And, as I sit here waiting for inspiration to introduce the TimeSplitters: Future Perfect review, I think to myself, what if. What if there was such a game that made you laugh when you played the single player, made you cry when you lost at a super-hard challenge and made you rejoice at the sight of multiplayer. What if there was a first person shooter that could take away Halo 2's shine? This must be it; hell, if there's a game that fits the bill, it has to be Future Perfect. So, as nervous as I was, I put in the disc. Prepare to be impressed or prepare to be disappointed. There were two chances, and with those two chances comes two writers from two different time zones. Ladies and gents, say hello to Christopher Martin.

Thanks Dex, you're right that TimeSplitters certainly has the potential to steal away some of the Xbox market from Halo 2 and that's why we're here. Most say Free Radical dropped a bollock when they didn't include the once promised online play with TimeSplitters 2, so hopefully the online play here will make up for that (well, for PS2 and Xbox at least), but we'll get onto that a little later in the review. The original TimeSplitters titles were unique and hilarious, with that signature Free Radical cartoon style and animations; I think fans of the first two will be more than happy with how Future Perfect has progressed, wouldn't you say?

Absolutely Chris! I think free radical are renowned for their cartoon style, as even Second Sight had a touch of caricature that adds a little extra polish to an already shining title. Future Perfect improves on the last in many respects. The 150 playable characters look and sound a lot better, with plenty of animations for each of them, and that's a lot. The gameplay itself is fantastic fun; it's got a great arcade feel to it, the type where you stroll up to the machine, stick in a coin and start blasting your mates with clunky controllers, laughing at things that are truly over-the-top. Of course, it would be unfair to compare this to drunken friends and bad controls, because you can look at this arcade fun-a-minute title in many different ways. It's a fantastic first person shooter full of customisations, a great game to have on the multiplayer shelf and one that you can play alone to become totally immersed in the single player. Is that fair to say?

Certainly is! There's a ton of great single player elements in Future Perfect, however the main attraction is certainly the outstanding story mode. You once again play Cortez as he travels through time to stop the TimeSplitters... okay, the story may be a bit silly but I highly doubt anyone will be playing this for the story itself. Just the joy of going through the various time periods, using all the different types of weapons, is good enough for me. Throughout your adventures you'll come across wormholes where you actually meet up with your future self and help him out, only to progress through the level and eventually become that future self who is aided by what is now your past self! The blazing fast arcade style works great in the game (though the single player is a bit slowed down compared to the multiplayer) and the title is as smooth as ever, probably smoother than Halo 2 even.

Don't let Geoff hear you say that Chris!

Sometimes the truth hurts! As expected, the levels and places you visit vary drastically and despite the progressing time zones being a bit linear, each story level offers something completely new and fresh from the last one. Not only that, but they're absolutely loaded with great cinematics that progress the story, showcase some great action and will actually have you laughing your ass off on many occasions; I've never played a first person shooter that was as funny as this one. At first I hated Cortez, I thought he was corny and trying too hard, but then I realised that this is intentional and he almost pays homage to those great one-liner action heroes like Arnold. The game suddenly became even more funny and likeable. Care to inform our readers about the other single player modes Future Perfect offers, Dex?

If you enjoyed challenges from TimeSplitters 2 then you'll all be glad to know that Future Perfect gets a double new and improved scoop, full of frustrating joy. First up we have plenty of wild and absurd challenges that include ransacking a Chinese restaurant, throwing bricks at everything breakable in the level and playing basketball; throwing balls through hoops using the uplink to move objects almost telepathically, similar to Second Sight, is no easy task because players cannot jump! There's the usual frustrating ones here too, where you have to survive ridiculously hard waves of zombie monkeys or kill waves of enemies with crap weapons, you know, the ones that will make you want to throw your controller right out the window.

Nothing ever reaches the Ninja Gaiden height of difficulty though!

I don't know Chris, that shooting bottle challenge nearly turned me grey! Aside from the 27 challenging challenges we have Arcade mode, where you can find fun matches against bots, or offline buddies and a nice Arcade League, which are like Arcade challenges really! These Arcade challenges normally want you to come first for a bronze, come first with so many points for a silver and for gold, well, shoot like there's no tomorrow. Of course, if you really outperformed the goal you can expect a shiny platinum award winging its way to you! I find Arcade challenges really therapeutic; there's nothing like trying to get a certain amount of kills on a mode you haven't really played - so you're learning new things, as well as having fun, in addition to unlocking new and exciting things! Chris, with so many things to unlock, I don't know where to start - can you help me out here?

Sure, and while there isn't as much to unlock as in TimeSplitters 2, a good number of items are waiting to be enjoyed that will no doubt keep you occupied. For starters, there are those 150 playable characters, most of who must be earned in some way. For instance, playing story mode on normal usually unlocks two characters for each level completed, as well as a bunch for finishing the entire story. Nearly every challenge unlocks a character and it doubles if you earn gold on everything! If a challenge doesn't grant you a character, chances are it unlocks a new mode or a new weapon, such as bricks, or the monkey gun (unfortunately it is not what you think it is.) Fans of Goldeneye 64 will find a lot to cheer about, as paintball mode can be unlocked, as well as plenty of other odd cheats for multiplayer like cardboard mode or slow motion deaths. However, before you get too excited, none of these can actually be played online!

That monkey gun sounds tasty and fun, but as Chris said, it isn't what you think it would be. It doesn't fire out little monkeys that bite off your foes' kneecaps, nor does it fire exploding bananas, or call down giant apes for assistance, no, the monkey gun is basically a really powerful Uzi that fires a massive burst of bullets that's near impossible to escape! Sadly, no monkeys are involved, although it's still a great weapon. There are plenty of guns available for you to customise and with each map supporting six weapons, it's going to take you a while to explore them all. Of course, you'll instantly find your favourites; the vintage rifle is an old but super-accurate sniper capable of beheading people and the remote mines are really funny when you manage to stick a friend and your friend's life lies in your hand, firmly clutching the remote.

TimeSplitters wouldn't be TimeSplitters without wacky guns though - and we have loads of those too. The ghost gun makes your vision blurry, so it appears as if everyone's a ghost, so you can then zap them with a Ghostbusters type beam and steal their soul away - and the tranquilliser gun inflates your enemies a bit every time you pump the darts in and eventually makes them explode, with gore galore! There are loads more too, melee weapons such as baseball bats and the right funny weapon like the throwable house brick, which always equates to some laughs. Chris, care to dive deeper?

There's plenty of reasons to keep playing TimeSplitters, as Dex hinted the weapon count is enormous, bigger than any other online console title. Arcade leagues and challenges will keep you busy, but not for long. You can view all the movies from the story mode any time you wish, which is a real treat! The story mode is fantastic but only lasts 13 levels, so the replay value lies in the multiplayer. Gamecube owners have got to play with mates in their living room while PS2 and Xbox gamers can take their games into the online world, finally! With 8 players supported for PS2 and 16 for Xbox, full scoreboards that keep track of everything right down to how far you've walked, high scores for every mode including story and even downloadable replays for the challenge mode, there's a lot to do online in Future Perfect. And we haven't even mentioned one of the biggest selling points of the game, one that will no doubt add weeks upon weeks of replay value for gamers (especially those with online access). You know what I'm talking about - it's Dex's favourite feature, the map editor!

Chris knows me all too well. You see, as soon as I opened this game up, I went right for the map editor. On TimeSplitters 2 I used to go on the map editor a lot, even though I had nobody to play them with - now, for Xbox and PS2 owners, this game gets a whole new world. I started right on Advanced mode but it's not too hard if you know what you are doing. Things can get complicated when you start messing about with "tiles" that you can stack to carve things out of the map, you'll need logic to make switches do special things and you can even program a storyline into the custom maps. I was in geek heaven and I had no intention of coming down for a while. I started with a shell of what was supposed to be a basic map full of vantage points - a map Chris and I cleverly titled Lockdown Tower and, if you have an Xbox, I would urge you to check it out. I started to take this shell online with Chris, beta testing my map, putting it through masses of stress tests and asking the important question - what can be done to make this better?

Dex certainly loves his maps - he treats each one as if they were his own children!

It's true; I give my maps 110 percent! After hours of testing and thinking, I started to come out with funky little features like The Room of Doom, a room with lots of incentive inside but that can be locked from the outside, so if somebody catches you inside, they can lock you in. Inside the Room of Doom lies a turret that's controlled by a panel, to put the poor sod that's trapped out of their misery, but, after spotting a flaw that could annoy people, we decided that it would be best to add a 20 second press override switch that lets you out. Nevertheless, silent treatment in the Room of Doom could make the winner of the game the loser upon escape! There are plenty of alcoves to shoot from in Lockdown Tower and there are loads of hidey holes that Chris loves. He also loves something that we added last minute, at the very top of Lockdown Tower, the Sniper's Den, a sniper's dream come true, which Chris can tell you about.

Dex created an excellent sniping room where the sniper can lock himself safely inside and snipe away; the only way in is to hack a console across the way, thus opening a door leading to a teleport into the room. It really gives a good sense of safety to the sniper (until grenades start flying in) and shows the power of the map editor when you put your mind to it. Unfortunately, some issues started to come up, such as players spawning inside the room when they weren't designated to. This problem can't be fixed and updated, either; because once your map is uploaded, it is there for good!

That's right Chris, it's a shame we didn't iron that out during our beta tests but it's not really a problem if you take it light heartedly. I think the real problem for PS2 and Xbox owners is the fact that you have to map-edit online if you ever plan on uploading your map. If you edit offline, your map that you saved offline becomes corrupt for online uploading, which can be a real pain, especially for Jonny Offline who plans to get broadband in the foreseeable future and has superb map-editor skills, which he has wasted offline. Also, for the purpose of the review I tried to edit the almost-complete Lockdown Tower offline, which corrupted my file, so I had to start from scratch. Chris can vouch; I said some nasty words about EA's online skills over the microphone after that tearful night.

It's true, those of you who played Burnout 3 and ran into the dozens of online problems with the EA servers will feel right at home here, because not much has changed. Viewing each other's replays online sounds great; if only the replays recorded correctly... as it is, the player ends up shooting the wall and then being killed, yet the replay is for the fastest completion time. Sharing maps adds a lot of replay value and infinite downloadable content, if you can find a good map worth downloading, or if your game doesn't lock up while looking for a friend's map! Creating single player story maps is a great idea, as you can even add objectives, however thus far I've only been able to actually play them from the map editor itself! The online play, once you get going, is an absolute blast overall, sadly severely hindered by several things and I promise I'll try not to complain about the fact that my copy has locked up over twenty times now and I know I'm not the only one…

Chris is right, every time we got into a meaty battle, his connection would jam up and if he was hosting the whole game would come crashing down, which was damn right annoying. Also, when we set up a match, friends wanting to join the host would get errors coming up, saying that they couldn't. Chris put his mind to it and discovered that the only way to bypass this was to join via the optimatch option. It's all a bit awkward if you ask me and if you have no way of communicating with your friend who is trying to join you, to talk them through the whole process, one of you is going to lose your patience fast and just opt for another online title. And that's not the only problem, is it Chris?

Unfortunately not; there are several "what-the-hell-were-they-thinking" issues online. One, if you enter a game that has started you're assigned an unchangeable character. Don't like being the giant, big-headed creature in diapers? Too damn bad. because you won't be able to change him until you enter a new game in the lobby. Why? Once a game starts, it can never return to the lobby. AT ALL! This means you can't customise weapon sets, pick a custom map, or change your character until the entire server is reset. What about playing custom maps online? It sure is great, especially since only the host needs the map for everybody to play; it is however unfortunate that once you start the game on this map, you're locked on it for good; you can't change anything until you completely reset the server. Outstanding, that's just the feature I wanted in a hugely anticipated title like this!

Come on Chris, calm down! Think about the good times, focus mate, focus!

Okay... calming down; once you do get a good game going there is loads of fun waiting to be had and Future Perfect is packed full of great game types such as Shrink, Virus, Vampire and Thief, as well as other standard online FPS modes. If you're a Gamecube owner or without online capabilities then you're missing out on a lot of multiplayer fun and tons of replay value with map sharing, which severely hurts the title in the long run!

Chris is right, the lack of online play for the Cube is a real kick in the teeth - but I have to stop right there and talk about some online moments that really stood out for me. Firstly, the Assault mode makes for some fantastic team play, the red team attacks and the blue team defends. Unfortunately, ninety percent of heartless baboons out there want to attack, so kind folks like Chris and I often fill up the numbers on the blue defenders. Basically, assault mode sports a manly voice telling you what you and your team should do on the map. "Defend the inner core," is what you hear if you're on the blue defenders and "Attack the inner core" for the reds. You then have to work as a team to complete that goal. However, defenders never really win, unless the time runs out and the attackers haven't completed the list of missions; suffice to say, playing on the attacking team is the more rewarding of the two. Assault mode is fun offline too but, when you get an online game going it can be great, can't it Chris?

Assault mode is a lot of fun when you get a good game working, just as long as the players cooperate and select the correct teams and you actually like one of the few maps it works with!

Again, Chris brings up a valid point. Assault only works with a handful of maps but I think all the maps that include assault mode have been done rather well! The maps as a whole are done well too but, like the weapons, you'll spot your favourites quickly enough. The Disco level is fantastic; it's not too big and it's great for a laugh on all the modes it supports. I also love the Subway level, where you can hear an announcer on the speaker system calling out odd phrases, or talking gibberish, which always brings a smile to my face while pumping lead into a floating snowman or a man dressed up in a bear outfit. All levels are played well with all modes, big levels are always great for a good match of Virus and, after playing the levels a couple of times, you will know them like the back of your hand, just because of the simple yet beautiful design.

You couldn't be more right Dex, the maps are easy to learn and flawlessly designed for the style of gameplay found here. My favourite has to be Zeppelin, where you're fighting aboard, well, a giant zeppelin! But you can head to the very bottom where the floors are coming apart and you fall to an untimely death, or go up and fight atop the actual zeppelin as the wind whistles past. The graphics are outstanding overall, capturing Free Radical's now signature cartoon look with extremely smooth gameplay. Story mode is littered with unique characters designs all over the place, each one brilliantly animated - the facial expressions are enough to make you laugh hysterically! Though I was really let down by the lack of true outdoor maps in the map creator, there's still plenty of colourful bits and pieces to choose from that look really good; in fact, new players will have a hard time telling a well designed custom map apart from a pre-built map. Finally, the graphics lack the ever popular rag doll physics, however the developers have gone out of their way to create some awesome death animations for specific attacks that look outstanding most of the time! The only problem with the graphics and map designs is the fact that there's dozens of invisible walls preventing you from really exploring some areas or finding a nice little hiding space! With a bit more polish and interaction with objects, Future Perfect could have been perfect. 150 unique characters, each with their own voice, is an impressive feat though.

Indeed it is Chris, but there are plenty of little niggles that get to me greatly, I just have to get them off my chest. First of all, there are no sounds for walking along, something that I really miss when you're walking down a corridor, the music dies down and the air is filled with silence. No footsteps, no nothing. And you're not telling me that the main character Cortez is as nimble and as silent as Sam Fisher. If you can get your head around that, there's the sad fact that there are no effects for smacking your baseball bat against the tree or throwing bricks against a wall. Little things make the big things matter and, although minor, it really does get to me. There's plenty good to overrule the bad though, as there are plenty of soundtracks and music bytes from the previous TimeSplitters games, plus plenty of new ones. In single player, the sound for the characters during full-motion videos really compliments the visuals, especially the voiceovers, when Cortez pulls some funny faces while wailing some over-the-top phrases, which all makes for a pleasant experience. Of course, all the gun effects sound great, but you don't need me to tell you that, especially if you played the other TimeSplitters games; the guns always sound deadly. Somewhat of a crap bonus for online players though is the permanent voice mask that seems to be applied and makes people sound like they are drowning or dying from some sort of illness. It takes some getting used to but you shouldn't have to get used to it - it shouldn't be there in the first place. Chris, take this review home…

When it works, TimeSplitters: Future Perfectis a highly enjoyable and addictive title. The times when we were able to get good online games going without any problems were absolutely fantastic, a real reminder of great blazing fast arcade shooters from years past like Quake and the classic Unreal. Offline players have an exceptional story mode to look forward to that, though short, is one of the best FPS single players I've played in a long time. Challenges and Arcade Leagues add a lot of replay and speaking of replays, recording your high scores is a real treat, as well as being able to download brand new single player levels and multiplayer maps if you have access. For Gamecube and offline players, the TimeSplitters experience is a bit short-lived, although if you have some mates around you can surely get some laughs out of the multiplayer or co-op. Online players have some great times to look forward to, if you have the patience to overcome the server problems and the lack of a lobby once the game begins, amongst other flaws. Regardless of these issues, this latest instalment in the great TimeSplitters series retains its heart; that of a blisteringly enjoyable arcade shooter and as such is well worth your time.

Reviewed by Dexter Pearson & Christopher Martin for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).