries and brutal melee combat were unlike anything else on the Xbox 360. Condemned ended on a bizarre, ambiguous note, but fortunately it was successful enough to justify a sequel: Condemned 2: Bloodshot.

Condemned 2 begins about a year after the end of the first game where Ethan Thomas successfully caught the killer SKX. Unfortunately, the murderer chose to blow chunks of his brain all over the interior of Ethan's car boot, rather than face imprisonment. Plagued by nightmares and delusions, Thomas left SCU, becoming a homeless alcoholic. After having a hallucination regarding Malcolm Van Horn (SKX's uncle), Ethan is pulled out of the gutter by SCU to unofficially investigate the continued menace threatening Metro City. The city's people are still going nuts, turning into bums and fighting each other, birds are still killing themselves, cats and dogs are living together...you get the idea. Unfortunately, the story takes a turn for the worse in the second half of the game, going from a mysterious, scary serial killer hunt to bizarre occult, sci-fi stuff – a real letdown. Where the original game left many things unexplained to make them scarier, Condemned 2 explains everything in black and white, losing the majority of the atmosphere, which was the first game's greatest asset.

Ethan Thomas - the man, the mystery, the homeless alcoholic!

The first thing players are going to notice when they boot up Condemned 2 is that the game received a pretty hefty visual upgrade. Condemned may have been a launch title, but it was no slouch – Condemned 2 adds more facial detail, cleans up the player models, and jacks up the quality of the textures and environments. In some respects, Condemned 2 still may not be as pretty as other titles on the market, but the game's use of lighting and ambient noise creates an atmosphere that more than makes up for any technological shortcomings. Throw in a solid soundtrack and quality voice acting, and you've got a game that delivers a pretty high quality cinematic presentation.

Much of your time spent in Condemned 2 will involve walking through dark rooms fighting deranged hobos with an assortment of household objects. Weapons range from fairly standard things like pipes and crowbars, to less common items like toilet seats and deer antlers. If you can't find a weapon (which is rare), you can always pummel your opponent with your fists, and give him a good kick when he's on the ground. Environmental kills are a new part of the melee system; after wearing an enemy down, you can take them in a choke hold and drag them over to an object and ram their head through it. The melee combat is just about as good as it was in the first game, though the impact of your attacks is not quite as brutal, and the ease with which weapons break is quite frustrating. Monolith have put a lot of effort into adding a more effective defence system for melee combat; instead of requiring exact timing to block attacks, players can now just hold both triggers to block at all times. Blocking the old fashioned way now acts as a parry manoeuvre, forcing your opponent back and opening them up for an attack.

Defensive play isn't the only aspect of melee fighting to have received a boost; a few new offensive abilities have been added as well. Changing up between left and right attacks, throwing the odd kick in, or leading with parries will trigger a combo meter to appear – get an attack in while that meter is on screen without getting hit yourself and you'll receive a significant damage bonus. In many situations, Ethan is outnumbered, so pulling off a combo is out of the question. At these times, it's best to use a chain attack. Chain attacks are executed when your rage meter is filled; simply pull either trigger twice and follow the on screen button prompts to unleash a ferocious attack on your enemy. The majority of the time, a chain attack will dispose of your foe, though if it does not, he will be in bad shape, only needing another hit or two to go down. As players progress through the game and perform chain attacks, they will eventually gain extensions to the rage meter, allowing for more devastating moves.

Gun-based combat is greatly expanded in Condemned 2, which is both good and bad. On the good side, the guns are weighty, sound excellent and pack a real wallop. The bad thing is that guns and ammo are a little too easy to come by; the sheer power of weapons removes a lot of the game's challenge. Having so many gunplay sections really goes against the game's strength and main focus of melee combat, making Condemned 2 seem a bit weaker than it really is. It doesn't help that the bits that incorporate heavy amounts of gunplay also are the most poorly designed – Monolith sure have a thing for office buildings. Those who enjoy playing with guns should be satisfied with the game's 'FPS' mode, which is unlocked the first time players complete the story mode.

"I don't need him to talk. I just want his blood." - Gil Grissom, C.S.I.

One thing that many people chastised the original Condemned for were the investigative sections – the game forced you to use exactly the right tool, and wouldn't let you progress unless you found what you needed. While Condemned 2 cuts down on the number of forensic puzzles, they're done in a much better fashion. Ethan has access to his forensic tools such as UV light and IR Spectrometer at all times. Investigation puzzles are generally broken into smaller sections; for example, you'll have to identify the victim's sex, occupation, try to find an identity match and a cause of death. Other investigations will have you observing blood spatters and damage to the surrounding environment. Players are rated on their performance in these sections – getting the answer on your first try means getting a better rating at the end of the level.

The single player side of Condemned 2 is likely to take a maximum of eight hours. It's significantly easier than the original game; I managed to make it through the game on hard mode, with a gold medal on every level in a single day's play. There's a little bit of replay incentive in there – players are rated on their performance at the end of a level – a gold medal requires perfect answers on all forensic activities, destroying sound emitters, discovering TVs and Radios with reports on the Metro City crime wave, and hitting all of the on screen prompts. There are a few other distractions: the game can be replayed in 'FPS' mode, which increases the number of weapons and the availability of ammunition. The Bloodshot Fight Clubs allow players to take on an endless wave of enemies in one of five levels with weapons of their choosing. The game's achievements are fairly evenly split between single player and multiplayer, though the latter are much easier to get.

Condemned 2 has a selection of different multiplayer modes, with nine maps available. There are standard game types like Deathmatch and Team Deathmatch, but the other modes of play are far more interesting. The Bum Rush mode pits up to two SCU soldiers against up to six infinitely respawning Influenced players (the bums, basically). The Influenced players need to band together to take out the SCU soldiers. The problem is that they are super strong, and can take the Influenced out in one shot. Crime Scene once again involves teams being divided up between the Influenced and SCU, but this time the SCU must find and scan evidence boxes (containing a decapitated head) which the Influenced have hidden around the level, and must protect with their lives. I had a lot of fun with Condemned 2's multiplayer, much to my surprise – there are plenty of people playing the game, and it offers something a little different. Players should be advised that the game's latency can get a little hairy when more than four players get on a server.


Condemned 2: Bloodshot has a lot of major improvements over its predecessor; the expanded forensic investigations, improved melee combat, nifty multiplayer, and much better visuals and sound. On the other hand, the game's need to explain everything to players in black and white and the crazy plotline in the game's latter half and the crazy abilities that come with it, effectively kill the game's greatest asset – its atmosphere. Despite this misstep, Condemned 2 is still very much worth playing, especially for those looking for something a little different in their first person games.