Affectionate Diary

It’s one thing to approach Curtis as a cartoon-esque, entirely deliberate and knowing icon. He’s a compliment to Eminem in a host of ways, both presenting himself as the stereotype he needs to be and carving his own brand of classical Hip Hop archetype. It’s another to play as him in a game where in all honestly, there doesn’t seem to be anywhere enough killing.

For the most part, Blood on the Sand is entirely competent in providing mid-grade third-person combat thrills, although you can’t help wondering why so many interstitial bits clutter the path of destruction. Comparisons with The Club are surface at best, as the fundamental conceit is quite different, not to mention that Blood on the Sand isn’t a flaccid, failed experiment in something that should have been a million more awesome than it turned out to be. But then, we have to be thankful that both aren’t Stranglehold, which was so far of its mark that shit became laughable.

For all the ancillary messing around with buddy-based clambering and painfully shonky C4 wall destruction, one underlying criticism remains: when the FUCK are things going to go spastic? Where are the waves of cannon fodder and the riotous destruction of *everything*. Have these motherfuckers even played EDF 2017? THAT IS HOW YOU FUCKING DO IT. I love the shitness of Blood on the Sand’s concept so much that it actually hurts emotionally that the game doesn’t seem to provide the nutjob content the basic premise suggests it should. Man, I should be seeing as many limbs in the air as an average bazooka hit in NARC, right? Curtis is a SRS BSNS badass motherfucker. I should be shooting people until they’re mince and then getting rewarded for it. With extra napalm and fuel-air explosives.

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