Thank you Sega for sending us a review code!

Vanquish was originally released in 2010 for the PS3 and Xbox 360 consoles. In 2017, this title made its way onto Steam and has been well received. Like the Steam release, the 10th anniversary edition has been remastered to support 4K graphics at 60FPS.

This game takes place in the near future with a space colony that has been captured by the Russians. This space colony has a solar microwave transmitter that has been used to attack California and New York will be next if the American government does not surrender. Instead of surrendering, a group of space marines led by lieutenant colonel Robert Burns is dispatched along with your character, Sam Gideon, who is a soldier for Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).

Sam is equipped with a high tech suit that can glide on the ground for short amounts of time and can slow down time when it takes damage. You’ll have to utilize various destructible crates and objects for cover. If too much damage is taken, you can restart the mission or reload from a checkpoint. Thankfully, there are plenty of checkpoints so not much progress will be lost. However, you will lose points from your score for each death.

Vanquish is broken down into five acts and can be completed in less than ten hours. There’s a wide variety of missions and plenty of robotic enemies and bosses to take down. In this third-person shooter you can carry up the three weapons and some grenades. My favorite weapon is the laser cannon since it’s quite powerful and never runs out of ammo. It does overheat and can only be used in short spurts. Other weapons include machine guns, rocket launchers, sniper rifles, and disc launchers.

During many of the missions you’ll have some AI support, but taking down the intimidating bosses will rest mostly on your shoulders. Some of your allies will be KO’d and you can revive them by injecting them with some adrenaline. Robert Burns is nigh invincible and can hold his own in battle quite well.

Guiding Sam on his mission is Elena Ivanova who relays critical information and unlocks many of the closed gates and corridors for his team. Whatever doors she cannot open, Sam gets to blow up with explosive charges. If you’re looking for a lot of action and explosions, this game is for you!

Vanquish does have its fair share of content that earns its Mature rating from the ESRB. Though most of the enemies are robotic, there is plenty of human bloodshed and gore seen in high definition. Language is all over the place with many F-bombs and the Lord’s name dropped on many occasions. Last but not least is Sam’s smoking habit that causes him to light up a cigarette whenever he has a breather. In one scene, he was hanging for his life on floating debris while holding a smoke with his free hand.

The visuals look great and ran well on my Xbox One X. The levels are well designed and the compass leads the way to the next objective and counts down the distance between you and your goal. The bosses are huge and usually have a glowing weak spot to set your weapon sights on. The auto-aiming feature is especially useful here!

I must admit that I’m not a fan of Sam’s gruff voice, but I guess it’s fitting with the smoking stigma. Everyone else’s voice seemed good though. The background music and sound effects are well done and make the game very immersive.

Though Vanquish isn’t terribly long, it packs a lot of action in it. After completing the game you’ll unlock the God Hard difficulty mode. You can also select and play acts in any order you like. I can see why this game is held in high regard and if you don’t mind the language, smoking, and violence, it’s a fun ride.