Ah the Sonic cylce: see the game’s reveal trailer, get excited thinking “finally, THIS is the game that will make Sonic be good again”, see some gameplay videos and think “this doesn’t look too bad!” and then play the game and realize it’s terrible as always. It happened with every Sonic game. EVEN Black Knight where they gave Sonic a sword had a lot of people thinking that it would be the game to revive Sonic.

Well, before actually playing the game, I was planning on coming into this review saying “Hey guys, this new Sonic games is bad as usual, don’t buy it, ‘k?”. But somehow I can’t do that, because then I’d be lying.

Read on and see what Generations did right with the Sonic franchise… FINALLY!

Developer: Sega
Publisher: Sega
Date of Release: November 1st 2011 (November 3rd for Steam)
Platforms: Playstation 3, Xbox 360, PC (Steam version reviewed)

Genre: Side-scrolling platformer
Rated E for Everyone

Overall feel

So the story goes as follow: some beast is blasting through time and space destroying everything in its path and taking Sonic’s friends prisoner in time. So Sonic has to save them. At the same time Sonic is dealing with that same monster that’s ravaging space and time… Oh, and by that I mean Sonic from the Genesis day. So you have 2 Sonics from different time periods fighting for a common goal, each with his own levels and gameplay style. The actual plot is actually NOT completely cringe-worthy like in other modern Sonic games. I couldn’t survive a whole Sonic Colors cinematic for example, while the cinematics here were at least bearable, and even really good in some cases (see: the cinematics before Metal Sonic and Shadow).

Generations is a game that pays tribute to everything Sonic. And I truly mean everything. This not only has levels from (well, more like “inspired by”, since they’re not exactly the same) Sonic 1, 2, 3&K, Adventure, Adventure 2, Heroes, 2006, Unleashed and Colors, but references to just about every Sonic game. There’s the kickass Toxic Caves music from Sonic Spinball and probably music from most Sonic games overall, the Chaotix are here (sadly no Chaotix-insipired level…. they have 2 Sonics to work with, so why not?), Blaze is here, Silver is here, you have Metal Sonic and Shadow… Not much of Sonic video game lore was forgotten here (seemingly no cartoon/comic references though, so no Princess Sally), though I will say Big the Cat seems to be missing… not that anyone really cares about him.

If you’re a Sonic fan, you’re gonna be in for a cool trip. But even then, this whole tribute to Sonic wouldn’t be any good if the gameplay sucked so…. There are 2 gameplay styles here. Fully side-scrolling levels with old-school Sonic in the style of the Genesis games, and levels that play like more recent Sonic games with some side-scrolling segments and some exploration/3D moments, so let’s talk about that!

Retro Sonic gameplay

Remember Sonic 2 on the Genesis? Yeah, this is just about what you’re getting here. As I and many other people have said for a long time, Sonic is not about speed, it’s about momentum and trying to maintain that momentum through properly timed jumps and spin dashes to avoid slower-moving segments of a level. This game pretty much nails this idea when it comes to the retro Sonic levels, with different paths depending on your performance. As far as I’ve seen, the physics are pretty much spot-on here, it really feels like Genesis Sonic (though, again, I just play the game, unlike the people who, instead of playing Sonic 4, tried to find problems with the physics that don’t exists in normal play… but from my experience there doesn’t seem to be the imaginary problems people had with Sonic 4). What’s cool is that all the levels truly have that retro Sonic feel to them, even the ones that take place in levels from modern Sonic games. City Escape has these cool segments with a truck trying to stomp you, Crisis City uses firestorms to change the horizontal momentum… it’s all well thought out. One enhancement that I quite enjoy here is the fact that the spin dash is now assigned to its own button (you can do it by crouching and using the jump button, but you don’t need to), making spin dashing a lot faster and easy to do at a moment’s notice.

Long story short: Retro Sonic levels=really good.

Modern Sonic gameplay

I’ll be brutally honest here: Sonic games on console have SUCKED since Adventure 2 (other than Sonic 4 which kicked ass), and the major culprit is the fact that is just feels like it plays itself without you really needing to do too much to finish levels. It’s just “Hold forward, win”. It reached its worst with Sonic Colors, where you could literally button-mash the homing attack to beat bosses.

Here, it keeps a similar gameplay style, with some side-scrolling segments and some “behind Sonic” segments. It actually plays a lot like Colors in general… But, for some reason, it doesn’t suck! Yeah, it just feels a lot less “I’m playing myself” than Colors did. There’s honest to goodness obstacles this time around, the jumps and boosts and homing attacks feel like you’re more in control (though movement when you’re not running is still a bit of a hassle, it’s not much of a problem when you’re going full-speed, which should be ALL THE TIME anyways). It’s not like in Colors when you can just keep the boost on and finish a level, here you actually have to do some platforming of your own. Crazy I know. It’s like they actually DESIGNED LEVELS, which is something modern devs tend to not really do anymore. It helps that the jumping in side-scrolling segments is a bit less floaty than in Colors and more precise.

It’s also super-exciting. I won’t spoil it, but the “modern” version of City Escape, while it does have some parts that are taken straight out of Adventure 2, is mostly original, and features an insanely awesome bit at the end that always has me go “OHSHITOHSHITOHSHITOHSHIT… WTF WAS THAT”. The levels have some parts that just get the adrenaline pumping not just because of the action on-screen, but because the game isn’t just playing itself though those parts, it actually requires YOU to do the awesome things you see on screen without relying on something stupid like QTEs or just plain watching.

My only complaint here is that drifting is super-tough to control properly, and doing a homing attack in side-scrolling segments pretty much stops your horizontal movement altogether (they should have implemented the homing attack from Sonic 4 instead).

Long story short: they took the basic of Colors, and made it not suck. These levels are actually FUN, differently from my expectations.

Content

There’s 9 levels, each with 2 acts (one for each Sonic). Each act has 5 or so red rings which unlock extra stuff like music and artwork. There’s 7 boss battles (4 story-based battles inspired by old bosses, but with new gimmicks and 3 boss battles featuring “Sonic clones” Metal Sonic, Shadow and Silver) strewn within that (you HAVE to do the 6 first to get to the final boss)… Not sure why some reviewers said that there’s only 2 boss battles when that’s clearly false though… Each level has 5 challenge levels for each Sonic, so that’s 90 challenge levels total. And each of those unlocks a bell, which will unleash a music note which you must catch to get either artwork or music. Each of those boss battles and acts and challenge levels rank you for time, or time+ring number+performance, with a maximum ranking of S. So, basically, there’s a shitload of content (as in I’m over 10 hours into the game and I’m only halfway through the content, and that’s without S-ranking everything).

I especially enjoy the challenge stages. A few of them are just time trials, but some will add stuff to the level, like more platform or blocks to make you take certain paths, or tons of enemies to make the way to the goal tougher, or just different layouts overall. Some will give you skills (such as shields for retro Sonic or boost-increases for modern Sonic), others will make you have to work with/against one of Sonic’s friends (sadly you cannot murder Cream the Rabbit). These levels are REALLY fun (with a couple exceptions).

Also, just a quick mention of Skills. Basically, you get 100 points, and you can use those points to equip skills (which you buy from the Skill shop). For example, you can get better underwater movement for both Sonics, increased speed for modern Sonic or shields for Retro Sonic (including bubble, flame and lightning shields from the Genesis games, which you get a few that you can activate when you want), and some other stuff. It’s not required, but it can make some levels easier, or make certain gameplay elements more forgiving (like making the rings stay longer when you get hit).

Difficulty

Okay, not really a “bad stuff” part, but this game is rather easy. You can buy lives, which are super cheap, and losing them all just makes you restart the level you’re at, with 5 lives. This game DOES have honestly hard parts and it will kill you from time to time, but I think the difficulty is a little bit on the low side overall. There’s a few cheap deaths on modern Sonic levels due to the controls going all herp derp on you, but not enough so that it makes the game worse. There are also times where you’ll spin dash or boost at the wrong time, making you miss a spring or jump you HAVE to use to go further, but that’s your fault if you do that, so I really don’t mind that at all.

One thing I DO appreciate is that the first thing the game does is ask if you want the retarded tutorial thingies popping up all the time. So you can have the game telling you how to jump or whatever, and tell you “hey, there’s a hole there” OR you can just remove that stuff and figure out how to do things yourself like normal people. I think it’s considerate of Sega to realize that not all gamers are idiots that need to have everything told to them.

Bad stuff

Not much to mention here actually. I’m serious. So the final boss is kinda lame. The rendition of the City Escape song on the retro Sonic side is one of the worst things I’ve ever heard (but the fact that you can change the music to anything in the game that you’ve unlocked mostly negates that problem. My other problem is Planet Wisp… The level is fine, no problem here, but the implementation of the Wisps here STILL sucks. Not as much as in Colors, and that’s mostly because there’s only 2 Wisps (the rocket, which was the only one that wasn’t completely terrible in Colors, and the spiky ball wisp which is super hard to control properly). Oh, and there’s minor glitches, like getting stuck in moments where the game is supposed to be taking control for a moment (there’s this one spiral ramp in Green Hill Zone where sometimes Sonic will just get stuck and you’ll have to restart the level). Not a big problem.

Another minor issue I had is just something on my end… I’m playing the Steam version (using my PS3 controller configured as a 360 controller, which controls SUPER well by the way, I suggest it since the Steam version is uber cheap), and there’s a few moments when I get major slowdown even though I have a good computer (Chemical Plant when there’s certain water effects, and Speed Highway when multiple of those police enemies sound off at the same time), not sure if it’s something in the configs, but it’s not a HUGE problem.

Overall

Sonic Generations is great. There, I said it. It’s super fun to play, there’s tons of content, it has the kickass Toxic Caves song from Sonic Spinball (I love Sonic Spinball……. what?), it’s a badass tribute to everything Sonic and it just feels great. I didn’t think it would surpass Sonic 4 (the only other good Sonic game of this generation), but it did by FAR. Declaring it the best Sonic game yet might be a bit much, but I will say that it’s stiff competition at the very least.

It’s a well-designed game with some actual thought put behind it and…. well… fuck, it’s great. And the Steam version is only 30$, so… yeah, pick it up and stuff! And if you’re European, get the Collectors Edition, it looks amazing!

(Note: You may have realized that I didn’t talk about the graphics. That would be because I forgot about it, and now I don’t really care about writing a blurb about them… I’ll just say “they look great” and leave it at that *thumbs up*)

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September sees a good amount of interesting/popular games:  7 multiplatform (Wii, PC, PS3, 360) releases, 8 PS3 releases, 3 3DS releases, 3 DS releases, 1 PSP release and 2 Xbox 360 releases. Don’t forget this only includes interesting or potentially popular games, and it maybe be missing what will be hidden gems. We never know.

So read on and see what you’ll be buying!

MULTIPLATFORM RELEASES

Dead Island 9/06 (PC, PS3, 360)

As far as I’ve seen, it just looks like L4D with slower gameplay and maybe a deeper plot (or at least some character development). Not interested.

Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 9/06 (PC, PS3, 360)

Seems like a God of War rip-off with a space marine and orks… I’ll keep an eye out just in case it ends up being a competent action game, but I’m not keeping my hopes up.
(Note/correction/whatever: The demo was very unimpressive… it’s a clumsy hack n’ slasher with the controls of Gears of War which just doesn’t work for action like this… BUT the jetpack level in the demo was fun… I guess jetpacks DO make everything better… it’s a rental)

NHL 12 9/13 (PS3, 360)

*insert same text as madden release from last month*

Resident Evil 4 HD 9/20 (PS3, 360)

It’s RE4… I shouldn’t need to say much more, because you already know if you want an HD version of that.

Resident Evil Code: Veronica X HD 9/27 (PS3, 360)

I’ve never played Code Veronica… So I don’t have much to say here.

X-Men: Destiny 9/27 (PS3, 360, Wii, DS)

Haven’t seen much of this… it seems like a possibly interesting beat ‘em up with RPG elements. Doesn’t look too bad, but it’s a rental for me.

Rune Factory: Tides of Destiny 9/27 (PS3, Wii)

I had no idea this was even coming. But I’m also not terribly familiar with Rune Factory so I have nothing to say about it.

PLAYSTATION 3 RELEASES

Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten 9/06

Disgaea always kicks ass. Nothing more to say. Buy this!

Resistance 3 9/06

First sucked, second sucked but had fun online, this one will probably also suck (don’t know about the online, don’t care). I’ll rate this game a “boringfps/10″

God of War Origins Collection 9/13

Portable lameness, redone in HD!

White Knight Chronicles II 9/13

Includes the first game with the modified engine from the sequel, so, if you don’t get bored of this fast, you have a LOT of content to go through here.

Atelier Totori: The Adventurer of Arland 9/27

The Atelier series is generally great. I’m pretty hyped for this one

ICO and Shadow of the Colossus Collection 9/27

Ico looked boring to play (haven’t played it myself, just judging from the boring-looking gameplay videos I’ve seen), Shadow of the Colossus was stupidly boring (a game where you spend most of the time basically doing nothing isn’t terribly exciting), not hyped for this at all.

Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell Classic Trilogy HD 9/27

Despite having all the old splinter cell games, I haven’t played them…. May be worth it, I wouldn’t know… yet.

Child of Eden 9/27

Wasn’t interested in the 360 release, not interested in this one.

3DS RELEASES

Star Fox 64 3D 9/09

This is my favorite N64 game, by far. I must have completed it over 100 times as a kid, and I still replay it from time to time. I’m pretty hyped to see it with even better graphics and 3D, should be quite interesting.

Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection 9/13

This game is great. It features amazing pinball tables like Funhouse and Pinbot and Taxi, and is overall really fun to play. One drawback on the 3DS version though… as far as I can tell, it’s missing 5 tables that are in the PS3/360 version: Tales of the Arabian Nights, Medieval Madness, No Good Gofers, as well as MAYBE Jive Time and Sorcerer that are in all the other versions…. If you have a PS3/360, get those versions, Wii if you don’t have a PS3 or 360… This is a nice alternative, but the HD versions kick its ass.

Frogger 3D 9/20

This actually looks really interesting. It’s classic Frogger gameplay, but in various environments, featuring a lot of new gameplay elements… I may check it out.

DS RELEASES

Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker 2 9/19

Loved the first one, and the other games in the previous Monster sub-series. This should also be great.

Kirby Mass Attack 9/19

The videos I’ve seen make it seem like a Kirby/Pikmin hybrid… looks pretty fun.

Solatorobo: Red the Hunter 9/27

Random Action-RPG, actually looks cool.

PSP RELEASES

Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 2 – Innocent Sin 9/20

Oh, this is actually the first time this comes out in the US. I know people will point me to Persona 2: Eternal Punishment on the PS1, I will point out that it’s actually a different game from the first Persona 2, one that takes place in a parallel world. So yeah, this could be interesting.

XBOX 360 RELEASES

Otomedius Excellent 9/01

It better not get delayed AGAIN. Well, I don’t have a 360 anymore, but, if I did, I would be all over this. It actually looks like a solid Gradius game.

Gears of War 3 9/20

It’s Gears of War. You’ve played one of the 2 before it, you’ve played this one.

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We have 1 3DS releases, 3 multiplatform releases, 1 Xbox 360 release.

Read on and see if you’re picking anything up!

MULTIPLATFORM RELEASES

Earth Defense Force: Insect Armageddon 7/05 (PS3, 360)

The previous Earth Defense Force on the 360 was definitely a cheap game. It was cheaply made, had various issues and it didn’t have much depth… but damn was it fun to play. I’m hoping this one will be similar. And it’s budget-priced as far as I can see too.

Call of Juarez: The Cartel (PC, PS3, 360) 7/19 (PS3, 360, PC)

Rule of thumb: if a game title starts with “Call of”, it sucks. The last Call of Juarez game was pretty bad, so I have no expectations for this one.

Catherine 7/26 (PS3, 360)

I’m not sure about this… the characters and story seem protentially interesting, but the gameplay just seeming a big repetitive block-moving puzzle makes me wonder if I’d even get much gameplay out of this.

3DS RELEASES

Pac-Man & Galaga Dimensions 7/26

This actually seems like a nice release for the 3DS. You get 3 Pac-Man games and 3 Galaga games. You have the classic versions of both, the recently-remixed versions of both (Pac-Man Championship Edition, Galaga Legions (though not DX for either of these)) and a completely new game for each (pac-man gets platformer that you have to tilt the system to move him around, while Galaga gets a first-person space shooter).

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So of course we went and made a list of the 5 best multiplayer experiences of the year.

Read and and see our 5 winners for this category!

Borderlands

What makes Borderlands’ multiplayer interesting is the different classes you can use, and how everyone can customize them however they want, making each character relatively unique. Taking on quests with different teams leads to different strategies every time you play since everyone will play their characters a bit differently, and mixing up all the different skills can lead to deadly combos. There’s a good amount of quests to take on and going through them with multiple people is great fun. Not to mention DLC which adds more quests and things to do(instead of plain weapon packs), along with constantly adding new areas to explore as a team. And playing in multiplayer gives more experience and better loot, so what’s not to love? (thank you Josh for helping out on the text here)

BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger

Fighting games always offer some fun competitive play. And BlazBlue is definitely no exception. Trying out combos on other players or just testing who’s the best, BlazBlue is as fun as it gets in fighting games. Add in the great online play featuring near lagless matches at all times, using a special “synchronization” system that pretty much removes any lag.

Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2

Well, the follow up for the most popular online shooter is definitely gonna land a spot here. Taking up basically the same online system as CoD4, with some modifications like killing sprees and death sprees, as well as new perks, this will surely live on as the best online shooter until Modern Warfare 3 comes out. The PC version ended up getting a bit gimped, but it’s still a solid multiplayer title.

New Super Mario Bros Wii

While NSMBW is a great single player experience, it’s great to finally play a Mario platformer with up to 4 people at the same time. It’s chaotic and a lot harder than playing on your own, but it’s so damn fun. Pissing off friends by forcing them down holes or blocking their jumps by jumping on top of them never gets old. What I first thought would suck ended up being a great idea. Great job Nintendo.

Uncharted 2

For Naughty Dog’s first competitive multiplayer outing, Uncharted 2 is stunning. With many maps available, and with each being sizeable with many nooks and crannies to be explored, you’ll rarely find yourself bored of your surroundings. The upgrade system is well made, players being paid cash to spend on new skins and boosters for each kill and for performing specific actions during each match. Multiple game modes add even more depth to the Multiplayer and there is promised to be much on the way in terms of DLC. In short, there’s as much to enjoy in Uncharted 2′s multiplayer as there is in its singleplayer. (Thank you Wintrale for the text)

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WET, which is available on the European store, and Mini Ninjas, which is available just about everywhere.

So I played them both a few times, so here are my impressions!

Read on!

Mini Ninjas
Well, I didn’t have much expectations for this one. The trailer was interesting enough, but I wasn’t sure what the gameplay would really be like just from that.
So after playing it… I’m not impressed. The controls look complicated when they detail them when you start the demo, but when you actually play it’s quite simple. You have 2 attack buttons: normal attack and Power attack. Didn’t really understand what the power attack did, but when used on the ground it seems to stun anyone it hits. There were instructions in the game, but i skipped the ones for the power attack >_>. You can jump and run as well. Using the R buttons, you can choose and use items/jutsus. Other than that, you crouch with L2(you can hide in grass) and you can switch characters with L1. Oh, and you have to do stupid things like shaking your controller to open doors (though you can thankfully deactivate that). I don’t understand that at all. Why should I mash buttons to open doors/chest/whatever? Just let me press 1 button to open it, it’s a lot better than way.

So the gameplay… Well, you run around, saving animals and killing magically conjured samurai(who are actually animals which were transformed… wonder where I saw THAT before… *cough*). The fighting is pretty bad. I found that random button-mashing was the most effective thing you could do in fights. Also, there’s ranged enemies, so the other element of combat is to find where the ranged enemies are attacking you from and killing them first, because they’ll be the ones doing the damage against you. Heck, you can clear a big group of melee enemies with a single use of the fireball jutsu if all the enemies are close enough(and, if the demo is to be believed, they usually are), so they’re not really dangerous.The game also features a level up system. You get experience by killing enemies and saving animals from bamboo prisons. Leveling up raises some stats, though I don’t know which one since the only level up I got gave me more attack power. Also, you have 3 characters to use in the game, and you get… I think 3 more(I’m not re-opening the demo to check that >_>). Each character has its own characteristics. The big guy hits big enemies harder, and opens doors easier. Hiro, the main character, is the only one to use Jutsu, and that girl that you have on your team… I have no idea.

There’s also an exploration element. Basically there’s hidden items everywhere and, if you’re inclined to do so, you can try to find them. Yay?

Overall… it was very boring. The combat is button mashing, the exploration element was very boring to me, and overall gameplay wasn’t very interesting. I did like the humor at some parts, but otherwise this wasn’t very enjoyable at all. The game just feels like a… mid-quality downloadable game, definitely not something worth the full price.

WET
Well, I went at this with little to no expectations. I saw a few gameplay videos last year, before the game lost its publisher the first time, before Bethesda picked it up.

Well, first things first: I love the graphical style. Looks like an old movie. I love it. The character models are a bit low quality(though Rubi is higher quality than the rest), but the style is great. The second part of the demo has a nice part where the graphic style completely changes. All in solid colors, characters and object are black, the “background” is red red and blood is white. That part looks awesome. And the little we hear of the soundtrack is actually pretty fun. It’s an original soundtrack made for the game, and it fits the visual style quite well.

So the gameplay. Well, it’s relatively simplistic. The game doesn’t even use all the buttons, which is commendable since these days it feels like developers are forced to use every button despite rarely actually NEEDING it. X jumps (a bit weird to get used to, since Rubi jumps forward all the time), Square uses the sword, circle makes you slide on the floor, R1 shoots your guns (you can just hold the button for better shooting) and L1 makes you wall-run (either vertically or horizontally). The d-pad makes you switch guns (the demo gives you access to a few more than the standard pistol). You can use some of those in combination for different moves. Using L1 near an enemy when you’re sliding towards him makes you do a Human Wall-Run, for example. Oh, and Triangle is used for various context-sensitive things(opening doors, using ziplines, drinking alcohol).

The combat is pretty simple. Actually, your sword kills pretty much everything in one hit or two. Slash your sword, kill stuff, move on. The interesting part here is the gunplay. When you, jump, slide, or wall-run, you can shoot enemies. As soon as you press R1 in these cases, the game goes in a slow-motion thing, where you can aim at your enemies easier. Added to that is an auto-aim feature for you second pistol. So you can aim and shoot at one enemy with one gun, while the other gun will automatically aim for other enemies, or if there’s only one enemy, pme gun will automatically aim for him and you aim on your own for the other. The combat is simple, but it’s actually satisfying, and button-mashing will get you killed.

The game isn’t perfect though. After the fun first part where you’re chasing after some guy and the BADASS part after where Rubi goes berserk, you get what could be an AWESOME chase scene in an action movie. Here Rubi chases after… some car I guess, on a highway. Her method of transportation? Her hands and feet. She starts on a truck, then jumps from car to car, shooting and cutting baddies as she goes forward, doing death-defying stunts. The scene is truly awesome. But the gameplay… Well, it plays like an on-rail shooter, and your aim is SLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW. You shoot enemies as they come out of their cars to shoot you(killing them is pretty important, because the longer they live, the closer you get from dying). And then… QTEs. Why? QTEs suck, I’d rather just look at this awesome scene instead of the whole stupid “Press X to not die” parts.
While I’m in the subject of QTEs, I guess I’ll also whine that opening doors by mashing buttons is still the stupidest idea ever.

Another thing I find is that some things lack transition. For example, to heal up, you drink liquor. Those scenes are cool. Rubi takes a sip of whatever the drink is, throws the bottle in the air and shoots it. But there’s no… transition after it, it goes straight back to gameplay and she’s instantly back in her neutral animations instead of moving back from the “bottle-shooting” animation. A bit weird.

Overall though, the demo was quite enjoyable. The gameplay is pretty fun, and the style of the game is just really cool. *Insert perverted “Wet” joke here*. Not sure if it’s gonna be worth the launch price of 60$ (70$ here in Canada), but it definitely looks like a fun game. Check out the demo if you have a European account, it’s worth it.

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I didn’t have many expectations for this game. If anything, I was expecting it to be average and nothing more. But the game ended up being really badly made and no fun at all.

So as you can guess, I didn’t like it.

Read on to see why!

Looks and sounds
The graphics are… unimpressive at best. The character models have seemingly low poly-counts(the lion bosses look lame and lifeless), the environments are repetitive (basically every room looks the same), the enemies designs are not too great and have a massive lack of variety and the cutscenes use the in-game engine which isn’t too great. It uses some sort of cel-shading to try to hide the flaws, but ultimately fails.

The sounds are basic stuff. The music is not too bad actually, the high point of the game… The voice acting is…. Well, the lion bosses sound lame, the lame light magic guy is lame and Ayumi is okay.

Story
You play as Ayumi, a treasure hunter. She’s on some random island with ruins looking for treasure. After the first boss she becomes cursed and tried to find a cure for the curse (which, sometimes, makes a big number of enemies pop up). So now she tries harder to find the treasure since it can apparently get rid of the curse. Really basic and boring story. I skipped half the cutscenes because they weren’t fun to watch. Ayumi could’ve been an interesting character, but fails to do or say anything interesting. The setting and such of the game doesn’t help either. Random girl going to random island to find random treasure and gets random cliché curse… Not gonna win awards anytime soon, that’s for sure.

Gameplay
Where to start? Well, it’s hard to say if they wanted to make a lame DMC clone or a lame Dynasty Warriors clone…
The controls are okay. You can jump(X), use normal attack combos(Square), shoot your guns (R1), lock-on(L1), move around and use special attacks or power-ups binded to certain buttons (Triangle, Circle, L2 and R2). The normal attack combo is standard stuff. The lock-on system is quite annoying to use. Special attacks and guns target to the currently targeted enemy (which is random basically, unless you point the camera straight at the enemy you want), or just hit an area around you. What really annoying is the dodge system. You need to be moving in one direction, then push the same direction while pressing the jump button. It doesn’t work well, but above all it’s completely useless other than in one of the trap rooms.

Fighting enemies is simple at first, but it becomes a hassle really fast. At first it’s hard to see when you’re getting hit, since there’s pretty much no sign of attacks hitting you(small splatters of blood), unless it’s big fireballs. Eventually, there’s tons of enemies in a room that can hurt you just by touching you, so when there’s a lot, your combos get broken off fast. You also realize that getting hit cuts off your attack and you get a tiny amount of time where you can’t attack (other than certain special attacks), so when you’re surrounded by a lot of enemies and other flying enemies are swooping down on you(AKA ALL THE TIME), your chances to attack are quite cut down. And with so many many enemies all the time, the targeting is screwed up too.

When entering a room, normally there’s a type of enemy in particular you have to kill, and the only way to know that is killing them and checking if the “enemy life bar” is going down or not. And the encounters are usually long and boring, with many life-bars, or generators that respawn enemies that you have to destroy. Pretty much all the rooms are like that. This game is the very definition of repetitive. There’s, like, 3 trap rooms with no enemies, but they’re actually really lame and easy to get through.

Really, the fighting is all sorts of annoying, you really need to experience it to see the crappiness. The hit detection is bad, there’s bugs everywhere (the most obvious one being that Ayumi jumps at total random sometimes), and it’s just not fun at all. There’s some interesting ideas, like enemies that are weak to certain kinds of magic or attacks and such, and the combo meter to get more souls when killing enemies works fine when it’s not being stopped by annoying flying enemies. But there’s so much bad that the good points can’t make up for it.

But with all the annoyances, you’d expect the game to be really hard. But it’s all the contrary. The game is overly easy to get through. Why? Well,it’s simple. If you have enough souls, you can’t die. There’s an upgrade system in the game, requiring to gain souls to gain new techniques, but what you’ll most often be using is healing. That’s right, you can pause the game any time and heal yourself. Any trouble you may have with the game is nulled by the fact that you can heal yourself when you want. Sure, it costs souls to get them, and the cost goes up as you advance through the game. But the number of souls you get as you advance gets higher and higher, and you can revisit rooms to farm souls, so it’s really easy to get both the skills you need and still have enough to heal yourself all you need through “tough” battles. This makes the game really boringly easy.

The one almost interesting part is the boss fights. They require you knowing what techniques and skills to use. Some bosses have special barriers, certain weaknesses, things like that, and having the right build or skills can make or break the battle. But in the end they’re also a bit easy, and when you have all the skills you can easily set-up the proper skillsets you need.

Overall
This isn’t a well done game at all. Filled with bugs, clunky hit detection, annoying enemies and it’s just not fun to play. I see what they were trying to do with this game, and it was a good attempt, but in the end the final result was bad.
The story is boring, the gameplay is lame and filled with bad design, the graphics are sub-par, the story is bad, and it’s too easy. It’s a bit hard to explain, but the bottom line is that it’s not a good game.

I can’t recommend this game to anyone really. Unless you like bad games, that is.

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Well the current-gen has been going on for around 3 years now (well, a bit over 2 for  the PS3 and Wii, a bit over 3 for the 360), and it feels like it’s just about the right time to take a good look at each current-gen console, their merits, their faults, and just analyse the current situation in the video game industry.

We’ve got powerful polygon pushing consoles, and someone who changed their whole marketing schemes and that is trying something relatively different (sounds familiar….), but what state is the industry in, and what are the consoles like after a few years on the market?

Now I want to make this an analysis mostly around the gamers, consoles and games, so I won’t go around talking about sales statistics and all that crap.

Check out what I’ve got to say on this.

First, let’s look at the consoles themselves.

Microsoft Xbox 360

Ah, the original Xbox. How I liked to hate it. After the lameness that was what trolls would call the “FPSbox”, I was expecting a less than stellar showing from Microsoft once again. It took me quite a while to actually get one, but recently I got my own Xbox 360, and I must say that I am relatively impressed. The first Xbox wasn’t a really good console. Huge controller, boring game library for the most part consisting mostly of Halo and other FPS, with only a few gems (Ninja Gaiden, a censored version of Conker’s Bad Fur Day… amongst oa few others and probably a others I might not know about) and some good multi-platform titles. Overall though there wasn’t that much variety and, in my mind, it failed even more than the Gamecube.

But the 360 proves that Microsoft is able to get it right. Incredibly robust online(full of useless features that people love), hard drives for game saves and demos and such, the new NXE which makes it slightly more appealing to the masses with the new avatars(worked for Nintendo with the Miis) and a library of games to be proud of. No longer is the Xbox the home of mostly FPS, there’s lots of variety now. A bunch of RPGs, action games, some previous Sony-exclusive series getting their game on in the green box. The Xbox 360 is definitely a great system for gamers who like just about any genre.

But it’s not without its problems. The hardware is constantly getting problems, I don’t think I have much more to say than RROD. Good thing Microsoft give a 3 year warranty on that. The other big problem with me is the online. It’s really good and stable and all, but having to pay 50$ a year is a rip-off really. When you consider that you have to pay your ISP AND Microsoft to use your 360 online… it’s kinda stupid and not very cost effective for the average consumer. I mean, the PS3 has relatively stable online with a store that offers a bunch of stuff, and it’s free to use, can’t the 360 do the same? When I think of wasting 50$ on a feature like that, I also think that, with that 50$, I could buy a game instead.

Sony Playstation 3

The playstation. The first catered gaming to a new audience, aiming a bit more at the “cool kids” and “jocks” and basically non-gamer kids/teenagers, bringing a new group of gamers to make new types of game and appeal to larger masses. Until the playstation, video gaming was always a nerdy thing, but the playstation’s marketing broke that categorization. Though there was still enough for “oldschool” gamers on the playstation, it was no longer considered “stupid” by “cool people” to be playing video games.  The Playstation 2 built on that and offered even more for the “true gamers” that were there before the Playstation, and it dominated the competition easily. 

Hoping to do the same this time, they released the PS3 with high hopes that the developers would learn to use the PS3′s new Cell processor to its fullest. But that…. didn’t work… at least not for a while. The first year was less than good for the giant Sony gaming division which has dominated for 2 whole generations. The Cell was harder to program for than other processors, so there were a lot of watered-down ports of 360 games, or “less good-looking than the 360 version” multi-platform games, with very few exclusives that stood out. As it went on developers lost hope and started making their exclusive PS3 games go to the 360 as well(though I’m pretty sure Microsoft offered some… incentive to do so).

It looked glum for quite a long time, but it finally picked up in 2008. MGS4 came out, various other exclusives started showing off the potential of the PS3 and developers seem to start getting used to it. Around the time MGS4 came out I got my own PS3, and I am impressed. Despite the slow start, this is a very good console. Robust and FREE online(with a few hiccups here and there), good and easy to navigate interface, lots of cool “media center” functions in addition to gaming, and it’s a Blu-Ray player (No longer the cheapest on the market, but still a great choice). Overall the Playstation 3 is a great gaming console, but still lacks a bit of variety in the gaming library, seemingly taking the original Xbox’s place as an FPS machine(though there’s still quite a lot of great non-FPS games on it).

Nintendo Wii

Ah, the Wii. Most “True gamers”(who are most likely the evil “cool kids” that came in during the first Playstation’s dominance) are saying that it’s single-handily leading the video game industry to total destruction. Now, I don’t entirely agreeing with that, but I also think that it’s taking 1 step in the right direction and many steps in the wrong direction at the same time.

Wii surprised everyone with the ability of motion control out of the box and the potential for really innovative games, or innovative takes on old games/genres. The addition of the capability to download games of the old, from NES to N64 and other systems in-between including some third-party console (Genesis and NES games on the same console? That’s impossible!!!!), the system had a lot of appeal to old-school gamers (who haven’t already resorted to emulation or just using their old consoles to play old games). With the promise of a new Zelda (well, that was actually promised on the Gamecube first but both got it anyways), Mario, Metroid and Brawl, what could’ve gone wrong?

Well, quickly(AKA when they first used it) people realized it didn’t exactly have to 1:1 motion controls Nintendo led us to believe it would have, making the motion control nothing more than “waggling the wiimote=pressing a button”, and a lot of the “motion control” is controlled by the sensor bar and has more to do with the pointer than the remote itself. With few games taking full advantage of it (a few exceptions like Metroid Prime 3). The Wii-motion plus is supposed to make the motion sensing a lot better, but we’ll see. The Virtual Console, well it’s hard to say anything bad about it. An increasingly large library of games to interest any gamer, though people always find something to whine about (just be patient dammit, Earthbound will come someday).

The big problem here is the non-VC library of games. Sure, you have Mario Galaxy, Zelda, Mario Kart, Smash Bros Brawl, Metroid, but otherwise, most of the games are mini-game compilations or really lame “brain games” made to appeal to non-gamers. Some games come to break the cycle of bad cash-ins that sadly sell a lot though. No More Heroes, Wario Land, Tales of Symphonia, there’s still a little bit to interest the “core” gamer or even just the Nintendo fan (which Nintendo clearly don’t care about). Hey, did you see that? In all the good games I listed for now, only 2 of them are third-party. Yeah, the third-parties are scared of the Wii. They see that the userbase on the Wii would be uninterested in games that aren’t mini-game compilations or published by Nintendo, so they are reluctant to develop for the console. Add to that the really lame online system, the huge amounts of accessories needed to play certain games (add the Wii Motion Plus in not too long), and the basic cost of controllers… It’s an expensive console, even compared to the PS3.

Overall it’s not a bad system at all. But third-parties need to give it more of a chance, the userbase needs to look beyond “mini-game compilation number 882894″, the core gamers need to be patient, AND Nintendo needs to listen to its fan-base. We don’t want gamecube games with revamped controls, we want new games that use the Wii controls in an original way and that are fun to play. We want better online. You’ve got a system that’s really weak compared to the opposition, at least try to use the system’s strong points to make it appealing to gamers. But that’s not gonna work, since th Wii is more popular than Jesus, so Nintendo will keep swimming in money while us Nintendo fans get left behind the hordes of old people playing bad games. Happy to see third-parties are finally starting to take a chance with Wii in 2009.

Portable gaming

Pretty much a passing mention on this. Though their “generation” started earlier, the DS and PSP are important to the current-gen. You have 2 big contenders. The DS is basically the god of portable gaming. There’s a huge variety of games on it, with titles that vary from casual-bait mini-game compilations/brain games to old-school games to innovative games that use the touch-screen to RPGs to… anything. If you like any type of game, you’ll find something satisfying on the DS.
The PSP is really a mixed bag. It got no more than 3 good games in 2008 and doesn’t get much support (though there seems to be a few good games on the horizon right now). The games you find are…. pretty much what you’d find on the PS2, and remakes/ports of older games. Though it’s a weak system library-wise, it still has some good stuff and it needs more support. 

Portable gaming is the perfect way to complement “normal” gaming, with the ability to play anywhere. With the DS with the huge variety and the PSP with its…. huge potential(?), they are an important element in gaming today, and the current systems have more than enough to interest any gamer. Now let’s see if the iPhone can get any popularity in the gaming market.

 

Well we’ve seen the consoles, their good and bad points, so let’s check this generation as a whole

So we have the pixel-pushing power of the PS3, the slightly less pixel-pushing power but still as good looking Xbox360, and the comparetively weak Wii with its tacked-on motion controls (at least until yet another accessory is shoved down our throats to improve the motion controls). Each offers a different experience. The Wii alone is (hopefully) trying to change how we play games, while PS3 and Xbox 360 are pushing the graphics departement closer and closer to its limits, and each console defining how it is they think online play should be like.

The way games get made is changing every day. May it be to appeal to more people (FPS and way too much of them(even if some of them are really good), needlessly violent games, mini-game compilations, lame brain games) or just to experiment with new technology, the industry is in full motion to make games in a new way to make the industry evolve.

As for the gamers, I can’t see how anyone wouldn’t be pleased with the current generation of consoles. Though the PS3 and 360 have a very similar library, and both took a while to really get the library of good games going, there’s still some exclusive titles on each that make both of them worth owning. Action games, millions of FPS, lots of racing, a few RPGs here and there(few more on the 360), and actually a bunch of old-school stuff. If you have either of the consoles, just check the exclusives for the other, you might find a good reason to get the other console. 

As for the Wii, well if you like the Virtual Console(and/or are against emulation), there’s lots for you to check out. Otherwise, well the Wii is clearly marketed at non-gamers with things like Wii Fit and party game galores which interest mostly non-gamers. There’s a few good games out there, but the “true gamers” won’t have enough with just Wii games, so owning either a 360 or PS3 is better to get through this generation of gaming. If you only have a Wii, the time between worthwhile releases is really long, with barely anything between Brawl and… whichever of the 3 other good games you were waiting for that came out in 2008. Really hoping that 2009 will be different for the Wii and that developers will really experiment with it. At least we’ll be getting Punch Out!!.

Overall though, if you have either the PS3 or 360, as a gamer you should have little trouble finding something to interest you. The Wii should mostly be there for the novelty, and to play some Mario Galaxy and a few Brawl matches from time to time, it’s really just there to complement the other 2 consoles. I’d say this generation has something for everybody, and everybody should at least give a chance to every console on the market right now. And if somehow the current consoles don’t do it for you, there’s no way the DS won’t at least have SOMETHING you’ll like.

 

Which console is “better”?

None of them! yeah, easy answer huh? Unless you want to count the DS… But Let’s look at this closely. The Wii has infinite potential in original gameplay ideas, PS3 is the HD console done right with something for everyone(and free online), and the Xbox360 is the perfect console for online play (if you don’t mind paying the 50$ a year) and it also has something for everyone.

Each console has its strengths and they each have weaknesses (as covered earlier. Though it’s easy to hate on the Wii for its lame online and limited and frankly boring current game library, you have to look beyond that and see that, at its base, it’s a great console that, if developers actually took their time to make good games(looking at you The Conduit, you better be good), would be badass. It’s easy to hate on the 360 because of its predecessor, or because of the backwards “pay to play online” idea, a kinda weak starting lineup, the stupidly high failure rate of the consoles (mine is still safe…), but really, it’s a great system with great games and no one in the right mind would deny that. It’s easy to hate on the PS3, what with 599 US DOLLARS and the weak starting lineup and the tacked on motion controls and… I could go on. But the PS3 is an incredible console, it finally has great games, its capabilities as a multimedia device are awesome, the online is free and, besides a few hiccups from time to time, it’s quite reliable.

If you’re a gamer, no system will be “better”. You might prefer one over the others, but calling the others bad is just plain stupid and wrong.
Which console do I personally recommend? Frankly, I’d say the PS3. The hardware is really reliable, the online is free and mostly stable, there’s a lot of good games and downloadable games if that interests you and it’s a great multimedia center at the same time. But don’t disregard the other consoles. Heck, you probably prefer the 360 or the Wii, and that’s fine. They are all worth having for something.

 

What does the future hold?

I really don’t know what the future holds. It’s a mix of me thinking gaming will go for the worse because of the bad trend of lame games on the Wii getting picked up by Sony and Microsoft soon, or that everything will go for the better, the Wii userbase will progressively start buying games that aren’t lame mini-game compilations and maybe even (I can dream)more consoles, developers will learn the quirks of each console (more particularly the Wii and PS3), and better games for all systems will start coming out.

Really, it could go either way. But what I know is that gaming as it is will change. Hopefully for the better.
My guess is that it will actually go both ways. Sony and Microsoft will start taking a bit on Nintendo’s marketing ploys, making their systems more geared towards the non-gaming masses (Microsoft already started, with the “Avatars” partly), but will continue marketing it towards gamers at the same time. Though, going by this idea, the number of mini-game compilations and other “family-friendly” games will increase and sell just as well as actual AAA titles, developers will continue making games that will interest us “real” gamers and gaming will continue evolving in all the casual gamer side, the the “real” gamer site and the mainstream gamer side. Bigger, better-looking FPS and sport games will come out, a variety of other genres will push the boundaries set by previous titles and mini-game games might eventually start being high-quality and lead “non-gamers” to become closer to being “real” gamers themselves, experimenting with more than just mini-game compilations.

The future of gaming is, at the same time, looking up and down, and if the big 3 can make the right decisions, every aspect of gaming, may it be mainstream, “hardcore” or casual, will get better. It depends mostly on them, and a few willing third-party companies to continue making games for everyone out there. Sure, the big 3 could all go the nintendo way and eventually forget the gamers who supported the industry from the start until now, but I am keeping my hope up. The future is potentially incredibly bright. Gaming will change. If it is for the better, that is for the big gaming companies to decide.

 

What about the next generation?

I think it’s way too early to start talking about that. With the Xbox starting its 4th year and the Wii and PS3 starting their 3rd year, the generation still has at least 2 years to live on, and if it goes like I’m expecting, we still have at least 3 years before that.
If we’re “lucky”, this generation still has 4-5 years before going to the next. Nintendo is still selling the Wii at a stupidly high rate after so long and is still not THAT easy to find. The PS3 is almost starting to get it right, a price drop or 2 will make it truly start. The 360 is really getting in the game now, if only the failure rate went a lot lower. Each company is still working out their current console, and right now is just not the right time for any of them to start making a new console. Nintendo is swimming in money right now, and if their pool starts emptying, they can just release differently colored Wiis and the sales will skyrocket again, so they have no reason to make something new just yet. Sony is still trying to really pierce in the market now, and it would be strange for them to just stop supporting the PS3 already when it’s starting to sell better and finally getting some kind of footing. Microsoft is finally getting it right with the 360, and a new console so soon would be counter-productive and frankly it would be stupid, since it would start up at a really high price for now and the current less expensive alternatives would blow it out of the water. We still have some time before thinking about Next-Gen.

What the next-gen consoles will be like? Well by then we might start having Ultra High Def TVs that go up to over 9000p(pure random stupid speculation!), so Sony and Microsoft will both compete to be at the peak of what the technology will offer at the time. Nintendo will most likely take a big step forward tech-wise and also support whatever definition is “standard” by then but will go for less powerful hardware as the competitors to offer the lower-priced system. But, if any of the companies learned of their errors from this generation, none of them will start at anything near “599 US DOLLARS”. If we’re lucky enough, the entry-price for next-gen won’t be much higher than 300$.
When the next-gen consoles die off, Microsoft will stop supporting the 360 after  month or 2, Nintendo will get a few more titles out on the Wii, especially if it’s still selling well, and the PS3 will continue for a few years before dying off just like every previous Sony console.

The next-gen, whenever it comes, will hopefully show that the companies learned from their mistakes and will really do something incredible.
 

Conclusion

Okay, I ranted on long enough now. What I really wanted to do was to give some insight on the current-gen of video game consoles, what were my thoughts on every console, what were my thoughts on the generation in general, its fanbase, the developers and what this could bring in the future, a few “what if” things. Hope you enjoyed this read, and hope that, if you didn’t already, now have a more educated opinion on the consoles of this generation.

 

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When this game was first released, most gamers were likely filled with either awe or doubt. A first person game that barely had any shooting and concentrated on platforming/parkour, in a unique graphical style. I wasn’t the only one to be interested by such a concept. Seeing it in action was unlike pretty much anything else I’ve seen before.

The hype for this was huge. Does it live up to it, or is it gonna be considered overhyped? 

Graphics
The graphical style here is quite original. Some may see a really bland, empty environments, but what I see is great design choices that make this city look like it’s in the future and, well, that reflects the overall impression of the kind of society the game protrays. 

There’s a limited range of colors, really mostly white, blue, green and red, with a slight bit more colors and a few different kinds of environments in different stages. All of it is urban looks and building interior, with not much more, but all of it really works.

The character models look really pretty good. Not incredible, some look a slight bit cartoonish, but it all works with the general look of the game. The animations, especially on Faith (or at least what we see on her >_>) are smooth and just really good. This leads me to one thing that somehow really revolutionizes the FPS genre as a whole: If you look down, you’ll actually see Faith’s body. Crazy, I know.

The one thing that bothers me here is the 2D animations. They could have a really cool anime look, but here they just look…. bland and boring. Looks like higher end flash animations you could see anywhere on the internet. It’s like they really didn’t care about making these animations interesting and they just look… meh. 

Overall, other than the 2D cinematics, the game looks great. A unique and interesting look that I’ll never be bored of seeing. There are a few graphic glitches, some screen tearing at parts, but nothing bad. Overall it runs smoothly.

Sound
The game sounds great. The sound effects are, for the most part, spot on. From the gunshots to trains to Faith breathing heavily when she’s running, everything sounds great. The voice acting could be a bit better at parts, but overall it works great.

The soundtrack is great here. It fits the game’s mood perfectly and just sounds really nice. Though I wouldn’t listen to it if I wasn’t playing the game, it’s really enjoyable to listen to when you’re actually playing. 

Story
If there’s one thing to fault in this game, it’s the story.
Faith is a runner, a person who runs on the building rooftops or building interiors while running from the police(named “Blues” here) to deliver information to various people. This might sound like it could have potential to support a fun story, but quickly the game centers on Faith’s struggle to save her sister, wrongly accused of murder, from the Government. She goes around finding information about people related to the murder and eventually finds who did it, then goes to save her sister. The story is boring, the characters aren’t really likable, the twists are lame and predictable.

The game had potential to have such a great story, but in the end it was just really badly done and uninteresting. 

Gameplay
Running
The main part of the game is the running/Parkour. Most of the time you’ll be just going from rooftop to rooftop, finding routes to reach your target, or get stuck in a fast-paced chase against Blues who will be shooting relentlessly at you until you die, or until you get to the next area, where they’ll magically stop looking for you.

The platforming itself works great. The controls are seamless. L1 controls upward movement: jumping, vaulting over obstacles, wall-running, getting up from an edge, jumping from one edge to another, and other “upward” movements. The L2 button controls downward movements: Sliding, crawling, rolling on the ground, going down from an edge and a few other “downward” movements. The game is made so that, when you press the button, it will do what is needed depending on your position/speed and other conditions. If you’re close to a wall while running you’ll wall-run with L1, if you’re going fast enough you’ll slide with L2 (under obstacles if there are any), and various other actions. The R1 button initiates a 180 turn. You can use it for a quick turn in battle, and if you’re next to the wall you can use it for a Mario 64-style wall-kick and get to a higher wall in the opposite direction.  Everything works smoothly. If somehow something isn’t working properly, it’s going to be because you’re not doing it right. 

Jumping from obstacle to obstacle works surprisingly well, and there are very few parts where the game is too hard. The platforming is all about finding exactly where you need to go. To help you with this, pressing the O button will tell you where you need to go, and objects that you can use will either appear red or turn to red when you’re close enough. That can cause some confusing as the things you need to use don’t always appear red, and sometimes pressing O won’t do anything, but when you get stuck it’s just that you didn’t exhaust every possibility.

Overall, the platforming works great, just as good as the first gameplay trailer that was shown to us. You can do just as good, if not better than what was shown in the trailer. I wasn’t sure it would work that well, and playing it definitely surprised me. 

Fighting
One of the more wonky parts of the gameplay here. First unarmed fighting. The R2 button is the main attack button. You have different attacks depending on if you’re standing, crouching, sliding, jumping or wall-running. Overall most enemies go down in a bit more than 2 full combos. Some require some more, but they’re rare. The hand-to-hand fighting works okay, but is a bit clunky and doesn’t work as well as it could.

Then you have disarming. When fighting an enemy up close, he will try to attack you with his gun with a melee attack. At that time, his gun will become read, which is the time you’ll have to press the Triangle button. This will make Faith go through a small cutscene where she’ll attack the enemy and take his weapon. That’s always a “one hit kill”, and it gives you a gun with almost no ammo. The whole disarming feature is a basically a Quick Time Event, which suck so much in almost any game that use them. But, surprisingly, they implemented it well here, they appear seamlessly through the normal gameplay and don’t interrupt it at all.

The final part of the combat is gunplay. Being in First Person perspective, it’s surprising to see that not only does it NOT concentrate on shooting, but it’s not very good at it either. The aiming isn’t really precise, and the guns have so little ammo it’s pretty much not worth talking about, since one gun will most likely not help you go through more than 2 enemies, if that. But this isn’t really a problem, since it’s 100% to go through the game without shooting once (except one mission with a sniper rifle you need to shoot).

Overall the fighting could be better, but it’s not the aim of the game, so it can be pardoned.

Difficulty
This game truly has an oldschool feel to it. Most of the game is trial and error. Well, mostly error. You will die in this game. A lot. Sometimes it’s not exactly clear where you have to go, sometimes you’ll have trouble going through a room filled with enemies, sometimes Faith won’t do exactly what you want her to, but most of the time, if you die, it will be due to the fact that you didn’t time your jump well enough, or you just fell from a bit too high. Some parts are just genuinely hard. But differently to other oldschool hard games, you have a lot of checkpoints and infinite lives, so dying isn’t that bad, giving you quite a lot of time to know where to go and such. So the game is hard, but incredibly forgiving.

Overall
This is a really good game. The trial-and-error gives it an oldschool feel, the gameplay itself is quite original, the replay value is definitely there if you like doing speed runs and time trials, this will definitely become a really competitive scene, at least on the online leaderboards.
So, if you like doing time trials and such, it’s going to be way worth it, and is pretty much a must buy. If not, I say this is a rental. A MUST rental. 
There are a few flaws, but overall this is very fun to play.  Definitely check this out. Whether you have a PS3, 360 or PC, it’s well worth trying.

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