Review #445: X-Men Legends

 The game that made me hate Iceman.

 So, over 10 years ago someone came up with a brilliant idea: Mix X-men with Diablo. Why someone hadn't come up with said idea is beyond, but it worked, it received three sequels and even DC jumped on the same ship with Justice League Heroes. But as much as I love the franchise, I never had the opportunity to play the first game, the one that started the franchise... and I think I was lucky.

 The story pits Xavier's mutants, the X-Men, against Magneto's Brotherhood of Mutants. The X-men fighting for peace between Humans and Mutants, the Brotherhood of Mutants fighting for dominance over the Homo-sapiens. But it's not all that simple, Kinkaid's brewing a new plan involving the mutant-slayers, the Sentinels. It's an alright story that's faithful to the source material. In between missions you'll be able to explore the X-Mansion, and interestingly, all this is done through the eyes of Magma. While she's not a mandatory character on missions, and the game doesn't revolve around her, it was a brilliant idea to frame the story through the eyes of a not very popular character, so she's as new to the X-Men as most are new to her character.

 X-Men Legends is a Diablo clone, which makes it a dungeon-crawler RPG. You take a team of 4 mutants from a total of 15(Or so the game claims. You can only play as Professor X twice, and it's more of a must rather than a choice). Each character has three special moves(Usually a single target move, a area-of-effect move and a temporary boost) as well as an 'Extreme Attack' that borrows energy from a shared pool of energy rather than Mana. The usual staples of the genre are in too, you will carry Health and Mana potions, enemies drop equipment and cash too. The loot is a bit limited though, there're no modifiers and the variety is fairly small. It can be played simultaneously with another player, which is kinda cool, and the AI takes control of the other 3 or 2 mutants, albeit you can switch characters at the tap of a button. Said AI can be customized a bit, how aggressive you want it to use, when and if you want it to use health potions and which special move you want them to use if you press L2 to have the AI attack your target.

 Every time a character levels up, he earns 1 stat point and 1 ability point(twice for levels ending in 5), stat points can be spent in: Strike(Melee), Agility(Defense), Body(Health) or Focus(Mana)... but you'll soon find out that Melee will never do much damage, and Agility is negligible if you spend your points on body, so even physical fighters are better off spending points in Body and Focus to be able to tank hits and spam their special moves. As for abilities, they can level up their three basic special moves as well as a few passive abilities. The Extreme Move must be earned with these Ability points as well, but since the energy pool is shared... I just had one character learn his and had the rest of the characters spend their ability points on other things.

 While it's a Diablo clone, the combat feels more like a beat'em up. Characters have various attack strings made up of weak and strong hits. You can grab enemies and throw them, or even pick up objects and throw them, and not every character has enough strength to pick up every object! There're also a few puzzles.... that require specific characters. This, THIS absolutely ruined the game for me. When you least expect it, which is more often than not, the game will require you to bring Iceman to build bridges. Or put out fires. See? I was running Cyclops, Wolverine, Magma and Psylocke/Rogue, so I was completely boned. The second Morlock stage is particularly bad, since the save-point, the place where you can swap team members, was three maps away. THREE maps away. Do you know how much time I wasted because I didn't have goddamn Iceman on my team? And the best part about it? After finishing the game I found out that Magma can build bridges.... with her second skill. Would've been nice to know, since you always have to use primary skills to do these 'puzzles'(Which are more like stupid obstacles). And Jean Grey can build bridges too, but I TRIED using her on the first stage and it wouldn't work... though it doesn't surprise me, since even with Iceman, sometimes, if I didn't hit the target just right, the bridge wouldn't be built. Fun.

 There's another map in which you have to use both Jean Grey and Cyclops to finish the 'puzzle', so if you don't fancy either, have fun going back to a save point and losing two character slots. And Cyclops is used to weld doors. Do you even X-men? Cyclops shoots CONCUSSIVE energy, not Heat. This would've been acceptable with broader limitations, like having characters that can lift heavy objects to clear obstacles, or having ANY psychic(Psylocke, Emma) be able to build bridges. But nope, you have very limited choices when it comes to dealing with these stupid excuses for puzzles. Where's the fun in making a team if I can't play as the characters I like?

 The game should last you between 12-20 hours depending on how thorough you are. There's no backtracking and no game plus(Although you can unlock costumes for future playthroughs), which kinda sucks. Take Psylocke, she's unlocked 2/3 into the game, so unless you like replaying Danger Room missions, she'll only see about 5 dungeons worth of gameplay. And since I'm talking about gripes, the AI loves to get in your way. Say, you open a door and there're enemies behind it, they will dash right in-front of you, not letting you go through since now they're stuck getting damaged by enemies. And pray you don't get yourself surrounded by objects, since the AI won't move out of its place to let you through. Don't even let me get started on CPUs you must escort, they may get stuck on doors, or you'll have to go around the place you have to take them over and over again until they realize they have to get INTO the van. Fun.

 X-Men Legends certainly set up the basics for great future games... but as it stands, this game is very, very flawed. I'm sure some design choices sounded good on paper, but they just get in the way of the player's entertainment. I know it's tempting to play as characters that never made it beyond this game, like Jubilee, Emma Frost or Magma... but if you haven't played it before, it's not worth it... unless you like a particular team set-up that doesn't require you going back to a savepoint to sort a stupid obstacle. And that's the sad part, I'm sure that if I had liked Iceman, and thus had had him on my team 24/7, I wouldn't have hated the game so much sometimes. And that's the thing, depending on how you play will change how much enjoyment you'll get out of it.
 6.0 out of 10

Now Playing: X-Men Legends

 Legendary ripoff.

 I don't know who had the brightest idea to rip off Diablo but with X-men characters, but that guy was a genius! And the one who decided to bring the entire Marvel universe into the mix? Give him a raise! But I'm getting ahead of myself, two games ahead as a matter of fact.

 While I played both X-Men Legends 2 and Marvel Ultimate Alliance on the PC, as well as Ultimate Alliance 2 on the PS3, Legends 1 always eluded me since, by that time I was more of a PC gamer(I know) and my PS2 was kinda dead, so I was stuck with the PC ports of Legends 2 and MUA. But no more!

 I played a teeny tiny little bit, joined up with Cyke and defeated The Blob and... it feels pretty much like every other game in the franchise, which is a good thing... I think.

Review #444: Dead to Rights - Reckoning

 The follow-up we deserved.

 Dead to Rights II was disappointing to say the least, but Namco wasn't done with with Dead to Rights, not yet, and thus, Reckoning made it into the PSP. It brings fast-paced, arcade shooting action at the palm of your hand, and despite the weaker hardware, proves to be the real sequel(Prequel?) to Dead to Rights 1.

 Reckoning is a prequel to the prequel, which means chronologically it takes place before Dead to Rights II. Not that it really matters, these games never cared too much about story, and this is no exception. You only get a few lines of text before the game starts, concerning a hostage. And it seems like the took the piss with this one, as one too many times Jack Slate chases a lead, kills the lead and then complains about the lead being dead. And while Dead to Rights 1 was very cheesy, I think having the kidnapee be a fetished highscool-uniform wearing babe is a bit too much. The entire game is finished in under an hour, which is kinda sad, but it has a multiplayer component... in case you know someone else with a PSP.

 As with previous games, this is an arcade-shooter, meaning that it's nonstop, fast-paced third-person shooting all the way through. Jack retains most abilities from the console games, he can dive and dive in slo-mo, crouch, instakill disarm an enemy or send Shadow to instakill them. It all works better than II since it feels more like Dead to Rights 1. Shadow has his own gauge and cool-down, and well called down upon an enemy initiates a cutscene, thus making him useful again, disarms can be performed at any time, and you can switch to punches at the tap of a button, not that you'll run out of ammo in this game anyways. Fisticuffs are kinda useless to be honest, every single enemy comes armed with guns, so there's absolutely no scenario in which going melee is useful. But hey, at least the option's there, unlike II!

 In DTRII, having to redo entire segments was kinda annoying, but this time around there're checkpoints!... which are useless, since, at least on the normal difficulty setting, the game is rather easy, and loading screens don't last more than 2 seconds either. It's probably this easy to make up for the fact that it's running on a handheld with a single analog stick. I know that they made the most of the hardware, but having to quickly tap R to switch between targets can be rather imprecise at times. Movement is a bit floaty as well, but in a game like this, it doesn't get in your way. At all.

 It seems like I'm not crazy believing that this is the True Dead to Rights II since Reckoning reuses a ton of assets from Dead to Rights II. Entire stages, most enemy models, weapons and even Jack himself come straight out of Dead to Rights II, albeit with a lower polygon count. And, y'know what, it kinda redeems it in my eyes. This is the game it should've been, a fast-paced shooter that doesn't require you to think, but rather, kill as many enemies as you can in as little time as possible while looking as badass as you can.

 This is the game I wanted. This is what I expected out of a sequel(Prequel?) to Dead to Rights. This is a brainless, but highly entertaining, action game on the PSP, probably among the best. It also serves as an apology for botching Dead to Rights II!
 8.0 out of 10

Review #443: Mortal Kombat 4

 'This isn't brutality... it's fatality!', that's a classic!

 Mortal Kombat's case is a strange one. If you ask me, the first game was shallow garbage that only made a name for itself thanks to violence. One needs only look at Mortal Kombat VS DC, probably the worst of the bunch, which took away the violence... and people hated it for it, and not for its glitchy, ugly nature. And thus, I created a mindset that thought all Mortal Kombat games before 9 had been horrible. I was wrong.

 In Mortal Kombat 4 Shao Khan lies defeated, and how long did that last!?, but a new threat comes to Earth, the fallen god Shinnok, so the forces of Earth band together to stop him. The game features 15 characters, 8 returning and 7 new ones, alongside two hidden characters(Goro and Noob Saibot). And you could argue that Quan-chi, Shinnok and Fujin debuted a few days earlier in Mythologies. This game usually gets a lot of flak on the art design, citing Reptile's beginning on his descent towards a more bestial form and how Jarek sucks. But I disagree! I adore the art-style. Every character looks as if built with similar pieces, just look at how many characters have leg protectors or fabric between their legs, but I really like it. Reiko is a pseudo-Ninja clone, but with spikes on his legs and throws Shuriken, this gave us the first 'Frozen Sub-Zero' costume(Which is really cool!), a grey skull-headed Scorpion, and Liu Kang looks badass with a tank-top. I loved the new pseudo-femme Ninja Tanya with her yellow costume, Fujin is among the best new designs, and while I'm not much of a fan of Kai, I love how he is supposed to be another version of Liu-Kang, with vertical fireballs instead of horizontal. As for Jarek, while his moveset is uninspired(It's Kano's!) I love the armored pieces on his legs and arms, as well as the color design. He ain't that bad.

 The game offers an Arcade mode, with CG endings for all 15 basic characters, 2 on 2 fights, Team Battles, Tournament and Endurance(Think Survival) and Practice modes. Arcade features a few variations, you can pick different sized ladders and change the roster of opponents of each by tapping Start up to four times. Practice mode is a bit weird, since you can only change the settings before entering the practice battle, but it's the only place in the game that has a movelist... which is actually a plus since most games of the era forwent movesets entirely.

 Mortal Kombat 4 did away with dial-up combos, and has a more uniform combo system more akin to 2... which means that every single character has the same exact moveset bar special moves. And even then, many characters have similar movesets, so you can probably find analogues to combos, for instance, you could easily replace Tanya's spiral kick with Quan-chi's sliding kick, thus having access to the same combos that required said moves. It's shallow, it's simple and for people looking for depth it's a disappointment.... but I liked it. Landing hits feels really nice, and combos are pretty easy to land, making for a relatively good entry-level fighter.

 Another new addition is weapon combat: each character has a semi unique weapon(A few might look different, but they behave the same. Kinda like a bunch o' characters in the game!) and can pull it out with different button combinations. If hit, the fighter will drop his weapon, and then any fighter can pick it up! A few stages even have a few objects, like decapitated heads or rocks, that can be picked up and thrown for big damage. Side-stepping is a thing now, but it's a bit slow and awkward, so you probably won't be using it much. The rest of Mortal Kombat staples remain, two punches and two kicks, a block button and a run button.

 The game also implements a 'Maximum Damage' mechanic meant to make infinite combos impossible. Basically, if your combo reaches 50% damage, you'll be pushed far from your opponent. This is a bit wonky, since sometimes, if you deal a ton of damage, quickly without stop(Even if it doesn't look like a combo), the game will push you back anyways. Can't say I'm a fan. As for the CD-based version of the game, there's a bit more loading than I would've liked, included micro-loading seconds before a new round begins, which is kinda ridiculous.

 Lastly, running this on a PS2 caused some problems. A few negligible minor audio glitches as well as joystick issues if I turned on vibration. These resolved themselves when playing on a PS3 though. At least, unlike Mortal Kombat Trilogy on the PS2, this won't freeze at the end!

 I liked Mortal Kombat 4, that said, you gotta take it like it is: Style over substance. It's shallow, everything, from character design to gameplay, is very samey, characters can be freely interchanged between each other and you won't have trouble adapting... but I kinda liked it. I mean, it is an oldschool Mortal Kombat game, so of course most characters feel somewhat the same. So, for what it is, it's rather fun.
 6.5 out of 10

Now Playing: Mortal Kombat 4

 I might have to retract previous statements...

 I've said previously that Mortal Kombat didn't have any good games until 9. And I was talking from memory and personal experience, having played almost every numbered game since I was younger. Mortal Kombat 4 was probably my favorite, having spent countless hours playing it on the N64, and even then, I remembered it as a shallow, worthless affair.

 But I've spent a few hours playing it now... and it's really fun. OK, so every character is kinda samey, both in moveset and look(Fancy how almost everyone's got fabric hanging between their legs!), and the combo system is kinda simple... but it's fun. And I love the graphic style and art direction they went with for this game. It's probably a good entry-level fighting game, no frills no thrills.

 I came across a few audio glitches, and every now and then it won't detect my joystick for a spell and pause the game... but I think it's how the PS2 runs the game, since I gave it a whirl on the PS3 and it was just fine.

 I'm sorry Mortal Kombat, maybe you weren't as bad as I remembered you to be. Mortal Kombat Trilogy should be arriving shortly, so that should be interesting.

Review #442: Dead to Rights II

 The disappointing return of Jack Slate.

 Earlier this year I played Dead to Rights II, and boy was it good. Dead to Rights II is a prequel to Dead to Rights, and not only did it go back in time, it also took a ton of step backs while fixing very little. It was hard to prevent my disappointment from seeping over how the game was, because it's not terrible... but it doesn't reach Dead to Rights 1's heels.

 The game abandons all premise for story, while Dead to Rights 1 was a cheesy action-cop movie trope-fest, this has about 6 different cut-scenes with a poor excuse of a story thread tying them all together. I can't complain, this game went straight to business: Shooting down waves after waves after waves of thugs. It's a bit more mindless too, Shadow, Jack's canine partner, is but a a tool, and enemy bosses lack any sort of personality, you're in it for the arcade shooter action, not to be distracted with anything else.

 The previous game mixed hand-to-hand combat with run-and-gun-and-sometimes-take-cover shooting action, but this game separates both. There's about 4, very short, melee combat segments in the entire game, and the latter half of the game since to have forgotten about it, since there's no more hand to hand combat by then. It's quite alright, as these segments are rather bland: just mindlessly mash punch and kick, grab the occasional weapon and keep punching and kicking. The animations are a bit smoother than before, but it lacks some of the gratifying feedback from landing blows, so it's a bit duller.

  As for the shooting, it's more restrictive this time around. You still rely on R1 to auto-target your enemies, you can still dive and dive in slow motion by using stamina, take cover behind objects, grab enemies as meat shields, instakill disarms and use Shadow to kill enemies, and now you can also duck too. But while everything returns... it's been nerfed. Shadow will either distract or kill enemies depending on how much Stamina you've got left, so no stamina = no Shadow. Instakill disarms now have a cooldown, although landing one fills your stamina completely, and using meatshields is tied to the very same stamina gauge as Shadow and slow-mo dives. And Shadow is almost useless unless you use him to cheese the game, he no longer inititates a cut-scene when he attacks, so why use him if he takes longer to get to an enemy and maul him than simply shooting at said enemy?

 Look, if this was the first game in the series, I probably wouldn't have minded the restrictive mechanics that make the game a bit more strategic with your stamina consumption. If. But the fact is: Dead to Rights 1 came out first, and the way that game worked was beautiful. This? This is restrictive, and the game gets quite hard too. You will run out of ammo frequently, and you can't switch to fists, so you're completely boned unless you've stamina to call Shadow. Enemy Placement is also particularly annoying, they come out of corners, guns ablazing, so they will probably get a few hits in before you can react, heck, even when you open a door they're already shooting at you before you can react. It's a challenging game, and not necessarily for the right reasons.

 Luckily the AI is relatively stupid, once they see you they will freeze in place waiting for you to come to them. They might sometimes throw grenades, but they'll shout at you, so it's easy to dodge. Point is, if you're low on health, which you will be frequently, you can just sit idly by behind a wall, waiting for your Stamina to recharge and send Shadow over and over again, turning this arcade shooter into a waiting game. And it's not like I wanted to, but the game is so cheap that it turned into a viable strategy when I was short on health, since I didn't want to replay the entire segment again or go through the exceedingly long loading screens again either.

 The game's got a few poor design choices too. Every single enemy boss has a few invincibility periods just to annoy the player. Level design can be rather spotty some times, Chapter 6 is particularly bad, making you go through the same segments over and over again, you don't even know why, since the game is so thin on story and explanations, so you mindlessly go through countless foes as you retread old ground. And the last chapter? The game expects you to figure out that you have to shoot at a machine, something that you've never had to do before and have no reason to suspect that you have to shoot at something to activate it, in order to... send electricity back to an elevator? The hell????

 At least no more infinite enemies or stupid mini-games, right? Right??? Sigh, Dead to Rights II is a disappointing follow up to a great game and a mediocre game on its own right. To be fair to the game, when it's at its best, it's a rather fun arcade shooter, but those moments are rare and far in-between. It's hard to understand what the developers where going for with this game, as most changes feel so misguided or poor... The best way to experience this game is, probably, by not playing the first game first, that way you'll be able to enjoy this game the most... probably.
 6.0 out of 10

Now Playing: Dead to Rights II & Dead to Rights Reckoning

 One's really good and one's really disappointing.

 Oh boy, where do I start with this one? Shoot-outs and fisticuffs have been separated into different segments. Which sucks, since it's easy to run out of ammo. And all your fancy disarms and Shadow? Nerfed. Disarms now have a cooldown tied to Stamina, and how effective Shadow is depends on your Stamina, oh, and it no longer initiates a cutscene, so Shadow does what you could do but in a slower, less useful way. It feels so limiting... which is a shame, because when the game is at its best, it's a blast. 

 Because it's not a bad game, it's not horrible, but it doesn't measure up to the standards left by the first game.

 And then I took a bite out of reckoning. I was a bit worried, the menus looked exactly like the ones from II, even Jack has a lower-poly version of his DtRII model. But it's much better. Shadow has his own gauge, separate from Stamina, and initiates a cutscene when he mauls an enemy, making him as useful as he was in 1. Disarms are unlimited, just get close to an enemy and tap circle. And you can trade your guns for knuckles at any time, not that I needed to since I haven't run out of ammo yet, but I like knowing that I have possibility.
 I've played but two levels and I know that this is what Dead to Rights II should've been. An expanding and not limiting, that's the way to go... although I think the cover function is gone, but who needs it, this is an arcade shooter not a cover-based shooter!