Soldier of Fortune II: Double Helix - Gold Edition

This game rulezzz! 4ever! Jor1, HK2 :D

For a more detailed video review, check here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1DzUBfqXts Back in the day, this was a very solid game. It had way better level design than the first, it was way more grounded in reality, it had an ok story, satisfying gunplay, and exciting multiplayer if you had internet [which I didn't]. But nowadays it has its fair share of flaws it's harder to get over with. The story's execution is laughable at times, the fact that it takes itself so seriously only accentuates its issues. The gunplay is rather solid, but suffers from an acute case of "realistic gunplay means that recoil has to be impossible to control" philosophy, with random spray patterns added to the mix. The end result is frustrating, almost as if the developers wanted you to have fun but not TOO much. One very cool feature for 2002 was its random mission generator. It's extremely lackluster for today's standards, but I have fond memories of it since this was how I spent most of my time with the game due to no access to the internet and thus no multiplayer. It's an ok game. Not sure about its cost in this sense, but it's clearly the best in the series. Can be fun to play in the campaign, but beware the frustration of facing hitscan enemies who vary between "can't hit the broadside of the barn" and "aimbot engaged" for no discernible reason.

But the rest is a glorious super detailed gore fest about blowing everything in sight up. Once you get past the Jungle and to the mansion the game's design starts to shine.

SoF2 had great, realistic graphics at the time of release and still features some of the best gore in a videogame ever. This is a great game, if you're into hard, realistic action and firefights and like a darker tone in general. It was made with the Quake III-Engine, which had it's strenghts in displaying neat indoor- and urban areas. Therefore the rural parts did always look pretty bland. But the rest looks good, even today, except of the NPCs maybe. Yes, it's not a perfect game. Sometimes the AI behaves dumb, the stealth parts may also get annoying sometimes, but all in all i had a lot of fun with it. You'll get many levels to master. And since the game has tons of options for the user to set up, you can just adjust it to your liking. This includes such things as difficulty, how many times you will be able to save within a level, bullet inaccuracy on/off and on and on. You may also look for a singleplayer bonus level which is named "Assassination Routine" and can be downloaded for free.

Starts off okay-ish, and eventually develops into a mediocre to downright awful game with forced stealth sections leading to an instant failure the second an enemy notices you. On top comes an uninteresting story that focuses too much on exposition. Very disappointing overall, because I do enjoy the gunplay and how visceral it is, but it should have been a more focused game without any of the dreadful stealth segments.