M.A.G. or Massive Action Game, is sort of an anthem for shooter fans everywhere. Hell, it has Action right in the title. It basically ignores all the fluff that most shooters have and puts you right into the action, with a good 255 of your buddies. The idea is to put you into a realistic war situation, where every bullet fired, grenade hurled, and bomb dropped is a product of some real life human being’s actions. It’s all gameplay and no filler, and it is one of the first true online only experiences consoles have had to offer. The question is, is it a true revolution in online gaming, or, as one of my friends put it, is it an excuse for 255 people to yell obscenities and spout racism over a microphone.

In the future, global peace has been achieved … sort of. Countries have been forced to trim their militaries down to the bare essentials, just enough for border patrol. Not only that, but militaries cannot leave their nation’s borders, effectively creating a lockdown where no one country can attack any other. But we humans love a good war, because we need inspiration for new blockbuster movies and impetus to stop hippies from smoking pot in their mothers basements and start them smoking pot on protest lines. So to get around the pesky little problem of world peace, we hire private military corporations to do all our fighting for us. The big three Raven, SVER, and Valor are in a constant struggle for money and power, and M.A.G. allows you to play a part in that struggle yourself.

The story of M.A.G. is basically just a backdrop for all of the multiplayer action to take place in. At the beginning of the game you have to create a character who is a part of one of the 3 big PMCs. Each PMC has different weapons, items, and skills, but think carefully because you can’t change sides (until a very late level that is) or create multiple characters. The downside to this is frustration behind knowing what you aren’t getting. Very many players regret their PMC choice right out of the gate since you don’t get to take the PMCs for a test run, and you have no idea whether or not your faction’s specialized weapons, items, and abilities, mesh you’re your play style. The upside, well, since you are stuck with your side for the long haul, it certainly fosters a sense of team unity when you win.

There is no single player mode, and your tutorials are played out in 64 player multiplayer deathmatch games. As you gain levels you obviously unlock new weapons, items, and abilities, but more importantly you unlock new game types, such as Sabotage, which is basically a control point mode, and Suppression, which is an interesting type of capture the flag mode, except the flag is an enemy vehicle and you have to ride it out to transport choppers. The main game mode, and the only one to actually offer 256 player online play, is Domination, which is an attack/defense type mode that most interestingly has a lasting effect on M.A.G.’s meta game. Players each take potions on an absolutely huge map, filling out the ranks of eight player squads, four squad platoons, and four platoon companies. Higher level players get to take the role of officers, which have special active and passive abilities, and get to funnel orders down the ranks. Each platoon or squad has its own objectives, and these objectives change as the game goes on. You all have to work together to achieve victory, and each victory expands your PMCs territory on a persistent world map, once again giving your battles lasting effect, and giving you a sense of pride for your team.

As a shooter M.A.G. is very well thought out. Your play style is monitored and tracked by the computer, issuing you a class. Heal people and repair buildings, and you will be classified as field support. Spend time behind a scope, and you’ll be a sniper. There are plenty of other classed but they actually don’t do anything. They are just a handy label that helps you build your character from scratch. You can proceed down M.A.G.’s tech trees in any fashion you want, but different abilities, weapons, items, and other upgrades are labeled by the class that they help most, which generally does prevent you from wasting points on stuff you won’t end up using. Every upgrade is actually quite varied and weapons actually do feel different, so you do get a nice feeling of customization knowing that your soldier is yours alone with the abilities and weapons you are best with.

M.A.G. certainly has downsides too, however, and most of it lies in level selection. There are only three maps per game mode, one for each faction. If you are defending, you play on your map, and if you are attacking, you play on the enemies. Since the maps have territorial hazards such as turrets set up, they aren’t, in fact, balanced, as you would hope a persistent world game would be. Certain faction’s maps are hell on wheels while others are nothing more than a cakewalk. I won’t say which map is which in this review, because that feeds into M.A.G.’s other downfall, faction buffing. Since M.A.G. takes place in a world where the meta-game is persistent, new players will generally sign up with the faction that is winning. When you add this to the fundamental map imbalance, this causes the overall metagame to become unbalanced quickly, very quickly.

M.A.G. isn’t the most stunning game graphically, or musically, and there have been one or two graphical glitches around, ranging from dead bodies getting stuck in walls or corpses doing the spaz out dance when getting sniped. Still, it works, because you will most often be focused on the gameplay and nothing else. M.A.G. is basically a proof of concept game, including nothing more than what was promised from the outset. It is a 256 person shooter, no story, no fluff, no huge graphical advancements, just a good core gameplay system and lots of people to kill. It’s like the Wii Sports of the shooter world, simple, no frills, but very fun and innovative.

So is M.A.G. the next big thing for shooters? Honestly, I’m not sure. For now I’m having a load of fun with it, and I’m sure you will too. Somehow, by the grace of god, it isn’t hard to find 256 people to play a game with, so you’ll be playing this for a good long while. Whether or not M.A.G. withstands the test of time though, is another story. Modern Warfare 2 and Halo 3 are still huge, and M.A.G. honestly enough, is a bit of an indy game that the majority of the shooter fan base probably won’t take notice of. Also, its PS3 only, which seriously limits its exposure. It’s worth playing, and if its player base holds up, worth owning too, but its real worth will lie in the fact that it has proven that 256 player online games are possible to do, and has paved the way for other games to dip their feet into the massive action pool.

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