Greg Hastings' Tournament Paintball Max'd (PlayStation 2)

GameSpot editors' review

• CNET editors' rating: 3.5 stars Very good
  Detailed editors' rating
  Overall score: 7.0 (3.5 stars)

• Reviewed by:
  Greg Mueller
• Reviewed on: 10/23/2006
• Released on: 09/26/2006
• Originally published on GameSpot: Greg Hastings' Tournament Paintball Max'd (PlayStation 2) Review

The Greg Hastings Tournament Paintball games from Activision have appeared on the Xbox, Nintendo DS, and even the Game Boy Advance, but for whatever reason the PlayStation 2 has been without a decent paintball game until now. However, because Greg Hastings Tournament Paintball Max'd on the PlayStation 2 is the same game that came out almost a full year prior on the Xbox, it feels dated. It doesn't help that by now the previous versions of the game cost much less than the PlayStation 2 version, despite their being practically identical. But if you haven't played any of the previous games, you'll find that Max'd offers an engaging and skillful game of paintball with good online play and plenty of authentic content.

As in the original game, Greg Hastings' Tournament Paintball Max'd lets you participate in the lightning-quick sport of tournament paintball. All of the matches are team-based, with three, five, or seven players on each team. The three game modes are elimination, single flag, and capture the flag. All three games play similarly, but they're scored differently. In elimination matches, the objective is to just shoot all the players on the opposing team. That's basically the objective of the flag matches too, because the easiest way to grab a flag is to eliminate the opposing team first, so you can deliver the flag unopposed. In a single-flag match there's one flag in the middle of the course, and one start box on each end of the field. You score points by grabbing the flag and delivering it to the start box on the opposing team's side of the field. In capture the flag, you have to grab a flag from the opposing team's start box and bring it back to your own start box. The first team to secure a flag wins the round, and points are distributed based on how many eliminations and survivors your team had, as well as which team was the first to grab the flag and which was the one to secure it. In the flag match tournaments, both teams score points that add up from round to round, and the team with the most points at the end of a set number of rounds is the winner.

The rules are simple and easy to pick up, even if you've never had any exposure to paintball beyond early-morning showings of Gotcha! on cable. The focus of tournament paintball isn't on rules (you can often blatantly cheat by wiping off the paint when you get hit), but on quick moves and smart tactics. The courses are small and are filled with various low, medium, and tall structures to provide cover. Coincidentally, you have three different positions available: prone, crouched, and standing. You can also dive, jump, and sprint, which comes in handy when you have to take some evasive action (which you often will). In any given match, you basically run from cover to cover until you find an enemy, and then you just start blasting away with paint. The paintball guns--called "markers" by those who are in the know about such things--aren't particularly accurate, so the best tactic is to just send as many paintballs as possible at your target and hope that one or two of the balls hit their mark. You can run out of paintballs, but that rarely happens because most rounds don't last longer than 30 seconds, and it isn't irregular for a three-on-three round to end in less than 10 seconds.

As simple as it sounds, the game packs a lot of fun and intense action into these short, rapid-fire rounds. The challenge is in anticipating where your opponents will move and using a bit of smart teamwork to outfox them. One of the new features that makes coordinating your efforts on the field easier in Max'd is teammate control. You can aim your targeting reticule at any spot on the map and press the R3 button to tell your teammates to cover that area. By aiming at a teammate and hitting the button, you can get him or her to move up to the next nearest bunker. If you just want your team to attack, you can hold the R3 button for a couple of seconds. It works well, and you'll use these commands often; you'll rely a lot on your team to back you up, and if you don't communicate with them, they'll quickly get eliminated and you'll end up losing the round. Before each match, you can also assign routes to your teammates using the breakout manager. It works similar to how calling plays does in a traditional sports game, and a good breakout plan can mean the difference between victory and defeat.

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