Section 8 has been on my radar since E3 when I saw the video showing the “burn in” spawns where you can choose anywhere to spawn on the map. My plan to play Section 8 was further confirmed when TimeGate announced that Section 8 would support 32 player matches on privately hosted dedicated servers.  So, you can literally host your own Section 8 room for you and your friends from your PC. As far as I know, there are not any other Xbox 360 games that support this.  The final push was the release of the Section 8 multiplayer demo that hit Xbox Live a couple weeks before the game launched.  The game’s multiplayer has a lot going on, and a lot of depth, so it really takes a few hours to start getting the hang of everything.

Before I start digging into the multiplayer I want to mention the single player campaign.  Frankly, is pretty terrible and short.  I completed it in less than 6 hours. Tha campaign only serves to give you a chance to try the different weapons and armor load outs.  The levels in the campaign are the same as in multiplayer but with a really generic story.  I found my AI teammates to be useless.  They would even occassionally kill me with friendly fire or run me over with a tank.  I started the campaign on Hard difficulty but after 4 missions had to switch to normal.  There is an escort mission that I tried probably 25 or 30 times that is impossible because of the lousy teammates.  The level is just not possible without your teammates helping you kill off some of the enemies but they would end up sitting back not doing anything.  Another issue I have with the campaign is the achievements.  There are some that require playing on Hard and completing objectives in very short time periods. I gave up on them after it took me over three times longer than the time needed for the achievement on a nearly perfect run of the missions.

Fortunately the multiplayer is great with a good squad who communicate. Without that you will die over and over because it requires a lot of teamwork to win. The multiplayer is not team deathmatch thought.  So, it is not just about killing the enemy, but completing objectives and using smart tactics.  You need 1000 points to win and each team’s objective is worth a certain number of points. However, stopping an enemy team from getting objective gives you 50% of its points and gives them none.  So you can very quickly hurt the other team’s score by stopping them from getting objectives all while boosting your team.  Stopping the enemy objectives requires timing and team work because objectives have a specific window of opportunity. If you can complete your objectives and stop the enemies at the same time then your team will be nearly guaranteed a victory.  Because of all of the objectives going on at once it takes a couple hours for most players to really start getting the hang of everything going on. Even with a really good squad to help me get off on the right foot I still did not really know what I was doing until after a couple hours of playing.  I am just now starting to feel like I am starting to scratch the surface of the depth of Section 8’s multiplayer.

Another big part of the depth of Section 8 is the customizable load outs.  You can choose any weapon, equipment, and abilities you want in any combination.  You can have 6 different combination saved as unique load outs.  The game gives you some by default but customizing them to fit your play style, your team, and your opponent is a big part of  Section 8’s multiplayer.

As much fun as the multiplayer it could really use a party system.  That way you could easily join matches with friends as a squad or team. Right now you basically have to find a server with room, join, and then invite your friends into it.  Or, join one of your friend’s match and hope there is a spot open on their team.

TimeGate has also done a great job with the online stat tracking. It is not as detailed as Halo 3 but still have a lot of info available.  It makes it really nice to see which Badges, Feats, and Achievements you are have. They also have Clan support in Section 8 which is really nice since very few Xbox 360 games have that type of support.

Section 8 is not for everyone, but if you are looking for a deep multiplayer game to play with a clan or group of friends it has a lot of depth.  Personally, I am enjoying it and would recommend people give it some time before they make their decision on if it is the right game for them or not.