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Battlefields are not populated with a few dozen men clamoring for a flag, true battlefields are playgrounds of destruction in which hundreds lose their lives. War is big, it’s fought by many people and MAG understands this. With three persistent factions with thousands of members and individual fights consisting up to 256 players there has never before been a game that exposes the extravagance of modern warfare.

It’s a hard road to hoe for MAG, as a full-priced multiplayer-only title exclusive to a system that hasn’t had the best track record for flawless connectivity it’s got a few skeptics. Combine this with the fact that the Playstation 3 doesn’t come packed with a headset and MAG is a game that requires lots of people working together and you’ve got quite the potential for failure. However, through all the potential setbacks MAG comes through with only a few nicks and scrapes.

The world of MAG is divided in to 3 military factions; the technologically advanced Raven, hardened soldiers of Valor, and dangerous rebellion of S.V.E.R. Each private military organization is fighting for control of a persistent overworld that’s affected by the outcomes of every battle. Players are forced to chose a side, create a warrior and fight for their faction across 8 multiplayer modes. As players rise in rank they can dump skill points in to various trees to earn upgrades and improvements for their character before being given the opportunity to control a squad at level 15.

As players improve their character there are a number of different skills they can invest in. The slow but deliberate progression of characters allows players to methodically plan out their warrior and load them with the abilities they value most. The game doesn’t do a particularly great job of explaining just how everything works, but that’s partially circumvented with a respecing system that allows players to pull and re-lay their skill points once they reach certain levels. It doesn’t make up for a lack of clarity, but it definitely helps indecisive players who don’t know what they’re doing.

Leadership is a big deal in MAG, as leaders of an individual 8-man squad, 32-man platoon or 128-man army players will be in charge of dishing out commands and deciding objectives for their subordinates. However, despite the exciting promise of bossing around 128 other gamers from your couch, this is a relatively exclusive experience reserved for only the most avid MAG players. Most who pick up the game will exist in the lower classes where following objectives is the name of the game.

MAG does a really good job of influencing players to do the right thing in battle. Fighting within objective points the superior officers select offers bonus experience points, as does healing friendly units. It’s subtle, but these two tweaks mean that players are constantly looking out for one another and are more likely to follow orders. This results in a much more cohesive game that plays as the developers intended instead of turning in to a 256 player cluster of chaos like it so easily could.

It seems redundant to say, but MAG is best enjoyed with friends. Playing solo is enjoyable, but when you’ve got a real comrade watching your six the game is just more fun. Clans and groups are fully supported in-game and the matchmaking system does a fantastic job of ensuring groups never get split up. Though, avoiding separation isn’t the only things the servers do really well. MAG runs incredibly smoothly, even with it’s maximum headcount. There are very few dropped games, and almost no lag or stuttering. It’s unfortunate that MAG doesn’t come with a headset like it’s SOCOM and Warhawk cousins, but if MAG proves one thing it’s that the Playstation Network is no longer a joke. The service is clearly capable of some really impressive feats and does it for free.

That’s not to say that MAG is completely without flaw. There are a few oddities within the game’s mechanics that keep it from being fantastic. There seems to be a focus on close-quarters combat, snipers don’t get any XP bonuses as they’re most frequently found outside the direct vicinity of the objectives. Terrain is also completely indestructable and impervious to bullets, meaning that cowards hiding behind a thin piece of wood are completely safe from harm where they would be annihilated in other games.

The game also has some hiccuping animations when switching weapons/equipment and players can sometimes be found trapped between game geometry, vibrating at supersonic speeds. Though, these technical errors are minor and for the most part the control scheme, which is pretty much a clone of every other FPS, is comfortable and responsive. It’s nothing revolutionary, but it’s easy to get a hang of and never gets in the way.

MAG also suffers from a rather generic aesthetic, regardless of what team you’re playing for it feels like your world’s been crafted by a lousy Tom Clancey knockoff and you can’t help but shake the feeling you’ve seen it all before. In the larger maps there is some opportunity for new sights, but no matter what level you wind up in it all feels too familiar to stay interesting. It’s almost as if the developers made 3 maps (one per faction) and just chipped away until they got more manageable sizes for the smaller games.

Playing MAG is a very different experience than what you’re getting from your typical multiplayer shooter. For those looking for a Call of Duty clone you’ll be sorely dissapointed, MAG is a tactical game that relies less on the individual and more on the team. The metagame only gives back as much as you put in to it, but that means for those willing to invest themselves MAG will pay back in dividends. It’s not a perfect game, but nothing that can’t be fixed with updates. One thing can be said for certain, even at a full price-point MAG is the best multiplayer-only experience available on any console.

MAG was released on January 26th 2010 for Playstation 3.