Bayonetta.

The Winter Olympics are upon us, but take our word for it and skip the video-game version. Better to spend your time shooting angels or mercenaries, by yourself or with friends.

Vancouver 2010 (Sega; PS3, Xbox 360; rated everyone)
The official video game of the 2010 Olympics looks nice but lacks substance. It boasts 14 events, but because of the similarity of the controls there are really only four different games: skiing and snowboarding, jumping and aerials, speed skating, and sliding. Most events allow two to four players to compete, on the same console or on-line. The controls for all of the events are fairly simple, although at times they can be finicky and frustrating. Aerials is the most fun—it doesn’t become boring as quickly as the other events. The background environments for the game were modelled after Cypress, Whistler, and the other venues, but you’d be hard-pressed to tell. That said, the interface and animations are good, and there are some great lighting and speed-blur effects. The biggest drawback is the absence of the premier Winter Olympics sports: hockey, figure skating, even curling. We understand that those sports are too complex to be included in what amounts to a compilation of mini games. But it’s also why Vancouver 2010 is an also-ran.

Army of Two: The 40th Day (Electronic Arts; PS3, PSP, Xbox 360; rated mature)
Released in 2008, the first game in this shooter franchise was notable for being amusingly homoerotic. The game was designed to make two-player cooperation an integral part of playing, and it was hilarious to watch these muscle-bound mercenaries beg each other for help climbing a wall. In The 40th Day, Tyson Rios and Elliot Salem, veterans of the U.S. Army Rangers, find themselves in Shanghai as the city is attacked. It’s a fairly standard cover-and-fire shooter, plagued by some long load screens. New to the game is a morality mechanic, which takes the form of decisions that must be made by you and your partner. After making a decision, you watch the consequences play out in a short animation. The forced interaction of the players isn’t nearly as clumsy in this title, so it’s less annoying than its predecessor, but it’s not nearly interesting or different enough unless you’re looking to create some steamy slash fiction.

MAG (Sony; PS3; rated teen)
It’s a simple concept—a game in which players take sides in an armed conflict. What makes MAG astonishing is that up to 256 gamers can play in the same on-line session. “Massive Action Game”, indeed. A first-person shooter in which you can direct your own career to become, for example, a sniper or a commando, MAG is set on Earth in 2025. Three private military factions—which differ in ideology, equipment, and style—are fighting each other for control and contracts. There are four modes of combat. Suppression is a death-match equivalent, with the goal being to eliminate as many enemies as possible. Sabotage is like Capture the Flag, with teams trying to either obtain or protect intelligence. In Acquisition, the objective is to steal vehicles. Domination involves all 256 players trying to control a battlefield. With that many people playing at the same time, things can get more than a little chaotic. That’s why MAG has a system that allows more experienced players to progress up the ranks to become squad leaders, platoon leaders, and officers in charge. MAG really just does one thing: provide a deep multiplayer shooter experience. And it does that very well.

Bayonetta (Sega; PS3, Xbox 360; rated mature)
Bayonetta is an Umbra Witch, the last of her kind. She has extremely long, black hair that seems to have a life of its own, swirling and attacking her enemies. There are pistols built into the heels of her stilettos, allowing her to fire bullets while doing pirouettes. When she attacks the bizarre, gothic creatures, she does so accompanied by a graphic of a lipstick kiss. With a beauty mark on her cheek and cat’s-eye glasses, she’s a subversion of the fantasies of fanboys who lust after submissive female characters. Bayonetta will kill creatures by locking her long thighs around their heads and decapitating them. And as Bayonetta is unrestrained and hypersexualized, so is the video game directed by Hideki Kamiya, the creator of the Devil May Cry franchise. While Bayonetta is very similar to the Devil May Cry games, it is much easier to pick and play. You can get away with some button-mashing in the early going, and as you get the hang of the combos and learn to dodge as much as attack, you can execute some pretty nifty manoeuvres. The story, set on an alternate Earth, involves the long-standing struggle between Paradiso (heaven) and Inferno (hell). God and his angels aren’t exactly the good guys here, and the game’s currency, which you’ll use to purchase upgrades, consists of halos, a “spiritual metal containing the essence of an angel’s life force”. Bayonetta is loaded with incendiary themes and imagery, almost as if it was meant to court controversy. It also happens to be fun, intense, and hilarious. Give in to its extreme, over-the-top nature and you’ll revel in becoming an Umbra Witch.