Title: The Saboteur

From: Electronic Arts

For: Xbox 360 (R18)

In EA’s The Saboteur you play as a tough-as-nails boozing Irish brawler in Nazi occupied France who joins the local resistance when his best friend is killed. The game has elements of Assassin’s Creed in that you can scale buildings and traverse the rooftops or blend in with the crowd so not to arouse suspicion. It also resembles Grand Theft Auto with the hijacking of vehicles, adult dialogue and content.

The look of The Saboteur is brilliant with its film-noir colouring with splashes of red to symbolise Nazi occupancy. When an area is liberated the colour comes back to realistic hues, which makes it easy to see where you have been.

The vehicle, climbing and shooting dynamics are all excellent, but there are many times where you’ll need your fists to fight your way out of a situation and this is where the game trips itself up. The hand to hand combat targeting is clumsy at best and proves a major frustration. This, along with some shoddy AI leaves me longing for what could have been one of the better games of last year.

Score 75%