Difficulty:

Just Right

Time Spent:

10 Hours or Less

The Bottom Line:

"Masterpiece"

The game kicks off with its protagonist, a blue-eyed American boy called Jason, being shown having the time off his life with his mates and his two brothers on holiday in an island paradise. In montage the player sees them doing shots, leaping into rock pools and skydiving.

The camera then pans back to show this montage is being shown on a camera phone that's being held by the group's captor, a twitchy, erudite psycho called Vaas Montenegro, who has a smile similar to that of a boa constrictor before it swallows its prey.

Vaas, by the way, is one of the best villains created in gaming in the last few years. Intelligent, charming and utterly insane, he's as likely to casually stab a helpless captive through the heart as he is to wax philosophical on the nature of madness.

Vaas heads up a colourful list of slavers, pirates, criminals, perverts and nutcases who Jason finds himself ranged against in his search for his friends, once he escapes Montenegro's clutches in the early stages of the game.

As Jason explores the tropical island environments, racking up an impressive number of corpses, he transforms from scared First World brat into an unhinged killing machine, tossing vestiges of his humanity to the four winds in his quest for alpha male supremacy. In short, he starts to resemble Vaas…