It seems that right since the outset of the science fiction genre we've been fascinated with walking constructs, from robots to giant war machines. From this fascination a number of great Manga cartoons and computer games have emerged, which try to give you the experience of driving or controlling said robot war machine. However, with the restrictions of technology and the limitations of consoles it's been a pretty standard run of point and shoot games, with only the Mech Warrior and Mechassault series really standing out. That was until the original version of Steel Battalion came out on the Xbox, only playable with a 40 button controller. For the first time gamers were given the most immersing robot tank game ever to be played within the comfort of their living rooms. Steel Battalion: Line of Contact is the sequel to that first cult hit, utilising the original controller but this time designed specifically for Xbox Live play only.

The game is set on Ocean City Island in 2080, which has been the subject of much military incursion. Peace did come briefly but the occupying army in the shape of the Pacific Rim Forces have kept this peace through coercion, brutality and violence. As a result, the islanders have revolted and war has begun again, with both sides taking their unique walking war machines, called Vertical Tanks or VTs, to the battlefront. The story is really just a foil to progress the gameplay and comes into the proceedings in a very limited capacity. All you need to know really is that there are two opposing sides and it's up to you which one you join. I sided with the rebels, having always been fond of the underdog.

The first thing I should mention about this game is it comes at a price. The game itself is your usual £40 but if you haven't got the 40 button controller you're looking at another £120 at least and then there's your Xbox Live fees on top. So let's get this straight from the outset - this game is not for the casual gamer at all. This is a tough game to describe, being really one of a kind and probably the best way to explain the core gameplay (mowing down giant robots in your own giant robot) is taking you through the controller and what it does.

It's a bulky thing, the top part easily taking up the best part of a desktop and the bottom having three enormous pedals to be worked by your feet. When I say it's got 40 buttons, I'm not kidding either - there's a button or switch for everything, including a windscreen wiper! When you've gone through the Live team selection process (more about this later) you first have to start up your VT. This means pressing a button to close the cockpit, another to start the controlling mainframe, five flip switches to start the various balance adjusters, internal atmosphere processor and various other gizmos and finally the ignition switch to fire up the engine. In fact, at the start of every game it takes about 30 seconds to boot your VT up before you can even take a step. Initially this authenticity and attention to detail provides a bit of anticipation and excitement for the oncoming engagement, but it can pall a bit as time goes on. After all, you just want to shoot VTs!

Next you have to get your VT moving and find some other VTs to blast. For this you have a gear stick on your left and your brake and accelerator pedal below. Five gears are fun to work with and learn, until you realise you've actually got to worry about three different directions when you're on the move. First of all there's the direction of the VT itself, steered by pushing the left joystick left or right. You have to be careful though, because at high speeds if you turn too fast your giant robot will lose its balance and fall over, which is very embarrassing mid-battle, I can tell you. Next you have to worry about your camera view, which has a 180-degree view to your left and right, as well as good movement up and down. This is essential for watching the horizon for enemies and finding your way through and around various environmental obstacles. Finally you have to worry about the direction your guns are pointing, as they are guided independently of the view-screen direction, via the right joystick. This means the more adept players can keep an enemy VT pinned down with gunfire whilst still watching for incoming enemies or steering through cities, forests, hills and suchlike. When you fire your VT up for the first time this three directional aspect is a real brain bender and it's going to take several battles before you're even vaguely comfortable with it.

The remainder of the buttons control such things as weapon magazine changes, map controllers, toggles to switch stuff on and off on the dashboard, your communicator and of course the fabled windscreen wiper. As you can imagine, your VT is going to get pretty dusty and grimy in battle, which means your camera is too. A press of the windscreen wiper sprays and washes the camera viewfinder, which can be crucial when you're trying to locate an enemy robot firing mortars at you on the horizon. Equally important is the communicator dial, with which you can contact up to five other units in your battalion. Discussions with team members are essential for providing or asking for backup. Constantly reporting your position and what you can see is essential to the success of any mission, as your radar only shows the position of your pals and not the enemy. The map itself is can be toggled from the control panel, providing a zoom in and out function, as well as switching to other information type reports and gives you a pretty clear picture of where you are on any given battlefield. Last but not least you have an eject button.

The problem you're going to find with this set up is, unless you've gotten hold of the original single player only game and put in a few practice sessions, the button you'll be using most at first is eject! Your first ever games in Line of Contact are probably going to be against players much more experienced and adept at the game than yourself. This means that while you're struggling to just walk in a straight line, or turn round without toppling over, the opposition will be racing past you at a 100kmph, showering you with goodness knows what kind of artillery. This can lead to quite a bit of frustration unless you can find a friendly experienced player on your side that is prepared to take you under their wing and talk you through a lot of the issues. With a bit of guidance, a lot of practice and many hours of gameplay you are eventually going to get to grips with it and when your persistence and hard work leads to your first 'kill' the reward is a feeling of elation, victory and lots of supply points towards weapons and VTs.

This leads me nicely to another aspect of this game - the selection of your VT, the weapons, points earned and what you can do with them. The VTs all come at a price, though thankfully some of the smaller models can be bought for tuppence, meaning just participating in a mission, win or lose, should net you enough to keep you in war machines. However, you can earn more by helping your team win missions, destroying other VTs, occupying strategic points on some maps and not letting the VT you're in get destroyed. On the flip side, you can lose points by accidentally firing on your fellow soldiers or hitting buildings in areas controlled by yourself, so you have to be careful. As each turn (roughly lasting two weeks each) progresses you get the opportunity to buy more advanced VTs, moving from relatively weak first generation machines to second and third generation. Also you can adapt the weapons on each before you go into battle, though again you have to be careful as too many secondary weapons could mean an unbalanced VT, making you prone to falling over more. In this hangar you can customise your VTs to have a particular insignia or colour scheme, which I didn't really bother with as mine was too covered in grime and smoke for anyone to see it anyway. Also here you can use any of the special items you may have encountered in the battlefield or bought from pilots hanging around in the chat rooms. These items include extra armour, weaponry boosts, special tokens, awards and so on.

These items are tough to come by, so you often have to spend a lot of supply points if you want to trade but again you may come across an experienced player who wants to help you out. For example, my side is HSO, the rebel side and I was struggling with some of the VTs available to me. However, a friendly Pacific Rim Forces soldier took pity on me and sold me, quite cheaply, some Deciders. These are massive first generation robots only available to the Pacific Rim Forces and so much better than my lightly armed and armoured Vitzh. In fact, my first kill was scored in a Decider. Thankfully you don't have to spend much time hanging around the chat rooms to make acquaintances like this. Before every game you're in a lobby, waiting for other players to join, which can take some time if you're waiting on quite a few. This gives you a chance to chinwag with the other folk from around the world, trade stories, add them to your friends list and generally pick up tips, tricks, trades and other useful bits and bobs. I did initially find the long waits in these lobbies before each game frustrating until I realised their worth.

When you do make it into the game you're visually stunned from the outset, although this doesn't last for the entire game. First of all you have a remarkably realistic and quite daunting cockpit, with flashing lights, dials, warning signs, radar and so on. It does actually look like the inside of a very futuristic tank, lots of greys and greens, clear cut steel corners and loads of instruments, half of which I'm still trying to work out what they mean. It all looks very authentic. You only get a glimpse of the real outside world though, as your cockpit closes over you in a very clunky mechanical and realistic looking manner, before you boot the computer up and then view it through a grainy outside video camera. However, this grain and the blips you suffer through this method of sight whenever you're hit adds to the realism, as does the grit, rain and dust you get on the lens. When you use the windscreen wipers it reminds me of being in a car wash and is very well done.

Then there is the landscape itself, which isn't always that impressive. In fact, the single player game had better graphics, with more variety and a more photo realistic touch, but then the Xbox processor didn't have to contend with the uploading and downloading of data constantly as well. It could be that some detail was lost to make up for processing speed, or it could be a look the developers have gone for. Either way, buildings don't seem quite so detailed as perhaps they could, trees look a little like cardboard cut-outs and hills look just like big mud pies, with little rock or other geography to really break them up. That said, it more than serves it's purpose and while the graphics aren't necessarily the best you're going to see on the Xbox, they are certainly far from the worst.

You're reminded of this fact when you see an enemy VT come speeding across the plain right at you, a massive cloud of smoke billowing out behind it from the dust the mighty legs have thrown into the air. It's enough to strike fear into the bravest of hearts, as you watch several hundred tons of killer robot bearing down on you, guns blazing. Phew, I've broken into a cold sweat just thinking about it! One thing that has to be said is that the VTs in this game are wonderfully realised, and it makes me wonder if there aren't any real vertical tanks existing today that these bad boys were modelled after. The variety of design makes them instantly recognisable as they head by, with so many moving parts on the go. When my team all start at the same location in any battle I often hang back just to wonder at these metal behemoths stomp by.

And stomp they do, reverberating through your TV speakers and into your enormous controller. The sound effects are perhaps the greatest part of this game and come in a variety of formats. There's the whoosh of my jet propelled escape seat (which I still hear all to often), the thundering of VTs running by, the roar of rivers being parted in their wake and of course the incessant sound of a variety of different weapons fire. The whoosh of a shell whizzing past your ear certainly makes you jump. The crackle of electricity, exploding and short circuiting dashboards and the warning klaxons sounding as you suffer direct hits makes your adrenaline rush and your eyes bug out of your head, as you desperately try and seek a way through all the fog and dust. Besides all the environmental sounds you can also purchase a Boom Box to go in your cockpit. This allows you to play a variety of different tunes while you engage in metal mayhem. A lot of these tunes become available as the game progresses and a new one always seem to appear just as you're getting tired of the last classic.

Unfortunately, for all these great features, the game may not have much lasting appeal for some gamers, being frustrated by what initially feels like cumbersome controls and an extraordinarily steep learning curve. Many are going to be put off at the first hurdle and may well send the game and controller back within the week. They're much sought after now though, so those that do could make quite a bit of cash over what they originally spent. Those who persevere with the game are going to open up a wealth of exciting levels, friends, items and other little surprises. The hard work and dedication almost always pays off in some form or another, be it a new map to play as each turn progresses, some visual detail you didn't notice before, a new, exciting sound effect and so on. Where the game really pays off in the longevity stakes though is when you start running with the pack and really pulling your weight in each battle. When some comrades at arms start turning to you for suggestions, tactics and general advice you know you're finally making a difference and it feels great.

The problem with Steel Battalion: Line Of Contact is that the casual gamer is not going to enjoy it. The price of the controller is exorbitant, Xbox Live isn't going to be accessible to all and availability issues make it a hard game to find. Besides that, you've also got to consider how long you want to be sitting in a game lobby waiting for a full complement of players to turn up, how often you're prepared to be blasted to kingdom come before you start really enjoying the game and whether you want to learn the uses of over 40 buttons on the control panel. However, if you're into mechs, immersing war-games and co-operative online play you're really not going to find anything better than this. The fabulous in-cockpit and grainy camera view graphics are awesome and the sound is thundering if your TV has decent speakers and audio capabilities. The action is thick and fast and the camaraderie between you and your team mates is heartening. If you're prepared to pay the price and put in the time, this really is the closest you're going to get to driving your own Vertical Tank and all from the comfort of your own home.

Reviewed by Dave Wynn for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).