They say that, to get to know someone, you'll need to walk a mile in his shoes. Well, the Odour Eaters better be on hand for Capcom's latest blaster Without Warning, because you'll get the chance to play as six different people, all experiencing the same terrorist takeover of a chemical plant.

You've got all out blasting with the Special Forces soldiers, on-foot action with the cop, and a bit of sneaking and stealthing with the TV reporter and trapped scientist. Your actions while playing as one character have no consequences further down the line, though - it would have been great to have a bit more of a branching storyline. Level design doesn't help either; impassable two-foot-high walls make for a very on-rails experience, offset by the inclusion of many pointless, empty rooms. Weird.

The 24-style clock ominously counts down the minutes between stages, and the game does a decent job of ratcheting up the tension. To hammer home the point that it's all happening at the same time, you'll hear the same dialogue from several different perspectives. There's too much repetition though, and it ends up coming across as a tad lazy. Although gameplay is fast and frantic, missions are a relentless barrage of respawning enemies, doing their darnedest to stop you obtaining yet another keycard or defusing the umpteenth bomb in a level. Controversially, there's no checkpoint system either; bite the big one and it's a long slog through the same slew of generic enemies. The third-person camera that zooms in and out to accommodate the action is a good idea, but close-up firefights can be confused and annoying affairs.

It's a refreshing premise, but it isn't executed as well as it should be. Approach with caution.

Great idea, mediocre execution. The fast and frantic gunplay is a laugh, although it gets repetitive very quickly.