With Gears of War hogging all of the Xbox 360's limelight and sucking away attention from many other deserving titles across the board (and too much at that if you ask me, as I don't find it nearly as award-worthy as everyone else seems to), Capcom's Lost Planet: Extreme Condition finds itself in somewhat of a tough spot. Being the first high profile release on the 360 to follow in Gears' wake of critical acclaim and sweeping retail success, it's inevitable that Lost Planet will be unjustly compared and critiqued by many based on their blinded love and affection for Epic's powerhouse of hype and graphical prowess, and thusly won't get near the credit it deserves for pushing the 360 to its limits. It doesn't stretch too far to innovate or revolutionize gaming in any particular way, which does cause for some feelings of disappointment when you play and see certain pieces of the puzzle left slightly underdeveloped, but Lost Planet ultimately proves that a game doesn't need to reinvent the wheel in order to be an outstanding product.

Set on the harsh, snow-covered and Akrid-infested planet of E.D.N III, Lost Planet presents an action-packed sci-fi narrative brushed with Capcom's typically successful East-meets-West stroke that appeals to both US and Japanese audiences. Wayne, a young amnesiac man (who is modeled after Korean actor Lee Byung-Hun) is found frozen in ice by a rag-tag band of snow pirates. Wayne takes the heroic center stage in Lost Planet's chilling story, with the only recollection of his past being the death of his father at the hands of a massive creature known as Green Eye. Upon recovering from his icy slumber, Wayne's only motive is to seek out Green Eye and avenge his father's untimely demise, but as expected a much more complex and convoluted plot unravels, as a sinister scheme to terraform the entire planet led by a mysterious corporation called NEVEC is uncovered, and of course Wayne's father turns out to have had some type of connection to what's going on. Unfortunately, whether it be the largely forgettable cast of characters or the generic, action movie-esque script, the story never really picks up enough steam to truly captivate, merely serving as mildly entertaining filler that holds the game together in between its stages of shooterific gameplay.

Through eleven missions and approximately ten hours of play, Lost Planet's main focus is action, action and more action, and boy does it ever deliver. Set in third person, the gameplay seamlessly fuses on-foot shootery goodness and high-powered mechanized warfare aboard weaponized robots called Vital Suits (VSs), enabling you to battle opposing snow pirates and the planet's Akrid race of insectoid aliens in multiple ways, all with a control and camera scheme that is spot-on. On foot you have a powerful arsenal of firearms at your disposal, including machine guns, shotguns, sniper rifles, plasma guns, missile launchers and various types of grenades, but while piloting VSs you have access to far more explosive weaponry like gatling guns, grenade launchers and laser rifles. Even sweeter, you can actually remove the larger weapons from a VS and use them by hand, although their heft slows you down quite a bit - and you can even swap VS weapon sets by exchanging them for new weapons found in the environments. There is also quite a variety of VSs to pilot throughout the game, each with a diversity of capabilities. Some can hover or perform long jumps, for example, while others can change into alternate forms, Transformers style.

Some subtle twists are littered throughout the game as well, providing a unique flavor to what is at heart a standard third-person action/adventure title. The health system, for example, works in an interesting fashion. Due to the freezing temperatures of the planet, humans require Thermal Energy (or T-Eng) to stay alive. As you navigate your way across the frigid landscape of E.D.N III, your T-Eng capacity gradually decreases, requiring you to hunt Akrid for the T-Eng globules they release upon death and activate checkpoint Data Posts scattered along the way, for surges of T-Eng supply. As long as you have T-Eng, your health regenerates thanks to the Harmonizer life support system attached to your right arm, but should you run out, your life begins to deplete and the damage taken from attacks will no longer heal itself.

Another cool mechanic involves your grappling hook, which in a way pays homage to another Capcom classic (and a personal all-time favorite of mine) in Bionic Commando from the NES. When falling from on top of a tall building, rock or other object, you automatically latch onto a nearby ledge, after which you can either dangle in mid air and blast away or rappel down to the ground below. The grappling hook's main function, however, is in ascending the epically scaled level designs that Capcom has created here - except for something like Grand Theft Auto or Oblivion, you won't find environments as organically designed or as humongous as those found in Lost Planet.

As gigantic as the environments are in scale, the stunning graphics and ear-saturating ambiance are indisputably the shining stars of this stellar title. The level of detail found here - encompassing the impressive textures, jaw-dropping particle effects, spectacular lighting and moderate degree of environmental destructibility - is simply astounding, bringing the frozen fields, volcanic caverns, mountainous canyons, deserted cities and dank Akrid nests you'll be exploring to life with unprecedented beauty and realism. I also can't say enough about how well Capcom did with the snow and lighting effects; as you trudge through waist-deep snow with even more pelting down, it's just amazing to watch how the snow realistically accumulates on Wayne's character model, or even how the sun glares off of the snow so realistically that at times you actually have to shield your eyes it's so bright! What's more, the ambient sound effects of the bitterly cold wind whipping and swirling in the air draw you into the game world as if you were really there, especially if hooked up to a surround-sound system.

The environments aren't the only massively scaled objects to be found either, as many of the Akrid species tower over Wayne as if he was an ant. Moth, scorpion, worm, mosquito and other bug-like monstrosities make up the Akrid race, and each type is as unnerving in appearance as it is terrifying in size. The boss creatures are most especially frightening, as they use their immense girth to shake the ground and send you stumbling off balance, unable to move until the earth settles. Having memorable enemies to do battle with only makes them that much more satisfying to take down, and with a slick effect that causes the Akrid to freeze in place and shatter into tiny pieces of ice upon dying, you won't soon get over just how breathtaking Lost Planet looks.

While all of the gameplay and presentational facets are sublime as is, there are a few areas that the developers needed to take further for Lost Planet to deliver a true next-generational gameplay experience. For one, the grappling hook, though fun to tool around with, isn't utilized nearly as much as it should've been. This is mostly due to the fact that the developers inserted invisible barriers to keep you from climbing certain objects or moving past certain areas, which sadly limits what free-form playability there might have been if the game allowed you to ascend any terrain piece or building in sight and open the huge environments up to more than one path choice of completion. Another annoyance stems from the fact that for some reason you can't jump and fire off the grappling hook at the same time. I can only imagine how cool it would have been to be able to jump, latch onto a ledge and swing through the air while firing away at enemies below - plus, it also would've provided more adventure and exploration sequences. Other smaller issues I came across, although not serious problems, were some shaky AI instances found in the human enemies and what is overall a fairly mediocre voice acting cast. I can also see some players being put off by the methodical pacing to the character movement speed, but personally it didn't bother me a bit.

Last but not least, I certainly can't forget to touch on the highly anticipated (and much downloaded in demo form over Xbox Live) online multiplayer suite, which absolutely packs an addictive punch. Although there are currently a few nagging imbalances regarding the weapon sets, spawning system and connection stability that hold it back from being a definitive must-have multiplayer game, the overall online experience is a blast. The maps are impressively laid out and riveting to compete in, the frame rate is lag free (although occasional disconnects do occur), a rewarding leveling system is in place and the main gameplay functions that make the single player so wonderful, like the health system, grappling hook, data post activation and combination of on-foot and mech-based combat, are all brought together online.

Supporting up to 16 players at once, matches come in four types, including typical deathmatch and team deathmatch variants known here as Elimination and Team Elimination respectively, a Post Grab mode in which the objective is to capture data posts on the map, and a Fugitive mode that places the match host in the role of a fugitive on his own to escape death, while every other player attempts to hunt him down. Finding matches is usually quick and painless, although certain aspects of the lobby system could be tightened up a bit more (Capcom has just announced they're releasing a game patch in March), and matches generally seem to go by quickly while packing in plenty of thrills to keep you hooked in for hours at a time. It probably won't make you forget about the top Xbox Live experiences around, but as an aside to the solo campaign, Lost Planet's online package certainly holds up its end of the bargain.

Lost Planet has impressed me as much as the best next-gen console games I've played up so far, and there haven't been very many to do that (especially on the 360) - so take that as high praise! There's a bit of untapped potential in certain areas, and the gameplay doesn't quite take that resounding next-gen leap forward that I'm still waiting for, but even with that being the case, I'm hard pressed to come up with any other 360 game that looks better or is as altogether riveting as the gameplay experience found in Lost Planet (well, except for Ghost Recon that is). Gears of War may be the consensus mainstream choice, but for my gaming dollar Lost Planet: Extreme Condition is as good as it gets on the Xbox 360 right now.

Reviewed by Matt Litten for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).