Bionic Commando Rearmed 2 has no sort of online play at all. None. There is co-op, but only offline. There is no reason for you to be online if you're playing the game. Unless you want the stupid thing to work, of course. Capcom requires your PlayStation 3 to be online to play Bionic Commando Rearmed 2, the same requirement that everyone hated in Final Fight—a game that at least had online play.

This requirement is laid out in the game's description with a note saying you must log into the PlayStation Network every time you'd like to play, but this makes little sense. Is piracy becoming that large of a problem with downloadable games? Will this do much to stop piracy, even as it annoys everyone who actually buys the game? These are all open questions, but it's hard to justify spending money on a game that won't work if the PlayStation Network ever goes down.

We're busy playing the game for an upcoming review, but we're not sure what to do with coverage when we know most readers are going to reject the game based on this ridiculous online requirement. The Xbox Live version of the game does not require an online connection to play after download. That can't make Sony happy.

One theory states that this is a move to stop the game from being shared between players, and to track how many people are playing each copy of the game. There has to be a better way.