John Woo Presents Stranglehold is one of the games that I have been anticipating since I first saw it at E3 2006. When I popped in the game, initial impressions were really good. Everything about the game seemed right; unfortunately, there were a few things that need to be mentioned that really hinder the overall game.

One thing that doesn't hurt the game is its looks. Whether you are talking about the raw graphics or the camera angles, this game has got the visuals nailed. Inspector Tequila looks just like Chow Yun Fat and the highly destructible environments are just downright beautiful and definitely a sight to behold.

The game has a very cinematic feel to it (almost as if a big Holywood director was involved ;) Cut scenes don't just show you the action; they give you the angles as if they were done with a real movie-camera. Needless to say, this all helps the "John Woo" style of the game.

Stranglehold's music and audio aspects are pretty top notch as well. The most obvious aspect is Chow Yun Fat's voicework, which is always great. The game's music is also dead on and feels just like a John Woo film.

John Woo Presents Stranglehold aims to be an "Interactive John Woo Movie." This means that it needs all of the iconic Wooisms. You need dual-guns, a diving/shooting system, a way to appropriately interact with the objects in your environment so that you can slide across or jump on them, and then of course, you need doves. Well, on all of these points, as well as a few I can't think of at the moment, Stranglehold delivers.

Stranglehold is the sequel to the classic John Woo/Chow Yun Fat film "Hard Boiled." You take control of Inspector Tequila as he investigates the kidnapping and murder of a fellow officer of the law. Tequila soon finds that the plot will take him across multiple gangs and many locations around Tokyo. The game's story isn't anything really new. It's what you would expect from most shoot-em-up movies, but you don't really need a whole lot of detail in this game's story to know that you need to go down this alley or that hallway and shoot anything that moves (or doesn't move for extra Style Points).

The gameplay format is a fairly solid one that has been around for years. Besides the Woo-esque bells and whistles, this game is a third person shooter that takes you through very linear levels. Well, linear levels or large rooms where you need to clear out wave after wave of bad guy before you are allowed to leave. The multi-wave rooms aren't all that bad. A lot of times, I was able to find some area to tuck into that would force all of the enemies to walk in front of my sights if they intended to come after me. The only times that fails is towards the end of the fights when, because of the highly destructible environments, your cover has been severely diminished. These typically end with some much bigger bad guy that made it very unwise to stay in one place for any length of time.

The other type of level, the very linear ones, cause a bit of a headache at times. Most of the time, it is pretty obvious where you need to go, but there were a few instances, like at the docks, when the levels didn't look as linear, but still were. The place had a more open feel to it and it felt like I could have gone in a few other directions. Mind you, I knew there would only be one way to go, but I couldn't figure out where it was. Thankfully, some random and frustrated bullet flying allowed me to uncover a destructible area that let me continue with my mission - this was very annoying.

Then there are all the aspects of Stranglehold that make the game more than just another third-person shooter, they make it a John Woo third-person shooter. These are things like Style Points, The Tequila Bomb Gauge and Standoffs. But I'm going to hold off on that until Game Mechanics with the argument that it's these mechanics that make the game different.

John Woo Presents Stranglehold has a few difficult bosses, but as far as the rest of the opponents are concerned, it isn't all that difficult. Where Stranglehold gets hard is in the previously mentioned very linear levels that don't always appear to be linear, but I've already talked about that.

One of the interesting features that have been showing up more and more in recent games is that the game will ask you if you want to turn down the difficulty when you keep failing in a mission. The first time I saw this feature was in the God of War games, but Stranglehold does it in a slightly better fashion. GoW would ask you and if you said yes, it would lower the difficulty of that save and be done with it. Stranglehold, instead of keeping your setting fixed, asks you what level to set the difficulty to every time you load your game. This means that you can lower the setting for this one time that you need it, but you can go back in the next time you pick up the game and put it back on your normal setting, great insight developers!

There are many things about John Woo Presents Stranglehold that gives it the right to have "John Woo Presents" in front of it, and it's not just because Woo helped to direct the cameras or it's a sequel to one of his movies. It's the style of the gameplay, and it is the specific mechanics that make you feel like you are playing as Inspector Tequila.

The first mechanic that needs to be brought up is Style Points. These are stars you are given by performing some very Woo-like maneuvers while in combat. These are things like running up railings while popping gangsters in the head or shooting signs so they fall on a group of bad guys. There are tons of other classic moves like jumping on carts and shooting while it slides across the room, or sliding down a counter and popping guys in the knees. Then there is always the classic jump while firing both guns trick (something you will find yourself doing a lot, possibly inadvertently, in this game). You can also earn Style Points by activating Tequila Time (think Bullet Time) and getting rid of a bunch of baddies quickly.

Style Points build up your Tequila Bomb Gauge. Tequila Bombs are four abilities that you unlock throughout the game. These are: Health Boosts, Precision Aim, Barrage Attack and Spin Attack. Health Boost, as you expect, recovers some of your lost life. Precision Aim lets you zoom in on the opponent in your sights and fire exactly where you want to. You will get treated to a nice, long, slow-motion shot as your bullet goes flying through the air and causes major damage to your enemy. Barrage Attack is great if you can't quite get to the enemy because they are behind a lot of cover. You will unleash tons of ammo on the world and destroy almost all of the barriers (and most likely enemies) around you. Then there is the Spin Attack. Any Woo fan will recognize this one. In slow motion (of course), Tequila loads up his guns, doves go flying and he spins around killing everybody in the area.

There are times in the game where Tequila will run into a room and find himself surrounded by several enemies, all pointing guns at you, and you pointing a gun at one or two of them; you are now in a Standoff. These scripted events feel a lot like the Precision Aim Tequila Bombs, and the same strategies you use when activating that ability should be used here. Anyway, here is a rundown of what a Standoff is. You start off by facing one guy. You use one stick to move Tequila around so he doesn't get hit by their bullets, while the other stick is used to set your sights. After a bit of time, the camera will shift to another person in the Standoff and so on, until you've had time to attempt to take out each of the opponents. Any that you didn't fell in the Standoff will have to be dealt with when you are given full control of your character.

Finally, the ammo in the game is of special note. It took a friend of mine to point it out, but you never actually run out of ammo in this game (because they never do in a Woo film, right?). If you use up all the ammo in your last weapon, then you are miraculously given your original dual-pistols with full ammo. This was nice, especially since there isn't any hand-to-hand combat in this game, and you rarely get close enough to enemies to use it anyway. This was just one more detail that had a very Woo feel to it.

Unfortunately, the biggest flaw that comes with Stranglehold is its sheer repetitiveness (well, that and its lack of a regular jump button, not a dive/Tequila Time button). It's hard to believe, but there were quite a few points when I was getting a bit bored with the game and I just turned it off because I didn't feel like going on. I would always pick it back up, but it's not like I left the game because it got me to hyped up (like BioShock) or I just wouldn't be able to make it past a certain area, it was just because I didn't see a reason to continue when I got to a save point. This was a rather sad realization, but it's true.

Stranglehold starts off fun. Letting you dive around the screen acting out your favorite action-movie scenes is a great premise for a game, but because of its quickness to get redundant, it doesn't last that well in the long haul. This game is definitely worth playing. It's a rental at least. I would recommend buying it if you are a big fan of this type of game and you don't mind the fact that you will be doing the same thing at the end of the game that you will when you first pick up the controller.