The war, or the battle for supremacy, is played out over a series of missions, all of which are standard fare including defending your turf, diffusing a bomb, killing a specific amount of enemy AC, and finding your way out of a level. What I found the most frustrating is having the enemy fire relentlessly on you while you try to navigate your way through an area filled with friendly Cores that get in your way. This is made all the more difficult with the strafing and boost controls that tend to move your Core into unintended directions.

The boost power-ups are good for getting you out of a jam quickly, but at the expense of control. Oftentimes I find my Core thrown into the way of another gang of frenzied Core killers. I'm accustomed to the dual stick control scheme of the PS2, and find the nub on the PSP virtually useless, not to mention the inconvenience of having to use the shoulder buttons to strafe. I found it easier to use the D-pad instead of the nub, just not more fun. Another problem is the camera. Unless you have a body that can turn quickly, the camera feels like a ten-ton weight. It's slow and cumbersome. By the time you look up to see what's shooting at you, you're usually dead.

Silent Line Portable is not the only PSP game that requires a larger screen and more detailed graphics, but that's no excuse. Things get messy quickly with muddled textures and the meshing and melding of the geometric shapes of buildings and robots. It would be much easier to get by with these graphics on a larger screen, where the environment could be more spread out.

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Expect the same sound effects as Armored Core 3, with even worse music. Fortunately, there's not a lot of audible ambient music, so enjoy the silence. If you can get a group of friends to partake of the Ad Hoc multiplayer mode, you will generate a bit more enjoyment from the game listening to your friends freak when they can't control their Core. Misery loves company.

By Cole Smith
CCC Senior Writer