A lot of fun, easy to learn. tons of missions to do, and you can choose witch ones you want to do

• from

I was hesitant buying this game at first. Normally I get bored with open world games, but JC2's chaos system is so fun I'll play hours longer than I realize.

• from

Spent 27 hours and 15 mins to finish the main line mission (Agency missions) and it only show 24.43% completion! The most addictive game I played on PS3 so far. I have this game in my PS3 all the time since I have it. Highly recommended if you love GTA/ Uncharted 2/ Infamous.

Cons:

The combat system is not as refine as Uncharted 2. I wish it have the control and combat system of uncharted 2. When you are too close to the enemy you can't even shot at them.

Transition CG sucks. Store is mediocre, but who cares? Blowing up stuff is fun!

Some bugs. I stuck in the building couple of times.

Pros:

As someone said before, it is fun no matter you play it for 15 min or 3 hours. There are always some shorter mission, or you can just blow up building, gas station, radio station to earn points.

Huge map and very diverse environment: From desert, forest, financial district, snow mountain, military ports.

Very details. You can see individual flowers on the grounds.

• from

Just Cause 2 is simply a fantastic sandbox game, it's true the story and voice acting are a bit weak but at its heart the game mechanics are solid. This is the ultimate casual game, pop it in and be entertained whether you play for 30 minutes or 3 hours.

The graphics are quite good for a sandbox game, the world detail and size is impressive. The cut scenes however aren't that great and do run pretty choppy, but you shouldn't be playing this game for those anyhow.

If you love sandbox games then Just Cause 2 is easily worth the money and you'll get plenty of fun out of it. If sandboxes aren't your thing then this may be the game that shines a new light on them for you.

• from

This may not be the "best" game I've ever seen, but I have had more fun playing it than anything I can remember.

What this game lacks in storytelling it makes up for ten-fold in pure gameplay. It is one of those special games that you can never seem to quit: "Just one more time," you say, and before you know it three hours have passed. In that way it's like Sid Meier's Civilization games, if Sid Meier was on crack and stole a helicopter in mid-air.

The secret to the Just Cause 2's success is its lunacy. In this sandbox-style game, the story is a non-factor. The point is to roam around the 600 square mile map (yes, really) doing whatever the hell you want. Keen observers may have noticed the double entendre in the title. ("Why are you riding on the roof of a plane?" "Just cause.") The creators clearly knew what this game is about. You could play it for a month and never see half of everything the game has to offer.

The grappling hook and the parachute make this game stand out above others in the genre, such as GTA4. I am still discovering new ways to use these fantastic toys. Among other things, they allow you to fly, attach yourself to cars and helicopters, attach ENEMIES to cars and helicopters, or attach cars and helicopters to OTHER cars and helicopters. The possibilities are endless! If you want to show off your creativity, you can record and upload videos to your Youtube account from the pause menu. I'm very anxious to see what gets posted.

The moment I fell in love with this game occurred very early on. In the middle of a high speed chase down the freeway, I realized that I could use my grappling hook to tether my enemies' cars to nearby objects. One shot attaches the grappling hook to the enemy jeep, another shot attaches the other end of the cable to the side of the bridge, and presto! The tether sends the jeep flipping into the air off the side of the bridge. I was hooked. (no pun intended) And oh yeah, the graphics aren't half-bad either.

As with 99.99% of games (or anything else, I suppose), there are some flaws that keep it from being perfect. The first thing that comes to mind is the voice acting. Simply put, it is the worst voice acting I have ever heard. The actors are not helped by the campy plot and cheesy in-game dialogue. Whenever you blow up a radar communications tower, for example, the dim-witted player-character says, "Let's see you communicate now, punks." My personal favorite is when you destroy an oil pipeline: "Take that, you pipeline jerks!" These not-so-witty quips are delivered with a very strange accent, like a Mexican impersonating Christian Bale's Batman.

Speaking of ethnic groups, the portrayals of the island's Southeast Asian inhabitants are fairly racist. One guy in particular never completes a thought without using the words "la" and "serdadu" at least three times... each.

Some people might struggle with the controls at first, but after overcoming a relatively steep learning curve you should be fine and will even enjoy the control scheme.

Overall, I think this game is a must-have for any sandbox-genre junkie. One reviewer said it's like playing an action movie, and that seems like a fair assessment. If you like Grand Theft Auto 4, then you need this game.

• from

This game is huge and addicting. I debated a long time before deciding to give this game a try. I didn't want to spend the money because I thought I didn't like sandbox games after borrowing GTA4 and hating it. As of now, I have played for over 25 hours and I'm about 25% complete. The gameplay offers many different types of challenges and activities. Sometimes I just feel like doing a race, or exploring new areas of the map, or I'll take on some missions. I highly recommend this game!

• from

This game is incredibly versatile with a huge world map to explore and while I get frustrated with relentless re-spawning cops when I am trying to complete a task it can be fun when you want them to come nonstop! I'm not a huge fan of how easily you die and the relocating to nearest checkpoint instead of your last position, but the access to the black market certainly added a nice plus to this game. I would like to see more weaponry and a car the is a little easier to handle, but overall this is an extremely fun game!

• from

Man, how nice to be away from reality. IRS, Bills, Responsibilities, nasty politics and more are reality. I'll leave them behind and grapple to a heli, grapple the passenger to his falling death next with the pilot and then take it over and then blow the hell out of a thug-run criminal gas station with my heli's built in rockets, parachute down and then motorcycle to a drug king pen's villa and blow the snot out of him and his goons and its not even 6:00am in the morning yet. Am I a Marine? Nope, I don't command that respect but I play Just Cause 2. Been playing it for addictively for 16 hours now and not even 8% through the main game yet. Here is the original review - a few gripes after.

Well, I've never really enjoyed "sandbox" games. Tried GTA and just didn't get into it. Maybe I didn't try it long enough. But this game just got started and its an absolute blast and I think its just going to get even better. Watched many videos and read some reviews and watched one of the developers play and man this game is just plain insane fun! The diverse things you get to do and blow up are just amazing. Creating chaos and destroying cities to piss off the government! If only! Well, here we get to do it and the light story motivates you to kick some tail. The controls take time to get used to and are a bit difficult for older gamers like me, but its so much fun its worth it. Glitches??? I'm having way too much fun to even notice, nor do I give a .... Man, grappling to a huge heli, blowing it up OR taking it over then latching on to a building and 'chuting down, so many options. For less talented gamers such as myself, it does get a bit difficult with all of the controls and fast action though. I'll just have to keep practicing. As far as value for a game? I can't imagine how long and how many great hours you could put into this game. I think there are almost 400 locations to explore and infiltrate and I'm just getting started and thats not even mentioning the side missions which I haven't reached yet. Fun factor and replayability give this game 9.5 out of 10(haven't found a 10 yet) if you like to blow stuff up, shoot thugs, drive vehicles - planes, boats, helis, hummers and who knows what else.....this game is absolutely for you. If you pick apart games for reality, well give this one a pass. Once I get way further into it, I'll update this review.

Some gripes: Save points! I wish there was an option to go exactly back to the place where you died. It seems that the game sticks you back into an old conquest and you have to fly/ride/run back to the other place or "transport" from your black market contact to a previous conquest that is close by to where you want to be. Not sure why, but thats the way they did it. Maybe there is another way but I don't know it. The vehicles can be difficult at first, but after you get used to them they are a complete blast. This game is still one of the most fun games I have ever played and there is so much more. Its one of the first games the I want to complete each mission at 100% and that can be fairly time consuming. The heli's are so much fun. I don't know why the put the vehicle purchase option in the game when you can just steal and aquire them in the game. Maybe there is a reason, but I don't know it yet. I bought a couple but it was just a waste of cash when I crashed them and stole another. I'll stand by my 5 star and 9.5 out of 10 review, or ok, 9.25 out of 10. A complete consuming blast, and still I'm only a small way in the game.

• from

I loved the demo for this game but I have given up after about 7 hours of game play. For every positive a negative outweighs it. I really thought this would be the game that I would play for months. I just found that it was more frustrating that fun. I tried the game on multiple difficulty levels.

Positives:

Unbelievable 400 square mile map with the ability to go anywhere. Hop in a chopper and your off. Wow moments when flying and descending and realizing you can land and interact anywhere. Beautiful sunrise/sets coming up over the ocean.

I generally liked the gun play and the grappling hook is unique to games I've played although it seems the novelty would wear off quickly. I did find it annoying that the grappling hook seemed somewhat finicky. Putting the crosshairs on something you should be able to grapple onto often requires moving the character slightly to allow grappling.

Negatives:

Horrible checkpoints. Maybe I'm spoiled by Uncharted & COD. If I clear an area of enemies or perform a task I don't really want to do it again. (especially in a game that some say will take 50-100 hours to complete) Example - early in the game you have to pull a car out of ditch. Then you proceed to ride on the car and get in a gun fight (with amazing physics and ability to shoot out tires etc. - which was great) but if you die at any point not only do you start back before the enemies but you have to get on the tractor and pull the car out again.

Non mission checkpoints do not exist. However, you must create "chaos" by blowing up crap to unlock missions. If you die during this time you are sent back to a stronghold (which must load) which might be miles away from where you were. Then travel back in car/chopper or use extraction (which must load) to get back where you were. (5 minutes earlier) It would seem to me that the game could find a way to punish death without taking you somewhere that you have no desire to be and will only stay for a few moments. Maybe a death tax ala Borderlands would be better.

Load times: I understand that the map is huge and it probably requires a ton of resources. Problem 1 - if you die during a mission, every single time it goes to a menu screen, asks if you want to quit or continue from a checkpoint, then reloads the map. If I die, I want to be automatically be put back to the checkpoint and not have to select this every time.

I would honestly prefer a map system like Infamous that opens slowly to eventually give access to the entire map. It seemed a little overwhelming to tackle 400 sq miles at once.

Problem 2: For a brief cut scene there are multiple loads in between very short segments.

Cheesy voice acting/cut scenes in general. I have read some people say that they are cheesy on purpose which may be true but they aren't over the top enough to be funny. At least going in to the game I was prepared for the horrible banter. If I turned this game on without realizing the developers were trying to be corny I would have really thought these people were incompetent.

I do think the music achieved what the cut scenes were trying to do.

Ammo: It seemed like I ran out of ammo often. Black market allows you to buy new guns but no ammo.

Repetitive: To create "chaos" you basically blow up the exact same stuff at different locations. The same statue, fuel tanks, radio towers, more fuel tanks, generators, and propaganda trailers.

Black Market: You can call to get supplies etc. I had problems getting a proper location for black market to come to. In one instance I pointed at every open area I could find and it showed it should work but would not. After swimming into the middle of a river the bacon finally worked. Again spending 3 minutes on trying to call for an extraction is too frustrating on a 50 hour game.

Overall, even if this game was half its price I would not spend my gaming hours on this frustrating game. I give it a 2 star because I eventually found it unplayable. I do think a few simple fixes would make this game a lot of fun to play.

• from

If there is one word to describe this game, it is: HUGE! I mean there is so much to do in this game. I've played for about 4 hours and I have only completed 2% of the game-it is that big!

On this fictional country: "Panau", there are tons of hidden objects, easter eggs, vehicles, buildings to destroy, and side missions which some complain about being too repetitive. But I mean really, what sandbox game have you ever played in which the side missions were not too repetitive? You could probably find only a few if at best for most of them are highly repetitive! inFamous was probably the most repetitive game I've ever played and the graphics were not even that great! But tons of people love that game-I was so bored by it after 2 days! The variability in missions are fine in Just Cause 2 and there are a number of approaches you can take upon successfully beating them.

As for the the storyline and cutscenes, they remind me of the days of yore when you had those cheesy PSOne movies where the people look side to side when talking! But you know what, this was a perfect sacrifice. To make a world this big without any loading problems, glitches, or even screen tearing-you gotta cut production on those cutscenes-it only makes sense to do so. And besides, I have only been enthralled by only a few video game story lines and Uncharted 1 & 2 are two of those. So usually in my opinion, cut scenes or video game story lines are pointless. I'm all about do and less talk! The actual in-game graphics are outstanding. Trust me-do a sky dive from 2000ft at sunrise in the game and you will be blown away! There are such rich and full detail-its ridiculous! I mean, on a clear day you can see clearly into the bottom of the ocean! Yes! You can see fish, coral, sand ripples, sea shells, even underwater currents that sweep sand along!

The best part of this game would definitely be your trusty grappling hook attachment! I just love this! For those that have played it, it's not like "Batman: Vengence" for PS2 where you only have predetermined grappling points which I thought was kind of lame considering you were BATMAN! Anything that is a solid, you can attach to! Even the bottom floor of a lake! Coupled with the disposable and infinite stunt parachutes makes these great character accessories. It's also always great when you can tether the grappling hook to a moving enemy jeep onto the road and see it flip over with all it's passengers! Nice!

Now some people complain about the in game controls for vehicles and such. I'm not so sure why this is. For me, the controls were very easy to get used to! The cool thing (which I wish most games gave you the option!) is that you can select your trigger (R1 or R2, L1 or L2) preferences for weapon shooting. I prefer the R1 and L1. I never liked using R2 and L2 for shooting and I have always hated that change once PS3 came around. But again that's just me.

Anyway, one last great thing about this game and I am pretty certain that this is a PS3 exclusive, is that you can capture videos directly from the game and either upload to youtube or save as a video file on your PS3 hard drive. This comes in handy when you would like to document some easter egg locations for your friends or compare stunt manuevers/mission approaches.

This game is terrific! This game is so big/intense that I traded in 4 other games that I got bored with just to commit my time to do this one!

GET IT! GET IT NOW! ARRRGGHHHH!

• from

I love this game. If you like Mercenaries, GTA and Saints Row. You will love this game. You do not lose $$ unlike Mercenaries were you lose $$ for every time you kill a civilian. I am at 194 hrs + and 90.8% complete (in Mercenary mode).

• from

This review actually comes as a result of watching my son play this game. As a rule he gets bored quickly with games, of the many games that we have owned, this is one of the few games that he has played non-stop. Let me begin by saying the map is HUGE! I have seen large "sand box" style games, but this one takes the cake! I have seen several reviews where the word repetition was used. Not the case. The different areas of the map offer numerous environments and you go up against three criminal organizations so therefore interact with different characters. The amount of vehicles that you can operate is insane! I have not witnessed any frame-rate issues. However, when you have such a large game requiring so much memory it comes at a (slight)cost. As you have read before the dialogue is "cheesy"; like out of a bad "crime movie". But the rest of the game makes up for this this. Have fun playing this game...but let me give you some advice....don't wreck your jet in the middle of the ocean....takes forever to swim back to shore!

• from

Many gamers are familiar with the Grand Theft Auto video game series, which redefined the third person sandbox style of adventure games. However, very few games have made a successful attempt to challenge the game series for the best sandbox game. Just Cause 2 is the best game made in quite some time that makes a legitimate attempt to challenge the series. The first Just Cause game available on the Playstation 2 could be enough for some gamers to avoid Just Cause 2. If you played the first Just Cause game, then this is understandable. It proposed a very good idea for a video game, but was extremely repetitive and redundant in its gameplay. It almost felt like a test beta more than an actual video game. Rest assured Just Cause 2 breaks past this barrier.

The game provides far more abilities for the game character you play as, named Rico Rodriguez. The most notable one is the grappling hook attached to the character's arm. It allows you to grasp just about anything in the environment, whether it is the side of a mountain, a barrel on the side of the road, a vehicle passing by, or even other people. The hook also allows you to connect two things together, like an enemy guard to a vehicle (and you can drag him to his death if you choose), a barrel to a building, or a vehicle to a statue (and you can bring the statue down with the vehicle). This adds to the fun factor tremendously, as you can spend hours trying different hooking combinations for your entertainment. The ability to deploy his parachute whenever you want and as many times as you want is nothing new, but with the new abilities of the grappling hook, this becomes more enjoyable as well.

The game map is another impressive feature of the game. The map could be a reason why the grappling hook can attach to things like mountains and trees. The map is huge. At over 400 square miles, it is one of the largest maps ever put in a video game. The area is essentially a chain of islands surrounding one large piece of landmass. Mountains of all sizes can be found (yes, there are some ski resorts around the snow capped peaks), forest areas are also common, and there are a few desert areas as well. Use of the grappling hook and the parachute together makes for a useful way to get around the large map. Don't worry, there are still plenty of land, air, and sea vehicles you can use to get around as well.

As previously discussed, the missions of the game are where the first game really disappointed many gamers. Just Cause 2 addresses this issue. Some may feel that the redundancy factor still comes into play, but at least there is far more variety in the missions. You can take over various types of settlements instead of only one or two types. The side missions involve various activities instead of the same one or two. The number of storyline missions seemed to have decreased from the first game (even though you can now play them with increased difficulty), but the game developers were clearly looking to put exploring the game map as the primary reason to playing the game.

Exploring a given game map, allowing you to do whatever you want, and doing the missions when you feel like doing them is how Grand Theft Auto became popular to begin with and nobody has made a game quite up to its level. Just Cause 2 does a terrific job at challenging the "top dog" of the sandbox style of games.

• from

In my opinion its the best sand-box game ever created. In Just Cause 2 you play as agent Rico Rodriguez, your orders are to find and kill your trusted friend and mentor (From the first game) who has disappeared on the island paradise of Panau. The world of Panau is huge with 400 square miles of treacherous terrain with hundreds and hundreds of settlements from large cities with towering skyscrapers to secluded beaches and snow covered mountain peaks along with military fortress strong-holds and collectables to explore, find or destroy. I've been playing for 16 hours and have completed just 10%. The game developer Avalanche studios did an outstanding job making the game so much fun and giving us many, many reasons to explore the large open world.

Thats a gripe I've had with some open-world environments like in RedFaction guerrilla and Farcry 2 -The enviornments at times seemed barren with no reason to explore because there was nothing to search for and find. Just Cause 2 solves this with collectables, Armor and weapons parts hidden around the map. Every time I play the game theres something very cool to do like for example attaching enemies to moving vehicles or explosives.

The graphics are beautiful, and the game is amazing with how far I can see off in the distance its really breath taking to see the sunset in this game. The enemy AI is very good at presenting a challenge to the player, if your attacking a military base or settlement you must clear the area and get 100% chaos in that area to stop the enemy soldiers from respawning.

If you enjoy open world sand-box games that allow you the creative feedom to do whatever you want then you probably know that there are not very many to choose from and possibly even less with Mercenaries 2 developer Pandemic being shut down by evil EA - so who knows what will happen to that franchise, so I'm asking everyone show your support for Just Cause 2 by purchasing a copy or two (I purchased two copies of Just Cause 2, one for my PC and one for my PS3 ^^) because I really want there to be a

"Just Cause 3"

...If we don't show our support for sand-box games we'll be over run with linear first person shooter clones of Halo and the Call of Duty franchises > <

I highly recommend this game ^^

BUY IT!

• from

Open world action with amazing Vistas, crazy stunts and so many things to do, see and destroy.

This game takes the crown the best open world game I have ever played. You will see views in a game that you have never seen before and you can go everywhere.

I have played about 16-20 hours and am currently about 12% done with game (according to the in game stats and just over 20% in trophy progress.) They let you take weapons and vehicles where every you want. (if you have trouble taking out a little communication station just hijack or call in an helicopter and take the place to town).

Another item they have done very well is AI and challenge. If you create a lot of Chaos (the main in- game currency) by killing troops or blowing things up, the "Evil Island of Panau" Army forces will be bring bigger and tougher guys so that you will have to eventually run and hide. This insures there is still a challenge even after you upgrade weapons and master the grapple and para-swing techniques.

Performance with the new engine is truly breathtaking. You climb or fly up the top of a mountain and you look out the island and water below you with no hiccups or pop-in. Rockstar is schooled as Avalanche Studios are the new king of Open World games!

Heck even the Map is 3-D (it has elevation).

Fantastic 1-player game that I want to see more and more of.

I will purchase every piece of DLC they release to voice my financial support for this product.

Truly awesome... Every open world fan needs to purchase this game.

5 out of 5!!

• from