Reviewed by: Drumbaby
Developer: SCEA
Publisher: SCEA

"3 - 2 - 1 - you're back in the room!" The catchphrase of the inneffectual hypnotist from UK sketch show 'Little Britain'. But like a bemused victim of successful hypnotism I've found myself powering down the PSP after a session of my latest game, snapping shut the Play Gear Pocket protective case, and being suddenly aware of my everyday surroundings, where previously I was Gabe Logan, covert operative extraordinaire based in some exotic war torn location. This game totally does away with peripheral vision concerns. The game in question is Sony's own Syphon Filter: Dark Mirror, and no matter how often I play it, I'm always left looking at the powered down PSP thinking 'how is so much game coming out of such a tiny little object?'

This is my first taste of the extremely popular Syphon Filter franchise, other than a bored trudge around a bland PS2 demo for the tepidly reviewed Syphon Filter: The Omega Strain. I'm not a big stealth fan, and my last 3rd person military style game was the excellent 'The Thing' on PS2...quite a long time ago really. If I'm honest I bought Syphon Filter to tide me over until the tardy Monster Hunter Freedom...but it turns out it's one of the best 'substitute game' purchase decisions I've ever made. And here's why....

You are Gabe Logan, elite covert operative working for The Agency. A bioweapon project called Dark Mirror becomes unearthed the moment it falls under the control of terrorist group Red Section. The project itself seems to have more of an 'official' stamp on it than it should, and so the classic scenario of a rogue agent fighting the very government who sanctions him rears its familiar head, while the need to find out exactly what Dark Mirror is keeps the story moving forward at a dizzying pace.

SFDM is broken down into seven chapters, each one divided into 4 or 5 acts. They place you in everchanging global locales, like Peru, Bosnia, and arctic landscapes, where chemical plants, UN buildings and mercenary shanty towns among others become your playgrounds. The game story is knitted together with a mixture of full blown CGI (of an incredibly high standard for any system) and game engine cut scenes.

Played in the 3rd person, except for when in sniper mode, you control Gabe (and occasionally his female partner in espionage Lian Xing) and use a mind boggling array of armaments and gadgetry to navigate your way through all manner of hazards. Gabe can crawl through vents, climb up ladders/ crates, snap to a surface while standing/ crouching in order to squeeze out a quick shot before popping back, fight in melee modes, sniper modes, neck breaking stealth modes, and can traverse long distances while dangling on RTLs (Rapid Traversal Lines) scattered around the place. He's as mobile and as nimble as any character from any similar genre piece on any system, and SCEA have made sure that the control choices are as plentiful as they are effective. In fact, after playing SF DM my excitement levels for other 3rd person action games for PSP have shot up. Where I previously worried about the lack of second analogue stick/ nub, SF DM has demonstrated that a game can still allow agile control, and acceptable camera, if the developers give the control scheme a little more thought. The only time I felt the controls were fiddly at all was when confronted by two enemies at once, with one in melee atack. Other than that though SCEA have pulled of a minor miracle. Let's hope that my excitement isn't dashed with the next 3rd person action game I buy for the system :)

Gabe's weapons vary from assault rifles (plus their silenced variants), shotguns, pistols (silenced too), rocket launchers, mines/ grenades/ knives, his bare hands, and my own personal favourite, the taser-like EDT. With this little gadget you can electrocute someone until they keel over, or continue zapping them until they turn into jolting screaming human torches. It's not pleasant, but it's bloody good fun! Each weapon has a distinct advantage/ disadvantage, giving the player plenty to enjoy in the way of strategy when approaching a new situation. My one gripe with them, especially in a game where its music soundtrack, voice overs, and ambient sounds are all of such an incredibly high standard, is that the guns all sound a little on the 'wimpy' side.

Gabe's other gadgets include a variety of vision modes for his goggles, including EDSU for detecting concealed electronics, IR for body heat, and NV for plain old green-out night vision. All modes are useful throughout the game, and many levels will punish you for becoming complacent in the use of one mode all the time. Mines can only be seen and disabled using EDSU, but that plunges you into darkness as far as the room's structure is concerned, even in light conditions. NV obviously helps you navigate in darker locations, but then you're blinded to the insidious mines. In both modes you're blind to environmental hazards like toxic chemical spills, which can only be seen with the naked eye. On a number of occasions I've picked my way carefully through a group of enemies, after disabling mines in EDSU vision mode then switching to normal vision...only to walk into a chemical spill on near zero health while hunting for more mines using EDSU. Doh! The net result is that, after the game steps up the variety of hazards per level as the learning curve increases, the maps become much more varied and immersive, and as with the weaponry choices, the player is given another fascinating set of problems to wrestle with.

Combat is always entertaining. Enemy A.I. is of the highest standard. They roll out of the way, time their reappearance in quasi-random intervals, they fall over, they limp away with a leg wound, and then have one last attempt at killing you, and they even flank you in the more open ended levels. They can use RTLs, climb ladders, use crates (both for cover and for parapets) and they bark orders at each other with enough phrase variation to make it feel pretty damn real. If you're sniping they move quickly, and to new locations each time. Starting a map afresh after being killed will often result in new enemy attack patterns, whch means it hardly ever turns into a duck shoot. Enemies will cover each other, so if you concentrate on an easy target you'll be hammered by his sniping buddy. Enemies that are knocked to the floor with a melee attack get back up while their compatriots continue a ranged assault, and then have another go. It's some of the most convincing A.I. I've encountered for a long time, and makes replaying levels an absolute blast. The combat system rewards the stealthy, but also allows you to go a bit Rambo from time to time...but obviously at price. Thankfully though the 'you've been spotted, try again you pillock' message is absent from firefights.

The gameplay is always kept fresh, with mission briefs ranging from stealthy seek and destroy runs, timed NPC hostage rescues, fixed placement machine gun/ sniping segements where you provide covering fire, and even babysitting unarmed NPCs as you take them to various gadgets requiring their expertise. One particularly cunning mission demonstrates the character A.I. where you guide a UN radio-ham through the darkness with your torch, and the only way he can walk through the hazards is if you shine the light in a realistic and considerate way. There are various levels of enemy class, including an increasingly more fearsome array of bosses, with the boss battles each having a unique flavour to them, rather than just 'shoot repeatedly while boss bar diminshes'.

Syphon Filter is a game aimed squarely at adults, with the odd use of the EFF word (never excessive, but always inkeeping with the stress inducing situation at the time) and a very non-cartoon feel to the violence. Even the aforementioned abuse of the taser is actually quite shocking (ahem) and this all adds to the constant feeling of iminent peril present in SF DM.

Is this game worth the 'big console' price tag? Most definitely yes. PSP to me is a brilliant system, but one that has been desperately trying to find its feet. There's been far too much in the way of PS2 games being clumsily shoe horned into its petite innards, and the less successful ports always beg the question :' Why play the mobile version when it costs just as much, and controls like pig?' Syphon Filter is part of a new wave of system-exclusive games that have been lovingly tailored to fit in with both the PSP's many strengths and also its limitations, and, befitting a portable gifted with the power of the PS2, has production values, and depth of gameplay, that is equal to (and in some cases superior to) many of the best titles found on the big consoles.

SF DM will be remembered as one of the titles that set the standard for PSP games. It's the perfect PSP game in so many ways. For a start, seeing as the PSP is a portable, it is a first rate pick-up-and-play game, ideal for playing in short bursts. You can have a quick five or ten minutes and reach a checkpoint after making some real progress. Even if you power down between check points, the PSP's 'sleep mode' function means that when you switch on again you're in the exact same spot. You can also play old missions again in 'challenge mode' trying to improve on old stats by finding more secrets, improving on completion time, or employing more skill in stealth/ markmanship. This only takes a few minutes of your time, and doesn't impact on the story mode at all. As a fully fledged story driven game, made exclusively for a system that has virtually the same horsepower as a PS2, it delivers on all fronts too. You can spend hours on making progress through the 7 chapters (or replaying old ones to improve stats of course!) with enough depth there to keep the experience as immersive as anything on the PSP's older bigger brother. It has a lengthy campaign of about 12 hours, plus all the replay value will net you numerous fully fleshed out bonus missions. It also has multiplayer (both ad hoc and infrastructure with leagues) for 4 vs 4 team DM. From what I've seen the online mode would suit Splinter Cell/ Counter Strike aficionados, and as a Quake DM fan I'd last about 5 seconds. Still, it's quite a nice inclusion on what is already a must-have package for anyone with a PSP who likes action games.

Oh, nearly forgot...The technical rubbish: The graphics are absolutely amazing, it has incredible presentation even down to the uber slick futuristic menus, and has sound on a par with most big budget Hollywood blockbusters. That is all. :)