Video Game (Short) Reviews

Mercenaries

This LucasArts title is Tom Clancy meets GTA. The premise is frighteningly realistic: North Korea is caught selling nukes to terrorists and a coalition of nations invades. Of course, all the nations secretly work against one another while they work together. This is where you, the mercenary, come in.

The game is, overall, worth buying/renting. It's fucking enormous and features several different maps and a lot of space to roam through and blow shit up. Every mission can be approached differently, from sneaking around disguised as an enemy vehicle to ordering cruise missile strikes and carpet bombs. It's not a game you can plow through in five or six hours and has a lot of depth. Plenty of hidden items and side missions make exploration worthwhile.

The size works against the game at times, as certain missions are at the ass-end of a map and after spending twenty minutes traveling there you get killed in two seconds and have to start over.

There are also a lot of glitches in the game, so save often. The biggest flaw in the game is the lack of save prompts after completing a mission, and I had the game freeze on me several times after I had done three or four missions in a row.

Bottom line: a great find'em and kill'em game that occasionally suffers from poor programming.

NARC

Somehow this game manages to make police brutality and drug dealing boring. Heavy-handed controls and complicated mission layouts make this game worth passing up.

For starters, the aiming system is one of the worst I've ever encountered in any video game . EVER. Centering your target with both analog sticks has the feel of trying to push two opposing magnets together. No matter how hard you try things just seem to slip. The only answer is to spray bullets everywhere, which loses it's pizzazz after about ten seconds.

The game makes no effort to save itself with an original story. It's like True Crime: Streets of L.A. except it's . actually not different at all. Tip for developers: Don't imitate games that suck.

Although certain carnal instincts can be satiated in this game via arresting a drug dealer, beating him to death with your bare hands and then selling his product on the street (or using it yourself) this juvenile gameplay is worth about an hour of your time. A novelty to rent but spending anymore than $5 to navigate this shitstorm is criminal.

God of War

Easily the best PS2 RPG to come out in recent years. Let's examine the list, shall we? Gratuitous violence? Check. Worthwhile puzzles that are a challenge to solve? Check. Engaging storyline set in an enormous arena? Check. Titties? Check and check.

God of War blends a fluid combat scheme with a large, but navigable, environment. You will spend hours playing the game, but it won't feel like you're running around in circles. The time spent roaming is not futile as GOW utilizes a pragmatic character development system that rewards you for your unrelenting slaughter. Developing weapon skills yields new combos and updating your magic spells might give you an edge over some of the tougher enemy bosses. Every aspect of your character from skills to stats to weapons evolves as your progress through the game.

What makes this game truly shine is the attention to detail in both setting and gameplay. The art and architecture of ancient Greece is rendered accurately (even the smashable pottery is legit!) but even more impressive are the customizable deaths for every enemy you encounter. You can rip the wings off a flying imp, tear an undead archer in half like a stack of parchment or tackle a minotaur and shove your sword through the back of his throat.

Variety is the life's blood of this game. The only accurate prediction you can make while playing is that this game is almost impossible to put down. A fantastic purchase or rental, whatever your gaming budget. If you buy one PS2 game this year, buy God of War.