1-1: Shanghai Streets

1-1: Shanghai Streets

You start by picking the mode - Solo Campaign - and your character - I chose Tyson.  Next you decide the difficulty level you will play - Casual, Normal, and Contractor.  I went with Normal for the first play-through - if you plan to get most of the Achievements / Trophies you will be making two complete play-throughs of this game.

The game begins with you and your partner standing on Nanjing Road in Shanghai dressed in casual clothes - very casual, as in you do not have your gear with you.  This is a bit of a tutorial in which you will learn how to change the camera side, move, and all of the other commands that are good to know if you want to play the game. 

First radio collection

As you proceed down the street look to the left for a butcher shop - on a table outside is the first radio message (Radio 1 of 14) you need to collect - it looks like a radio and is pretty obvious.  You can listen to the logs you pick up from the pause menu - and you should since they fill you in on events in the city.

As you move further up the street you will run into your Contact - JB - the bloke you are supposed to meet - and he will lead you along a route that includes more commands for you to learn like jumping, crouching, and taking cover.  Your contact takes out a patrol, and then you learn that he is a past SSC Operative.

He delivers your gear to you, with apologies, and you kit up.  If you did the custom face mask do not panic when it doesn't appear in the CS - that is canned video, and once you get control of your character back you will be wearing the correct mask.

First beacons placed

Your first task is to place beacons - so turn on your GPS unit and follow the path on the ground to the nearby breakout boxes - you and your partner attach the beacons together there.  As you continue along the street JB does the gate opening duties for you - and when you reach the second gate he wants you to take out the pair of alarm boxes on the other side of the area.  Basically this is your aiming tut, so go ahead and do that, and then use your A-button to sprint - and you have now learned most of the basic commands!

On the elevator you will be informed that mobile weapons drop can now be called in as needed - if you played the first Army of Two game you already know about that - if not, you will learn about it soon.  The next thing that happens is you are instructed on how to do weapon customization - hold the Y-button and select Weapon Customization to do that - but it takes money to do this, and some of the weapons are not unlocked yet, so your options are pretty limited right now.

Your contact Alice lets you know that a new objective has been added but not precisely what it is - explaining that she needs to check on it and get back to you.  JB gives you a mini-tut on your mask tech, and you are instructed on how to tie an enemy up.  JB warns you that there will be enemies ahead, and mentions that the rest of the beacons need to be placed above.