Hola senoritas and senors, welcome to the luxurious island of San Esperito. Sure, the government is a total dictatorship and is corrupt as could be, but come on down anyways and enjoy the lush scenery. However, be mindful of men in parachutes, cause someone is looking to bring down the government and initiate change that is sure to rock the isle.

When a preview starts out with you freefalling from the sky, the wind rushing by you, as you release your parachute and try to descend onto a moving vehicle where your first target to kill is, you know there is something unique to be had. In Just Cause, you play as Rico Rodriguez, an undercover CIA operative whose job is to go into countries with these corrupt governments and bring them down so that we can establish more American ideals. The game is setup like the Grand Theft Auto series and the more recent Saint's Row in many ways, as you have an absolutely gigantic world to run about in (1225 square miles) with things like vehicles to jack, weapons to collect, people to kill, only instead of the urban warfare of those past two series, Just Cause goes for the more military minded storytelling.

The goal of the preview is to kill four targets, which will help your cause of changing the island's regime. The first target, as mentioned, is in his vehicle and you are descending upon him as you jumped from a helicopter. The freefall is amazing in its rush, as you can angle the character down to increase speed, pull him back to slow down, and you can release your parachute so you don't die (however, if you perfect it, you can freefall all the way down to the vehicle and press the land on vehicle button in just enough time so you didn't have to use the parachute at all). Once you land on the vehicle, hop into it, kick him out, and fill him with lead.

The other targets work in much the same way, as the game presents them in such a way as to give you an idea of the scope and type of vehicles you'll be able to use. After that first target is dead, you can jump back into the car and takeoff for the next target, hijack another car, motorcycle, and then the last two targets are even killed by using helicopters and super powered boats, and these all controlled remarkably well across the rough terrain of the island's many dirt roads.

Besides the target assassinations, another gameplay type available in the preview involved Rico helping some local guerillas to take back a territory, which meant you and your AI controlled buddies storming a mansion in this case, killing the guards that surrounded the place at regular intervals, and destroying barricades with grenades when they blocked the guerrillas from moving any farther down the road.

The controls were especially tight throughout the preview, because after you got the initial rundown of what did what, it was extremely easy to perform a complicated maneuver like hijacking a car, speeding off, mounting the vehicle, releasing your parachute, descending onto an enemy vehicle, kicking them out, and then shooting them. I know, sounds complicated, but the button combos are easily identifiable after you experiment a little and the lock-on of your weapons (indicated by red and white circles appearing over your enemies) insured that it was really intuitive how you could easily run around your enemies while you continued to pop them full of lead.

The best thing about the game was easily the stunt mentality of Just Cause, as the action for the most part is completely unrealistic, but works in that Michael Bay action film sort of way. Jumping from moving car to moving car, using a car to get some speed then mount it for a parachute enabled jump, hanging from the tail of a helicopter so you can freefall, and jumping off a cliff high enough to enable your parachute to open and descend to the ground below were all action film worthy moments that instilled a sense of awe in me each time they happened (I spent a great deal of time just parachuting, because the draw distance is amazing in that it looks as if everything is visible on the screen at once).

Speaking of draw distance and graphics, the game is a lush beauty, as the corral underneath the ocean, the sandy beaches, thick and green trees and other fauna all made the island feel like a real exotic place that you'd pay to go visit (that is, if it wasn't overrun with a power hungry government). Explosions and more natural man made environmental features like factories and mansions were also rendered expertly well, with equal attention paid to Rico, who looks like a character that I wouldn't mind controlling for a while, as he had a very cool style and look to him.

I must say that before now I had hardly heard anything about the game, or if I did it was only something random like the fact about the total square miles of terrain within the game, but even then it never registered on my radar. After playing the preview, however, it is a huge, bleeping dot on my radar now and I can't wait to get my hands on the complete version, and participate in some more Die Hard-esque action in this surprising game. A sleeper hit possibly all the way, but maybe a hit nonetheless. If the preview is any indicator, a hit could be an extremely likely scenario. Now if you'll excuse me, I want to go parachuting again.