Socom: special forces

16 cert, Sony, PS3 ****

You can't move these days for military-themed games, each vying to be the must-have shooter of the year. Socom: Special Forces,the latest, brings some PS Move features to squad-based gameplay.

You take on the role of Cullen Gray, leading a five- man squad fighting back against a revolutionary group in an unnamed Asian country. To defeat the rebels, you have to fight your way through levels, ordering air strikes on tanks and using your team’s best sniper skills.

As far as shooters go, Socomdoesn't do anything too revolutionary, outside of the use of motion controls. The Move controller takes some getting used to, until it becomes almost second nature to swing the controller in the direction you want to move. The satisfaction of hitting a difficult target is immense. If you prefer, you can still play with the regular controller, which is more precise and probably the better option for serious players.

Controlling your squad varies in effectiveness. While you can order them to perform certain tasks, the AI can also manage it for you. Your teammates can be a little too helpful at times and utterly useless at others. If you give them free reign, they will destroy all enemies and even heal each other. They aren’t as quick to heal you, however, so don’t count on them in a sticky situation. This changes depending on the difficulty setting, and it’s worth playing through on a few different settings.

You'll definitely have the time; at about six hours, Socomis disappointingly short, but it's not the only game to suffer from this.

The multiplayer is, as always, the reason you will keep coming back. Online, you get four game modes, including Bomb Squad, which sees you protect your bomb technician from enemies as he disarms devices around the level.