I make myself laugh sometimes. Teamwork and Competition working together? That will be the day! It may look like it's working...for a while, but it doesn't take very long until you realise that this 'Teamwork' thing is really a facade, a wolf in sheep's clothing. Sure, at the beginning when you're still learning how to play, you don't mind when the bigger guys take all of the loot, you just want to learn the ropes. But before long that feeling of kindness and indifference disappears, and greed consumes you.

See?! See what it's done to me?! It's making me sinister....sarcastic....almost evil! I haven't felt this way since....Gauntlet. Do you remember Gauntlet? The original Gauntlet? You spent the first hour of playing that game trying to get the hang of the system, working together with a friend or three, trying to find the invisible potion (It doesn't exist!!!) than all of a sudden, you notice the score on the side of the screen. "Was that there before?" I remember asking myself. Very sneakily, and not telling my 'teammates' I would begin to focus more and more on my score. Little did I know they were doing the same! All of a sudden the 'teamwork' has disappeared entirely, and the battle had begun! Then, at around level 16, they lift the veil, and allow you to stun each other when you shoot. It is clear from there what your mission is, to spend as much money as humanly possible until your score is the highest in existence.

Okay, T-Crew. Sorry for the long winded intro, I felt compelled to explain the essence that is T-Crew before the game itself. Consider it a disclaimer, if you are kind and giving, good natured and well mannered, then prepare to be changed. Treasure Crew, or T-Crew as it's more commonly known, is a game of competition. It's fair to say that most 'Room Based' games are, but why do I go into so much detail about competition? It's because T-Crew hides it so very well to begin with, making for an enjoyable little surprise after the first hour.

So after logging into the world that is T-Crew, selecting one of four very different characters, and completing a small but fun and informative tutorial, you enter the 'Beginners Channel' and if your anything like me, spend the next 10 minutes trying to figure out what all the button on the screen do. After finding my way around the screen (I have a tick, I need to know what all the buttons on an Interface do, at all times. I find unknown buttons have an ugly stare and distract me from the game.) I entered my first room, imagined giant balls of spit flying at me from the 5 other players yelling "RDY UUUUUUPPPPP!!!!!&$^$*#", and entered my first game.

Still at this point, I really didn't have any idea what was going on. I knew how to attack, jump, combo, and summon a "Crew" which the tutorial briefly explained to me was some kind of creature that was going to be following me around and blowing things up whenever I liked. So it's safe to say that I was happy, but confused. I knew that once this game began I was either going to be in a 'Bots' like world, or a 'Gunbound' like world, PvP or PvE more appropriately. I was slightly relieved (mainly because the other guys in the room had much bigger swords than I) to find that it was in favor of the Bots style of play. The multi-player adventure game, that will see you and a team of friends running through various levels killing monsters, bashing treasure chests and racing to every last item that hits the floor like orphans to breadcrumbs.

As I mentioned in the beginning, for the first few games loot seems of little importance. You're level 1, you have no idea what your doing, hell, all I really remember was trying to keep up, and not fall off the edge. We killed a few things, I leveled up, and we finished the level. "Let's go again!" Someone yelled. "Yeah that was awsome!" I yelled back. Back in it was to kill some more creatures and level up once more.

Then it all begun to slow down. Killing was getting easier, I was beginning to know the level layout, and as if out of nowhere, the score appeared. It was right next to our names, and tallied at the end. As if a slave to this meaningless score I instantly began to try harder. Ten minutes before then, I simply wanted the enemies dead, now, I wanted to kill them. I dashed in, jumped in the air and timed in an Aeriel Dash Attack perfectly. I quickly turned around to continue the combo, and claim the kill. The points were mine! Then out of the mangled corpse of my prey burst a bag of golden coins! I had seen them before but never had they held so much value as right now. I was level 3 after all, I had things to buy! Another quick Dash Roll and the coins were mine. It had begun.

Three hours later, I was level 8. I had new weapons, new gear, a new crew, and a much better understanding of the world of T-Crew. Here's what I learned, in no particular order.

Crews reminded me a lot of Pokemon. Yes, yes, I like Pokemon. While I was going to school it was all the rage, up every morning in time to watch every episode. Causing me to miss a single episode was punishable by having to listen to me recite them to you backwards, #151 to #1, a thousand times. My mother used to know them better than most of my friends. She paid for her crimes...

Right, so Crews come in all shapes and sizes, in all the usual elements (Earth, Fire, Wind, Water, Air, Light, Dark, Steel), can learn new abilities by collecting crystals throughout the various levels, and evolve at level 10 and 20. You are able to select one at the beginning, and can summon new once by collecting their 'Item' and a 'Summoning Stone' of sorts. A 'Toy Plane' for example would contain an Air Type Crew, whereas a 'Smoking Pipe' would have a Fire Type. Find or buy the Card and Crystal, and summon a new Crew. You can have up to 4 equipped at once, and doing so makes you very versatile, helpful at later stages in the game I found.

Game modes would be the thing I was most impressed with in T-Crew. There are many, and all of them are a lot of fun for a while. They are as follows:

In Summary I realised that I haven't really talked about as much of T-Crew as I would have liked. Because in all honestly there really isn't much more to talk about. Like many a room based game before it, T-Crew doesn't have much more to offer than what I've mentioned above. There are shops, skills, and upgrades a plenty, and for the dedicated players that make it to the end, whooping the bejesus out of every noob that stands before him might just be everything he's ever wanted. Unfortunately for me, it really isn't enough, and having reached level 10 mostly by playing alone because it was easier, faster, and so much more productive, I don't think that I'll be coming back for more.

That being said, I'm not really a 'Casual Gamer' (whatever that is). I play hard for hours at a time, sleep when I absolutely must, and usually get up early to keep doing so if the game warrants the attention. For someone that only has an hour a night to play, and there are plenty of you out there, this might be just the thing you need. A quick hack and slash after school or work to relieve the stress, without the dreadful grind of some other MMO's.