Breach is an online first-person shooter for the Xbox Live Arcade and PC.  It was developed by Atomic Games, the same team developing the controversial ‘Six Days in Fallujah’.  After Six Days was dropped by Konami, Atomic Games said to themselves, ‘let’s make something of this in the mean time’ and the outcome was Breach.  The game is strictly an online shooter and a good one at that.  Not only is the Breach trademark, cover based and destructible environment, but it is also the Atomic Games trademark.

The game utilizes the Hydrogen Engine to support the completely destructible environment. You can destroy everything, put breach charges on outside walls and enemies behind are killed along with the wall. You can even shoot out little ‘shooter holes’ to aim through and give you cover until over course an enemy rocket launcher destroys your cover completely. You play US elite field operatives. The CIA Special Activities Division sends teams to complete black operations that no one knows about… in and out like it never happens. These scenarios are what you are doing in the game with special weapons, gear, and real gadgets that I never even knew existed.  Another great aspect of the game is that you get more XP for killing someone a higher level than you which I think should be in every game.  The XP you can gain from a kill is 5 to 35 XP.

The game is heavily based on cover and the destructible environments. Enemies can’t hide in a building, if you blow the shit out of it and enemies can’t grab cover on a cement median when it has a rocket launcher coming it’s way. Which keep in mind, rocket launcher although seemed a little over powered, they are only available at certain ammo boxes with a limited amount of them. After playing so many recent first-person shooters I would sometimes forget that I could use cover which is clicking the right stick that you can grab cover on nearly anything which is very useful. At the same time the cover system is not as smooth as other games with cover systems and could use some work.

Breach lets you rank up and the XP you earn is the same as the currency you use to purchase and upgrade weapons, perks as well as gadgets. You can gain XP from kills, assists, captures, saves and victories. You unlock new weapons, perks and gadgets at you level up which you can you use your XP points to purchase newly unlocks assets. There are 5 classes; Rifleman, Gunner, Sniper, Support and Recon. Recon is a special class that can only be unlock by maxing out you Rifleman and Sniper classes.  There all also 5 maps in the game right now ranging from snow to detailed landscapes to a missile silo.  ‘Silo’ is great for sniping while ‘Peak’ is smaller and a good chance to use your shotgun.

The game modes are really cool and innovative. Infiltration is basically like Domination from the Call of Duty series, just hold down one or more of the 3 control points. In Convoy, as defense you must escort two trucks to their destination while the truck will not move unless your team is near them and they are not in need of repair. The attackers can damage the vehicles requiring truck repair which can take time as well as killing you stopping the truck movement. If the trucks don’t reach their destination in time, defense looses. Convoys can also get blocked by blockades requiring you to take them out via explosives. In Retrieval the objective is to locate the canister and bring it to the capture zone marked on the mini-map which there are multiple ones to choose from to throw the enemy team off. The team with the most points at the end of the match wins. Sole Survivor is self explanatory, last man standing wins. And no shooter would be complete with out Team Deathmatch(TDM), which if you don’t know what that is, there is a game call Viva Pinata you might like. Of course Battlefield does not have team deathmatch but that’s OK because it’s awesome as well as a tactical shooter being their trademark.

Just a peek out of cover.

There is no automatic health regeneration which normally I would despise, but Breach pulls it off perfectly, partially because it doesn’t take that much to kill someone but you can get med-packs as a gadget to heal you or your teammates. Speaking of gadgets there are quite a few you can get and come in handy too. There is Dragon Skin which is armor, a sticky bomb(grenade), remote motion sensor (detects enemy motion, playable anywhere including a ceiling), Bionic Ear (increases enemy movement/sound with on screen sensor), IR Sniper Detector (any scoped weapon that is within the user’s view a glare is created on the lens, helping you locate enemy snipers), a Sabotage Kit that allows you to plant C4 on enemy weapons cashes or mounted guns resulting in an explosion upon use, an M2 Slam Charge (can be used as landmine or to detect enemies), a Medic Kit which is self explanatory, the M79 Pirate Cannon (thumper/grenade launcher) and the best is the Sonic Imager (See through almost all materials for a short period to see enemies).

The weapons you can attain are the M4A1, HK 416, ACR, M60, M240, IAR, M40A3, TPG-1, M107-A, M1014, MP5, Saiga – 12, AK-103, Seal Recon Rifile, MK 14 EBR, USP .45, M67 Frag Grenade, M18 Smoke Grenade, Breach Charge, M203 with attachments like Silencers, Recoil Compensator, ACOG, Reflex Sight, Holographic Sight, Recon Scope, 1, 3, 3, Sniper Scope 1, 2, 3. The perks are some of the most innovative ones in any shooter most notably the Bad Ass perk which starts you off with half health and gives you double XP. Other perks include Conditioning (Sprint longer), Explosive Personality (High explosive damage), Strong Arm (throe grenades farther), Thick Skill (extra head protection), Steady Hand (lowers recoils while being shot), Bandolier (extra ammo), Agility (extra speed), ESP (accurate blind fire), The Brawler (gives double damage to your melee attacks and reduces the damage taken by melee in half), Quick Reflexes (cuts weapon switching and reloading times in half), and Vendetta which places an IR marker on your last killer for a short 30 seconds after re-spawn to hunt for revenge.

Just made it.

At little as it takes to take your opponent down, there is also a hardcore mode, but it’s not really for the easy kills.  The aspects of hardcore mode make the game more realistic and make you learn to communicate with your team to win.  The mode take away vital aspects of the game that you might take for granted such as:

Minimal HUD experience – Aiming reticule and other items turned off, while certain other items are left in as real life affords greater situational awareness.

Disabling of Mini-Map radar system – removes the ability to use the radar to track enemy and friendly forces, players must be more aware of their surroundings.

Disabling of ammo counter and weapon fire-mode display.

Disabling of Kill Cam system: No longer gives you a hint about the person who killed you or where they were located — keeping your effective kill locations hidden.

Modified Damage Settings creating a more lethal experience: More realistic damage from all weapons, making direct fire fights highly lethal. Use cover to gain the upper hand.

Hardcore mode can be applied to any of the existing maps and Game types

Breach is an amazing shooter for an arcade game but cover and the use of destructible items is necessary for true victory. You just have to know how to use them. The cover system could be tweaked a little though and sometimes a dead on sniper shot are not always dead on, but other than that this is a great game and just a taste of what Atomic Games has to bring us. The game is rated “T” and will is out on January 26th, 2011. On XBLA it will cost 1200 Microsoft points and it will be $19.99 on PC over Steam and in stores (although after discounts it should be the same).

This game was reviewed on the Xbox 360.

The game ‘Six Day in Fallujah’ got canned from publishers Konami as they wanted no part in it.  The reason being that the story is a true one, the battle of Fallujah in Iraq.  Too close to home you might say?  But what about movies, there are countless true war stories made into movies that bring the emotion out in all of us using the media of movies.  What is so different about video games?  We are all grown ups and playing ‘Breach’ with developers which is an XBLA/PC First Person Cover Bases Shooter that releases the 26th on Xbox Live, I got the chance to speak a little about the development of ‘Six Days in Fallujah’

The game got canned by Konami and developers Atomic Games said to themselves, ‘we have to do something with this now’.  That outcome was ‘Breach’  which you can check out our review when it’s released.  Breach was almost like a test run for ‘Six Days in Fallujah’ with there destructible environments and cover based aspects being an Atomic Games trademark.  These aspects will be a part of ‘Six Days in Fallujah’ online and offline.  The game though is heavily based on single player as the true story of the battle of Fallujah is an epic one that deserves to be told in a way that only Atomic Games can bring to us.  They are at this point staying strong to their game not changing the true events that happened as well as working hard to complete the game for a publisher to realize what they have on their hands.  What is it that they have their hands on you ask?  A third-person shooter that takes place within a six-day period during the gruesome and real November 2004 campaign called ‘Operation Phantom Fury’.  Soldiers from the battle even helped with development of the game, but not just a game but a true story that needs to be told.

Singleplayer will also not just be a solo journey as the game will have co-op in it.  The amount of players in co-op in currently unconfirmed.  The Atomic Games team were very hesitant to speak about ‘Six Days in Fallujah’ at all but after having a lot of fun playing with them they lead on to some of the previously stated things while anything is subject to change.  Oh yeah, and Atomic Games didn’t always win either but it was certainly a joy while they explained the game to me as we whooped some ass.  Rest assured, ‘Six Days in Fallujah’ is in production and some might wonder how.  Could a publisher have the balls to take on a project so close to home.  Keep it here for the latest on the game and our review of ‘Breach’

Here is a new trailer (given below) featuring the gadgets in ‘Breach’, an Xbox Live Arcade Game for 1200 Microsoft Points also available on the PC this January 26th.

The game is made by Atomic Games, the same developers doing Six Days in ‘Fallujah’, and although I could not get anything out of them while playing Breach with them, I would assume this is a taste of whats to come in ‘Six Days in Falluja’ which has been dropped and picked up a number of times by publishers due to real life combat scenarios happening now overseas.

Come back and check out our review on the 26th.

Check out the trailer below.

Breach ‘Gadgets’ Trailer

Here is some more gameplay courtesy of GameSpot.com including ‘Convoy’ Mode which is a lot of fun as well as ‘Retrieval’ footage:

Here is the latest trailer for Breach which consists of all in game footage.  Breach is actually a downloadable game, that’s right DLC!  This first person shooter is pretty fucking awesome for a downloadable game.  It looks better than Blacklight: Tango Down (FPS DLC) and has more to it as you take the role of elite field operatives in the CIA Special Activities Division. This 16 player online versus FPS is unique in that you can put holes through floors, walls, or take out a brick in a wall to get the drop on enemies by creating ‘shooter’s holes’. If that isn’t good enough for you, you can always just crush enemies by destroying, ceilings, balconies and walls.

The game is out for the Xbox 360 Live Arcade and PC on January 26th for $19.99 or 1200 Microsoft Points. The PC edition available in retail or for download will feature a little more including Nvidia PhysX tech, a “higher performance” Hardcore Mode “to play the way operatives train” and dedicated servers.

Atomic Games has certified gold master of Breach for Xbox LIVE PC . Breach will officially launch on January 26th, 2011 worldwide on both platforms.

Breach will cost 1200 Microsoft points through Xbox LIVE Arcade for Xbox 360 or be available on Windows PC for under £15.00 and €19.99. Breach has been rated PEGI 16.

Justin D. May, 20, may well have succeeded if not for one fairly significant blunder- he told the developers he was stealing it. Now I don’t know what this guy was thinking at the time, but I’m fairly sure a rule high up in the list of things Not To Do If You Are A Thief is to tell your victim you are stealing from them.

“The suspect did admit to us several times, including as he was doing it, that he was stealing the code. He said to myself and several other team members, after being caught, that it was not a big deal, he just really liked the game and wanted to play it with his friends,” David Tractenberg, a spokesperson for Atomic, explained.

He was caught downloading the code, which one employee of Atomic claims is worth $6m, from a laptop, and after only managing to download 14MB of data (out of a total 2GB game- approximately), he attempted to escape by hiding in the crowd.

Joystiq tracked down the gamer on Xbox Live, where he claims that he was just trying to get online at the Hynes Convention Center using a spare network cable he found in the Atomic booth. His story doesn’t quite add up though; the HCC had wireless internet running all day long.

Atomic claims a slightly different view of things, “He said several times he ‘knew people’ and ‘could give us bigger and more important people’ and he could ‘name names.’ However, I have no idea if these people were on the show floor or just hackers at home,” Tractenberg explained. “I would hate to think he got someone’s full code and their title is going to be compromised due to this guy. I just need to make it clear he didn’t say anything specific.”

May was in fact on a panel show earlier, where he asked the Xbox Live director of policy and enforcement to unban is Gamertag, which was banned for playing Forza 3 early. He was reminded that all accounts that hacked Forza 3 to play it early were banned.

Below is the video of the May asking whether he can have his Gamertag unbanned. [Warning: Pathetic.]

The man further admitted to Joystiq that he did indeed steal the recently released Forza.

Since his arrest, the May has had his modded Xbox 360, several laptops, his PSP, DS and XMP3 all confiscated. He was bailed shortly after his arrest.

However, an arrest warrant has been issued for Justin May after he failed to appear for his arraignment in Boston Municipal Court this morning. He now faces charges of larceny which could cost him over $250 for buying, selling or receiving stolen trade secrets. May could face up to five years or a $25,000 fine on the first charge and up to five years or a $500 fine and imprisonment of up to two years on the second charge.

Anyone with information on his whereabouts can call the Boston Police CrimeStoppers tip line at 1-800-494-TIPS.