We sit through a demonstration of a handful of new single-player levels, and then try our hand at the game's multiplayer.

Front Mission Evolved is the next chapter in the series, and as you probably know by now, the new game will be a third-person shooter--a change of pace from the hybrid strategy role-playing gameplay we've previously seen from the Front Mission games. You play as Dylan Ramsey, a young engineer and pilot of a wanzer--Front Mission's giant, gun-toting mechs. Over the course of the game, Ramsey gets embroiled in the war between the United Continental States, which the young robot jockey joins, and the mysterious Sword of Damocles (SOD) faction. Over the course of the game, Ramsey will not only unlock his potential as a pilot, but he will also discover the secret of "edge," a hidden wanzer power that, when fully charged, slows time and doubles Ramsey's damage output.

Our session included a hands-off demonstration of three single-player missions followed by a brief hands-on with the game's multiplayer. We'll cover the single-player missions first. Evolved offers a mission-based single-player adventure that chronicles Ramsey's journeys both in a wanzer and out of one (the game has a handful of on-foot missions that play like more of a conventional third-person shooter), though fortunately for the young soldier, more often than not, he'll be accompanied by one or more computer-controlled allies who will provide backup fire while you scramble out of harm's way to replenish your vehicle's shields. Wanzers have four primary body locations--shoulders, left arm, right arm, and legs (the first three can be mounted with separate weapons, the fourth helps determine your wanzer's armor and speed levels), and damaged body parts slowly recover from damage when you can duck into cover, similar to the way shields work in the Halo games.

You'll pilot a wanzer into battle in Front Mission Evolved's campaign, but you won't be alone.

The first mission we saw took place about three hours into the campaign, in and around Fort Monus, a tropical region and one of the game's five primary environments (which also include Antarctic, outer space, and futuristic New York in two different states--before and after the devatastion of war). In this first mission, Ramsey piloted an experimental "Zephyr" wanzer, equipped for fast speed with a machine gun in its right hand, melee attacks equipped in its left, and missile pods on its shoulders. This mission required him to weave in and out of enemy fire as he and his computer-controlled teammates Adela and Russell charged forward into a military installation where four decommissioned wanzers lay in wait.

In this mission, Ramsey took on several different kinds of enemy wanzers, including brawlers, which get up-close and personal, and ballistic wanzers, which are equipped with heavy-duty rocket launchers. Fortunately, Evolved gives you more than just your weapons to play with; your wanzer can not only perform a standard dashing attack, but it also has a constantly-recharging energy meter that lets you either jump (or hover in midair by tapping the jump button twice) or "skate" along the ground propelled by rockets. Also, Ramsey's wanzers are equipped with another meter for the aforementioned edge, which, when full, can be used to slow down time, highlighting enemy targets in red and doubling his damage.

After smashing through these foes, we skipped ahead to the next level--an on-foot mission that requires Ramsey to infiltrate the Fort Monus installation and reactivate the four hidden wanzers parked inside. On foot, Front Mission Evolved seems to play a lot like a standard third-person shooter, and handily lets you tuck and roll (useful for going from cover to cover) and acquire cover, from which you can blind-fire by poking your weapon above your head. The installation was guarded by shotgun troopers, who come barreling towards you to blast you at close range, and machinegun troopers, who take things more slowly and tend to take cover themselves. Luckily, on foot, Ramsey has a handful of grenades he can use to flush them out. Unluckily, his grenades don't work that well against actual wanzers, such as the one he has to battle in this mission. The tight confines of the warehouse-like installation gave this battle a claustrophobic feel, and since most of the cover in Front Mission Evolved can be destroyed, we had to stay moving in order to stay alive, lest our enemy just blast the walls and pillars we hid behind.

After sitting through the single-play session, we jumped into a team-based multiplayer match which resembled the domination modes of the Battlefield series. This map took place in downtown New York (all six of the game's multiplayer maps will be modified versions of locales from the single-player game) and had three giant turrets across it. Our team's mission was to capture and hold these turrets for as long as possible. As it turns out, capping a turret not only nets your team some victory points (multiplayer matches can be set to a 500-point or 1000-point limit), it also activates the turret to automatically attack the enemy team--which means that in order to recapture the point, your foes will have to blow up that turret, then recapture it by standing near the wreckage to recapture it and reactivate it.

In multiplayer, you either destroy or get destroyed.

While Evolved's multiplayer has arcade-style pickup items for extra ammo and armor (Edge mode isn't available in multiplayer), the pacing in a full 10-player match can get so frantic that you won't really have time to meticulously hunt them down. We headed into battle with a pre-loaded medium wanzer (you can take several preset wanzers based on those you'll find in the game, but can also have slots you can use to build up to five different custom robots with whichever weapons and equipment you prefer). Once the action converges on a turret, confrontation gets fast and furious as players open up with their machine guns and paint you with missile locks. In addition, if you don't have a weapon equipped in a free hand, you can perform a melee attack, and this deals huge damage if you can score a hit. On foot, wanzers move frustratingly slowly, so when it's go time, we tended to find ourselves either hitting the jumpjets to hover above our targets to lock in missile salvos, or skating around like mad trying to avoid enemy missiles while laying down our own fire or getting in close for a melee kill.

Front Mission Evolved will be released later this month for the PC, Xbox 360, and PS3, and the PC version will support 3D graphics by way of Nvidia's stereoscopic goggles.

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We team up and fight giant robots with our bare hands...and stack some colored blocks.

It's hard to miss the developers donning bright red firemen hats, located off to the side of one of the halls at the 2010 Penny Arcade Expo. Indie developer Firehose Games was busy recruiting people to jump in and play their upcoming PlayStation Network title, Slam Bolt Scrappers. Described as a combination of Super Smash Bros. and Puzzle Fighter, you and up to four friends can either team up and play through the campaign, or split off into teams of two and tackle each other.

Feel free to punch the opposing team for their blocks.

As a scapper, your job is to punch these colored creeps that come from the sky, which gives you colored blocks to stack on top of one another in order to create weapons. Slam Bolt Scrappers doesn't need much of a premise to get you engaged in some hectic gameplay. In the campaign, you play cooperatively with AI teammates or real people if you can gather them (no online play has been announced yet). There are various different levels but the objective remains largely the same. You must punch the flying grubs that come from the sky and they'll drop colored pieces that makes it feel like you're playing Puzzle Fighter. You're stacking the same colored blocks to create two by two squares or anything larger. The bigger the square, the more powerful the weapon.

You use the X and Square buttons to punch, and you can button mash as much as you like. The circle button drops the piece that you're carrying onto your tower and the triangle button lets you discard it. To rotate, you use the shoulder buttons. It starts to get crazy when you're busy hitting things (or other people) and you begin to forget your main goal, which is to build up those weapons.

Each color determines what kind of weapon you'll get. The game will automatically use that weapon once you've created the square. For example, if you can stack a two by two tower of red blocks, it'll fire off a missile at whatever it is that you're fighting. In our case, it was a giant robot. If you're playing in the competitive mode, you'll be firing at the opposing team, who is also furiously working to build their tower of destruction. You can always fly over and punch them to steal their blocks, but if you die, you're out of the game for awhile but you can press a series of buttons that appear to get yourself back into the game.

Slam Bolt Scrappers is a bright, colorful four-player action game where you pick one of several goofy characters with silly hats, that have the ability to fly all over the screen. There is drop in drop out play, so it's easy for friends to jump in and play with you. There's also a beverage mode, which allows you to play the game with one hand while holding a drink in the other. Be sure to check back on our site for a demo of the game. Slam Bolt Scrappers is currently set to be released early next year.

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Sony shows off its arcade style action game for PlayStation Network at PAX 2010.

Sony is showing off Eat Them!, a new PlayStation Network action game, at this year’s Penny Arcade Expo. The game is being developed by European developer Fluffylogic, who last worked on Savage Moon, and owes a bit to arcade classic Rampage as well as Sony’s own War of the Monsters. We had the chance to try out a very early version of the game which has a nice retro feel to it.

Eat Them! documents what happens when monsters go on a destructive tear in a city. At the moment that doesn’t involve anything too surprising for anyone who’s watched a Godzilla movie. Buildings are smashed, ant-sized people go running around screaming, the military tries to put a stop to things- you know, the usual. You’ll play as one of several monsters, each with their own unique attributes, who have to level everything around them within a time limit. Your arsenal of moves is almost exactly what you’d expect. You’ll be able to run, kick, and smash into the buildings around you to satisfying results. If the basics aren’t good enough for you, you can improvise by grabbing most anything and using it as a makeshift club. Your grab move can also be used to pick up the hysterical masses running at your feet which serve as tasty snacks that restore your health. Your arsenal of moves gets a technological boost courtesy of weapons bolted to your massive frame. While that all sounds well and good, Eat Them! offers the cool twist of a monster lab you can use to create your own unique critter of destruction. While the selection of monsters in the version of the game we played were fine, we have to say the option to create your very own freak of nature has a very special appeal- you can just never cram enough eyeballs on a misshapen head as far as we’re concerned.

We tried a brief sampling of missions in the game which are set in one of four themed environments that are laid out as pulpy 1950’s style comic books. The demo we played let us hop into the different books and choose a mission. We reckon the game will feature a linear progression that has you unlocking missions are you tear your way through the city. Your destructive stroll through the city conveniently yields cash that it appears you can use in the game’s shop to pick up some essentials. While we were only able to try single player in the version we played, Sony rep on hand noted that Eat Them! is set to include online multiplayer for four people which has the potential for a whole lot of fun.

Eat Them!’s presentation helps tie the comic theme together very nicely thanks to a clean cel shaded look. There’s some nice line work on the monsters that helps the unsettling details, such as teeth, eyes, tongues, piping and other parts of their anatomy, stand out. The city and industrial environments we had a look at were laid out tightly, offering plenty of opportunities for smashing and mayhem. The third person camera worked pretty well most of the time but required some minor adjustment when we were trying to line up some attacks on buildings or dealing with a helicopter.

Based on what we played, Eat Them! is funky little arcade-style title that looks very promising. There’s just something satisfying about running around destroying cities as a monster. The addition of custom monster creation, and online play to the classic ’smash everything’ formula makes Eat Them! a game that’s worth keeping a look out for when it releases on PlayStation Network this holiday. Look for more on Eat Them! in the coming months.

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