Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #19560 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: THQ
• Released on: 2003-06-27
• Platforms: Windows NT, Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows Me, Windows XP

Amazon.co.uk Review
If you enjoy fast cars, boats, mobile assault battle-armour, big guns and a bit of property destruction on the side, Red Faction II is the game for you. Set a few years after the first game but curiously failing to feature Parker, the hero from the original, Red Faction II casts you as Alias, a nanotech-enhanced soldier out to bring down the Soviet-style Commonwealth that has decided to blight the land in the way that evil dictatorships always seem to in video games.

The primary gimmick of the Red Faction games is the Geo-Mod (geometry modification) graphics engine, which allows you to destroy almost any wall, ceiling and floor in order to proceed or simply to just have a bit of a laugh. The biggest problem with the first game was its terrible loading times, which really interrupted the flow of the game, but that's been sorted out for this sequel, which also includes improvements to the previously Spartan multi-player modes.

As you'd expect, there are also lots of new vehicles to drive--including a very natty robotic power suit--plus tons more weapons and even a new Halo-style shield system. Admittedly none of this is terribly original, and the frame rate can stutter on occasion, but it's still lots of fun for red-blooded men and women. --David Jenkins

Customer Reviews

Impressive, but lacks Internet multiplayer!
If you liked the first Red Faction, this one is going to amaze you! The graphics have been heavily upgraded to an extremely high standard, the game play has been upgraded and new vehicles have been incorporated.
Single player: The story mode has one big problem: It is TOO short. The story mode is fast action; there is no time to stand around. You are Alias, one of a team of six nano-tech soldiers. The Dictator Sopot starts to fear his creations, thinking they will damage the commonwealth. So you become, from being a great Sopot loved nano-tech soldier, a low level rebel being hunted down by Sopot’s elite guards. Sopot destroys the majority of his creations, but your team is strongest of the ones left. Fight in amazing battle areas with amazingly powerful weapons and vehicles to destroy Sopot, and then fight through the twists and turns the story takes after that.
Bot matches: The bot matches have been greatly increased, covering for the shortness of the story mode. There are many games to play from:
Death Match/Team Death Match: Destroy everything you see in the death match, or work as a team to destroy the opposing team in the team death match. Every one respawns back in to these to matches, and the winner is decided by the most kills in a time limit, or the first to get to an amount of kills.
Capture The Flag: Work as a team to capture the opposition’s flag. Remember that you can only capture the flag if yours is safely at base.
Bag Man/Team Bag Man: Points are given for the amount of time you have the bag, and you win by getting to the point limit set. You can choose if you want to disarm the bag holders in a match or give them weapons, so that it is easier for them to retain the bag. Team bag man is the same, except you are working as a team to reach the limit.
Arena/Team Arena: This is set to a certain amount of rounds. Once you are dead, you cannot respawn until the next round, but you can observe the match. The winner of the round is the last player standing, and the overall winner is the one who wins the most rounds. You really look around when the players decrease, as you can tell there are only one or two left to kill. Team arena is the same, except it is the last team standing instead of the last person.
You can also create bots for your arena, giving them certain strengths and weaknesses. There is also another match type you can win from doing the story mode.
Here are the problems of the bot matches: Firstly, you can’t have unlimited time, the most you can have is an hour. Secondly, you can’t play over the Internet, which is a BIG blow to the game. Also, I think it would be nice if they created a bot match in which the players battled in the Battle Armour.
Vehicles and weapons: Vehicles can only be used in the story mode. There are four vehicles that can be used:
Gun Ship: Another person from your team will pilot the gun ship, and you get to be the gunner. The gun turret hangs from the bottom of the aircraft. You can fire a Gatling gun, or launch rockets. The rockets can be locked on to targets if you want. You can also zoom in slightly on targets, to get a better view.
Tank: Another person from your team will drive the tank. You get to use the turret on the top. Fire the mortar or the chain-gun to displace your enemies.
Battle Armour: The battle armour is a walking weapons platform. It is my favourite vehicle. You can choose between three weapons to fire at an enemy, or fire them all at the same time: there are two chain-guns, two missile ports and two incendiary grenade ports (incendiary grenades burn opponents!). Blast (or trample!) your way through the environment with this terror machine.
Submarine: The submarine is relatively slow moving, but is very useful for dodging torpedoes. It has two torpedo ports, to fire upon enemies, and destroy the environment around you.
New weapons include: Nanotech Individual Combat Weapon (N.I.C.W.), this is an assault rifle with a grenade launcher. Wide Area Saturation Projectile (W.A.S.P.), this fires five rockets at the same time, and has a handy homing device. The anti-personnel fires multiple bombs, sticky ones, or grenade like ones. The shotgun now has an alternate fire that fires incendiary (burning) shotgun shells. Also, the sniper rifle has an aiming arrow, which aims towards a target when you get scope view close to it (scope view is alternate fire). These are just some of the brilliant weapons that can be used to dispatch you opponents.
Sounds and environment: The game includes many new sounds, but most of the music is the same as in the previous game (personally, I like the music). The environment looks very real, especially the sewage water in one of the levels. There are loads of maps to play on the bot matches, so you are spoiled for choice.
Summary: The game is excellent, and I recommend it to anyone who likes total destruction in their games!

Red Faction 2
After playing the original Red Faction, I was eager to get my hands on this, but in the event it proved a big let down. Difficult to pin it down exactly why, it was just so ordinary, it lacked any kind of finesse, there was no atmosphere. The team mates you are stuck with are stupid and irrating, with very little meaningful interaction. The story is dull and totally unoriginal. The graphics are well - very ordinary (it refused to go into the higher res setttings on my machine and stubbornly stuck to its default settings. Even so it still slowed down terribly when special effects such as mist or rain were present). The missions seemed pointless, the dialogue is laughable (for all the wrong reasons) the eneny AI is pitiful. The fact is I very quickly got bored with this - it simply failed to grip, failed to inspire any excitement, there's nothing new here at all. If you've never played an FPS before it might be worth a spin, but only if you can get it at a bargain price - otherwise give this one miss.

Good Game
Red Faction II (PC CD)-A good game to play,but it took me a while to get into it. As you play make sure you read the book with the game,so you know what you are doing.