You start out with the flak cannon from Unreal Tournament - pretty cool, yes - and then get increasingly crappier armaments from there. Ranged combat means blasting away meanly with one of a number of uninteresting weapons, the variety of which simply introduces less and less utility. The combat is messy: hand to hand combat means flailing about in the vicinity of the enemy. Their visual achievements, with the comic-strip cutscenes and cel-shaded thuggery, really are something. Paleo Entertainment are modders turned pro: they can't be expected to have QA'd this one into smooth gaming butter.

If we can step back for a moment - and get that perspective without self-bruising - it's worth remembering that Merchants of Brooklyn is a commercial outing in CryEngine 2 from a small, indie team. And then there are the crash bugs, the instant deaths, the quicksave attrition. A cyborg neanderthal gladiator using the dismembered limbs of his enemies and a transforming bionic arm to defeat the future Mob of Brooklyn - these ideas promise even more. The ultra-detailed cartoon visuals, where everything is outlined inked and outlined, certainly promise much. It looks fantastic: often colourful, occasionally monstrous, always stylish. Merchants Of Brooklyn is beautiful, brutal, horrendous and infuriating.

Perhaps a trip to the hospital will put things into perspective. I could beat myself around the face with it. A couple of hours into Merchants Of Brooklyn and I'm considering fetching that brick from the front garden.

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