Last night I played this for a little over an hour. In that time it gave me three Great Gaming Moments, which is very good going indeed.

The first two involved an assault on an island fortress. The mission was to blow up every building on the island, including the huge sixteenth century castle on the south and west edges. Trouble was, sitting on top of the castle were a couple of radio jammers, meaning I couldn’t call in any air strikes or support drops.

So, GREAT GAMING MOMENT #1 was when I decided to destroy a jammer by driving it off the tower, into the middle of a bridge several hundred feet above a bay and then jump out at the last second before momentum sent it to a watery grave. The jammer would fall into the water and die, I’d be on the bridge ready to take on the next jammer. Except I jumped out too late and fell a long, long way into the water below the bridge. Meanwhile, the jammer was stuck on the bridge, hanging over the edge, like the van at the end of The Italian Job. Oops. Great comedy moment.

A few tries later and the jammers were disposed of. (Blown up by C4 this time.) I called in an artillery strike on the fortress. Then I ran, but not fast enough as everything started exploding around me. I turned round to see I was standing by an edge, empty space just a few steps behind me. I thought I’d got away with it, until I suddenly noticed a wall rushing past me. Turns out the chunk of fortress I was on hadn’t been spared and I was standing on it as it plummeted to the ground. Ouch. More comedy. That was GREAT GAMING MOMENT #2.

Anyway, despite all that I survived. (Chicks dig scars. And shrapnel.) The next mission had me blowing up an oil rig. The advised method was to plant C4 on the legs and destroy it that way. I had a better idea. Instead I stood on top of the rig and called in an artillery strike. (I do like them.) Then I ran. I ran across the rig, across the helipad on the side and then jumped hundreds of feet into the water below. As I fell the artillery started landing on the rig. As I hit the water it started to explode. Then as I swam away it collapsed into the water. Job done. It was superb. More than anything else I’ve ever played, it was like being the star, writer and director of a great Hollywood action movie set piece. I was gibbering on to the wife for thirty seconds or so just repeating, “Did you see that? Awesome. That was AWESOME. Did you see that?” GREAT GAMING MOMENT #3.

In no other game do I turn the camera so often to show the view behind my character.

I love this game. I’m so glad I got it. I wasn’t going to, it’s just it happened to be a new release and I got more trade in credit than I thought I would when I went to get Spore. Thank you Blockbuster, for your reasonably fair trade in prices.