The onslaught of great multiplayer shooters has been seemingly never ending over the past few years, from Call of Duty, to Battlefield, to Halo and many others, it’s not hard to find a great game out there where you can have some fun online. The PlayStation series SOCOM has always bet big on multiplayer, and always fell a bit short of joining the heavyweights of Battlefield and Call of Duty. Does SOCOM 4 finally help the series reach its peak? Read on to find out.

SOCOM 4 is the first real SOCOM game on the PlayStation 3, and the campaign follows a squad of soldiers as they battle their way through the South American jungle fighting a group of militants who are trying to stage a coup. Not the most original storyline, but it’s good enough for a video game. It’s a third person shooter which switches between tense combat and steal missions, neither of which are anything special. They’re not bad by any means, just too generic — nothing stands out, and we don’t get to do anything we haven’t done a million times before. You’ll be jumping in and out of cover a lot, much like Gears of War and the cover system is quite smooth. We did experience a few issues, mostly related to the AI, but overall the campaign was smooth

Multiplayer wise, there’s co-op, and then there’s the main course of the game: SOCOM is known for its multiplayer far more than its singleplayer, and in SOCOM 4, there are plenty of multiplayer modes and plenty of maps to check out. With up to 32 players, multiplayer is quite competent and can get very tense (and that’s a good thing in multiplayer). However, like much of the game, there isn’t anything in SOCOM 4 we haven’t see before. Furthermore, we experienced a lot of lag and glitches in the multiplayer, to the point where it felt like a beta.

Visually, SOCOM looks decent, it’s not the prettiest game by far, but where it excels is during the cut scenes. Facial animations and visuals during cut scenes are stunning, to say the least, and coupled with great voiceover, it’s offers some of the best cut scenes you can have. Too bad the story and characters are too generic for us to care. The rest of the game looks decent, but doesn’t stack up against heavy weights like Uncharted. It is worth noting that SOCOM 4 supports 3D and Move, but we didn’t get to check those features out.

Ultimately, what SOCOM 4 offers has been done many times before, and done better. If you want a great campaign, great visuals and competitive multiplayer, get Killzone 3. Because virtually everything SOCOM 4 offers, you can get better elsewhere. If you’re a die hard SOCOM fan, you’ll probably enjoy it.

The Good:
Great-looking cut scenes
Good co-op mode

The Bad:
Campaign is too generic
Gameplay is too generic
Multiplayer is laggy and glitchy

Overall score: 6/10

Zipper Interactive has been pushing out one of the most successful shooting franchises that’s hit the streets for the PlayStation in the form of SOCOM. Currently, the developer is gearing up to launch SOCOM 4 which will feature ground up compatibility with the PlayStation Move motion controller coupled with top notch graphics and gameplay.

If you want to get down on the game early you’ll want to make note that the SOCOM 4 beta for PlayStation Plus subscribers has just gone live. According to Sony to beta will run through the 28th and will feature various game modes for PlayStation Plus subscribers to try out.

If you weren’t aware PlayStation Plus costs $49.99 for a year or $17.99 for 3 months which will give you early access to betas, new demos to try out and much more.

If you give the SOCOM 4 beta a go let us know how it is!

If you’ve ever played a game of Halo or Call of Duty online you’ll know the deal – get killed by a screaming 12 year old and then proceed to watch your body get teabagged. Sure, this is a fun way to grind your opponents gears but Zipper Interactive will be introducing a whole new way to do the deed in the form of victory dances. That’s right, SOCOM 4 will include 3 different victory dances that can be initiated over a dead body by pressing the Circle button.

Included dances are “The Chicken”, “The Robot” and “The Crane” which you can check out in the above video.

While this doesn’t really add to the overall gameplay it will definitely add a nice an innovative element to the game that is sure to see a lot of use online.

SOCOM 4 will be out exclusively for the PlayStation 3 on April 19th of this year.

Just earlier today we told you that that Gears of War 3 beta would be kicking off on April 18th for Bulletstorm Epic Edition owners but if you’re a PS3 owner, that probably doesn’t mean much to you. Luckily, the PS3 has their own respective line up of exclusive shooters as well – one of them being Zipper Interactive’s highly popular SOCOM franchise.

The SOCOM franchise has seen numerous releases over just about every one of Sony’s consoles both portable and not. However, as of now, Zipper Interactive has not released a game SOCOM game for the PlayStation 3 with the console’s only SOCOM title, SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Confrontation, being developed by Slant Six Games. This just won’t do considering Zipper created the franchise and the PS3 is one of the most technologically advanced consoles on the market. Luckily, Zipper will be going on to produce a SOCOM game for the PS3 simply dubbed SOCOM 4.

We’ve seen several tech demos of this game in the past with the developers making an emphasis on the Move support but until we actually get our hands on the game we won’t know for sure how it will fare. While the game itself won’t hit store shelves until April 19th, Zipper has just let us know some details regarding the game’s beta.

First of all, a private beta will be launching in March 15th with Zipper simply stating that they’ll be “contacting elegible players soon.” Following that is a more widespread release with PlayStation Plus subscribers getting the beat on March 22nd, Killzone 3 owners getting it on March 29th and finally all PS3 owners with PSN access getting it on April 5th.

In terms of gameplay, the beta will include two different maps dubbed Assault & Battery and Port Authority and 4 different game modes including Uplink, Bomb Squad, Last Defense and Suppression.

That being said, as an extra tidbit we’ve included a video of SOCOM 4 being played with the PlayStation Move after the break. Be sure to check it out and let us know what you think.
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Sony has revealed a new bundle which includes PlayStation Move and SOCOM 4, called “Deployment Edition”. The new bundle includes a copy of SOCOM 4, one PlayStation Move controller and Navigation controller, a “Sharp Shooter” gun attachment, and a PlayStation Eye camera.

The bundle will be available on April 19 and will retain for $150.

Guerilla Games’ Killzone franchise is one of the hardest hitting exclusives that the Playstation 3 has. Killzone 2 had some bugs here and there but was received generally well and applauded for its hard hitting graphics and amusing gameplay. Well, Killzone 3 is just over the horizon and looks to bring gamers things like 3D graphics and more.

If you’re picking up Killzone 3, you’ll be happt o know that a beta for Zipper Interactive’s Socom 4 is being bundled with the game. There’s no telling exactly what will be included in the Socom 4 beta but considering the game is largely multiplayer based it’d be safe to assume that it will definitely include that.

Killzone 3 will be hitting store shelves exclusively for the PS3 on February 22nd.

Every console on the market has their own respective exclusives that help them differentiate themselves from the rest. One hard hitting title that has been exclusive to Sony’s consoles is none other than SOCOM from Zipper Interactive. First appearing on the PlayStation 2, SOCOM has seen many different iterations spanning the PSP and now, the PS3.

Zipper Interactive’s latest title is SOCOM 4 which we’ve heard about many times in the past including its support for the PlayStation Move motion controller. However, while we’ve sene a whole slew of media surrounding the game we’ve yet to hear when the game will be released. Well, thanks to a Wall Street Journal article on the PlayStation Move we now know that SOCOM 4 will hit store shelves in April of this year.

Exactly when in April we aren’t sure but we’ll keep you posted.

Games are getting 3D support left and right. Yesterday, we learned that the upcoming Medal of Honor Black Ops will support 3D, and now Sony’s tactical shooter SOCOM 4 is confirmed to sport 3D as well. In fact, developer Zipper Interactive has confirmed that the delay of the game to 2011 is solely because they need to add the 3D feature. Not only that, the game will support PlayStation Move as well.

About a week ago Sony let us in on their big announcement which turned out to be SOCOM 4. Love it or hate it, the SOCOM franchise is a valuable asset to Sony and the Playstation 3 in general. Not long after SOCOM 4 got announced, Sony announced Playstation Move, the official name for the fabled Playstation Motion Controller. These two announcements led gamers everywhere to ask if the two would work in harmony. The answer? Yes, they will.

At GDC Sony announced that SOCOM 4 will be one of the games that will utilize Move. Of course, you’re still going to be able to use a normal Dual Shock 3 controller but if you want to get a little more immersion and use Move, you can do that too.

via joystiq

Other than CounterStrike and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, the game that really got me into online gaming was SOCOM: US Navy SEALs for the PS2. Sure, the game isn’t an FPS, but something about it had me playing until early in the morning. Well, much to my enjoyment Sony has just been nice enough to announce the newest installment to the series; SOCOM 4.
A trailer for the game is set to drop at some point today which we’ll let you know about. Sony comments on the game:

“Although you’re vastly outnumbered, you’re armed with the latest weaponry and your men are second to none – but do you possess the stealth, speed and tactical thinking to lead them to victory? Time is not on your side: you have just six days to complete your mission. To emerge victorious, you must lead from the front, maintain control of the situation and fight with sheer intensity.”

via sony