Red Faction II

The Faction Is Back!

• NA release: 1st April 2003
• EU release: 6th June 2003
• JP release: N/A
• Developer: Volition, Cranky Pants Games
• Publisher: THQ
• NGC Magazine Score: 66%
• Mods Used: Widescreen Code

I’ve played two Red Faction games before. In the original, you can use explosives to dig through the terrain anywhere you want. I’m Red Faction Guerrilla on the Xbox 360, you can destroy any building with the right equipment. So I was curious how the game in between them would stand. It doesn’t have the terrain deformation from the original and it doesn’t have the building destruction of its sequel.

Instead, a few rooms in the game have defensive structures that can be blown up. Which is rather strange when you think about it: the only stuff you blow up are the things which are supposed to be designed to withstand blasts. Red Faction 2 also drops the Mars setting, which makes this a much more generic shooter, and one with dodgy aiming.

The most unique aspect of Red Faction 2 is that it’s an explosives-heavy game that takes place in mostly small rooms. This means you will blow yourself up. A lot. Especially when you have allies with you that love to run in front of you as you fire a missile. The one saving grace is that your health packs are used automatically when you run out of health.

But other than the heavy use of explosives, it’s just a stereotypical shooter that is lacking the unique features the franchise is loved for.

Fine

Unfortunately, for all its attempts to bring new ideas to the table, Red Faction II still fails to make itself particularly worthy of attention. None of its core ideas, good though some are, are really explored well enough. The liner levels offer little in the way of exploration, and the Geo-Mod technology doesn’t add anything especially worthwhile to the game. All in all, something of an underachiever.

Geraint Evans, NGC Magazine #82

Remake or remaster?

It got a slight remaster on PS4.

Official Ways to get the game

The original Xbox version is available on the Xbox store and a slight remaster is available on the PlayStation store.

Europe

Japan

North America

GameCube Games by Date

2001: Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2002: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2003: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2004: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2005: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2006: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2007: Mar, Jun, Aug

first person gamecube Red Faction shooter THQ Volition