Click to enlarge I'm not going to sugar coat it: Red Steel 2 isn't a hardcore first-person shooter. In fact, it's not actually an FPS per se, unless you take the acronym to mean "First-Person Sword-er." What Ubisoft Paris has made here is an arcade-style game that most closely resembles a good old-fashioned hack-'n-slash side-scroller -- only viewed through the eyes of its protagonist.

There's some light exploration -- even some hidden areas and items to be found -- but Red Steel 2 is, at its heart, a brawler that relies heavily on combos, special moves and finishers. There's some shooting, but it plays only the slightest supporting role to the main attraction: Swinging the Wiimote around like a sword and looking cool (on-screen, at least) in a stylized, sci-fi western world.