Red Faction: Guerrilla is perhaps the most self-aware game released in recent times. It never tries to be more than it is and Volition has produced a title that is extremely tightly focussed and refined. Instead of deciding on a core mechanic and lumping unnecessary features on top of it, Guerrilla’s central concept of pitting one man with a hammer in a battle to the death against a building several stories high has been so well realised that the problems it has are hidden beneath a pile of rubble.

Seeing as this is a review and it is part of the game, the story should be discussed despite it being almost non-existent. Alec Mason travels to Mars to become a miner with his brother. It wasn’t entirely the best decision he’s ever made, though, as Mars is in the iron grip of the Earth Defense Force. After his brother is killed for giving the player a tutorial, Alec joins the eponymous Red Faction resistance movement and starts taking orders from the same omnipresent voice-over actor that guided the player in Crackdown, and proceeds to destroy half of Mars’s civilisation.

The premise and story only exists to provide context for the glorious mayhem that ensues as soon as the player takes control. There is one simple fact you must know about Red Faction: Guerrilla – it has the best destruction ever committed to a gaming disk. Almost every mission in the game asks the player to destroy someone’s property, and knocking down buildings simply never gets old.

Buildings, bridges, turbines and power stations are governed by semi-realistic physics that have had a healthy dose of videogame fun applied to their structural integrity, which allows the player to topple government strongholds with a sledgehammer. Each blow weakens individual walls and support beams and sections of buildings will fall in on themselves as girders are knocked out and load-bearing walls are destroyed. Each building becomes a puzzle and working out the fewest number of sections to demolish to bring the whole thing down is a real joy. In fact, one of the side-mission-types creates a puzzle by giving the player a building and a limited inventory and time limit and tasking them with reducing it to rubble as quickly as possible. These become fiendishly addictive and showcase the brilliantly implemented physics in the game.

Of course, it might get boring if the sledgehammer was the only tool at your disposal, but thankfully there is a veritable toy-box of anti-building weapons. Rockets of varying power, sticky charges and a rifle that fires rounds that deconstruct matter are available to wreak havoc across the red planet. Improvised destruction methods such as explosive barrels and make-shift battering-rams (hijacked vehicles) are littered about the world and the designers have always made sure the player has something to hand to cause some demolition.

Guerrilla is very much a traditional sandbox game with a number of story missions and a bewildering amount of side-missions that unlock upgrades and help liberate sectors. The mission types don’t offer much in the way of surprise, with hostage rescues, destructive rampages and convoy raids all acting as a reason to create explosions. It should be noted that although the game allows you to progress through the story with a minimal number of side-quests needed to be completed, the side-quests unlock most of the cool toys, so it is well worth taking some time to upgrade your arsenal. Once you get the jet pack you will wonder how you ever lived without it.

Whilst the world may be filled with objectives, it is certainly not full of interest. The art is very reminiscent of Total Recall and the music has a distinct 80s movie vibe, but Mars is mostly just rock of varying shades. Structures jut out of the craggy landscape and are filled with civilians and soldiers milling about, but there is very little to draw the player in and engender a sense of discovery and exploration. The world exists purely to house pockets of chaos and to provide some ground to cover between mission locations. This again speaks to the focus of the game, but the player will often wish for a more compelling world to explore.

The campaign provides more than enough content to keep the player going for many, many hours, but on top of this, Volition has completely over-delivered on the multiplayer content. The game features a number of modes that emphasise working with your team to destroy the other team’s buildings and features a now-expected levelling-up system to reward you for your hard work. The real stand out feature of the multiplayer is the use of backpacks. There are a number of different backpacks to pick up and wear throughout the maps that grant the player abilities such as an enhanced sprint, a jetpack and increased fire power. Things get interesting with the more powerful backpacks, though. Rhino allows the player to run straight through walls, smashing them aside, and Tremor creates a localised earthquake around the player, which quickly deals with pesky structures. Despite some odd crashes whilst using the Xbox guide in the otherwise competent matchmaking system, the game provides a highly unique multiplayer component that is certainly far more enjoyable than anyone expected it to be.

Red Faction: Guerrilla knows it is a game about making buildings fall over and it doesn’t purport to be anything else. It is the definition of an action game; a game that dispenses with silly ideas about storytelling and creating a living, breathing world and instead sets up an orgy of sledgehammer-based destruction for the player that is refined, focussed and, in some places, over-delivers in content. No other game sensationalises destruction in the way Guerrilla does and it is incredibly hard to complain about lack of depth when a bridge full of enemy vehicles comes crashing down due to few well-placed explosives and a liberal application of your hammer. Oh, you can also drive a walking construction vehicle which only has two controls: ‘move’ and ‘swing arms through wall’, which sums up the game nicely.