Milind Dixit

Way ahead of its time - the fact a 24 year old game still feels great to play is a testament to what Rare could do when they were at their best. My favourite feature is being able to control bots during multiplayer (or against other bots) - you can have two guarding you, or send one off to target a player, or position them how you want. There's no other game - other than Rainbow Six Vegas 1 and 2 - that let's you control an AI / bot team anywhere near like that.

Never thought I'd be playing this on an Xbox Series X in 2024. Despite the age, it doesn't feel too dated. The characters are pretty simple - most female characters are usually scantily-clad (as far as 2005 graphics can achieve anyway) except for...I think...one of them. The plot is fairly easy to follow though I haven't given too much thinking time to the time travel element of it. Gameplay is where this shines - it honestly doesn't feel that different to a modern FPS. Ok, you can't take cover or lean around corners but for basic gunplay it's still good. Guns have weight and sound decent, plus the fact there is a good range of futuristic + older weapons, with the modern ones sometimes having a secondary mode. But the best thing is how customisable you can be in 'Arcade' mode - controlling bots, changing rules, characters, guns etc. And it extends to other things - for example you can customise the control setup to mirror exactly how you want it. I'm used to Call of Duty setups - e.g. (on Xbox) - B to crouch, X to reload, left trigger to aim down sights (but only while holding it down) etc. Great throwback game - and especially that you can play it on the latest gen of console still. It's pretty great to see a loading screen appear for at max half a second before it drops you into the game. Makes playing it on harder difficulties more tolerable since I did die quite a lot.