Serious Sam: The First Encounter [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.125692]
Enter The Matrix
Right, for my second review I am going to do Enter The Matrix. Firstly because after reviewing a good game I thought I should review a bad one for balance and secondly because it allows me to put off having to tackle the knotty question of Assassin's Creed.
In brief: Enter the Matrix is a third person shooter following the characters of Niobe and Ghost for pc, gamecube, playstation 2 and Xbox (I played the Xbox version).
Technical stuff: I'm going to skim over this because there's nothing to complain or compliment here.Loading times are a little too frequent for my tastes (though this may not be such a problem if you play it on pc) and graphics are fine but pale in comparison to newer games. The lockon works fine most of the time and there's a manual lock for when it doesn't.
Plot: The game takes place after the first movie and incorporates bits of the second and third as well as making some things up. You play as either Ghost or Niobe and it doesn't really matter which. The manual claims that Ghost is better with guns and Niobe us a better melee fighter and although Ghost will occasionally show his preference for firearms in his speech it doesn't have any real effect on the game-play. Every second mission is different depending on which character you took which means that if you want to complete the game with both you have to replay half of the levels which is frustrating if you want to complete all the missions. You play segments from the movie, such as the meeting of captains that gets broken up and the power plant raid, and it works fairly well most of the time as you have a clear objective and an obvious method if completing it. The characters are fairly likable even though I have the same problem here as with the movies in that they are killing innocent people, sometimes completely unnecessarily. However some bits come across as fan service, such as when Ghost spars with Trinity for no adequate reason, and the fact that the game proudly states that it has 'never before seen scenes' it makes me a little suspicious of who it's trying to attract. There's even a lobby shootout in the first level for fans of the original movie. All in all the plot is fine and manages to make you feel somewhat attached to the duo, especially since even the person you're not controlling comes off as useful during the missions.
http://i.neoseeker.com/p/Games/PC/Action/Adventure/matrix_profilelarge.jpg
Game-play: This mainly consists of fighting, either in melee or with guns. The weapons are fairly powerful but there are a huge number that are only slightly different, making it difficult to find ammo for the ones you like and forcing you to change weapons constantly (which is a pain, more on controls later). Also there aren't many interesting ones apart from one that fires gas grenades and I only remember one bit where you get ammo for the thing.This means that gunfights are repetitive and dull.
The melee combat is also uninspiring and doesn't bring across the feel of the brawls of the movies. There are only two types of attack and no combos which leaves it feeling bland, especially when only a few quick attacks will take down all your opponent. When the melee combat does shine is when you're forced to fight agents in boss fights which can only be won when you use the environment to your advantage, such as kicking him out of a plane which is surprisingly satisfying. However when the terrain gives you no advantages you have to leg it, pronto, creating only one particularly good running scenario out of at least four. However, though it works once, it is soon screwed up by the fact that they spam agents who get in your way whilst running during your encounter with Smith and other times by making it very difficult to tell where to go. This inevitably leads to frustration as you try to get round them as they constantly throw you to the floor and jump up and down on you.
Worthy of mention is the focus system where you use the matrix's trademark bullet time mechanic to pull of special moves, aim more accurately, run faster and just generally be more awesome. Though it is fun initially as you run along walls and corkscrew dive towards your enemies when you try to pull of the complicated moves the controls interfere. In order to pull off a cartwheel you have to hold both triggers, one to target and one for focus, push the left thumbstick sideways and press a to jump. Getting this right is nearly impossible in a combat situation and if you want to mix shooting into that you have to press one of the small fiddely buttons on the xbox controller. What's more it's just as easy to dive towards your enemies and blow them away with the shotgun, leading to repetitive gun fights where that move is employed constantly since you're impossible to hit whilst diving. Focus is further let down by the fact that it is often used in wrong ways. For example, in one of the chases mentioned above, you have to run down a long and uninteresting corridor with an agent in hot pursuit. The only way to shake him off is by using focus to run faster and whilst in the game this might be faster it is much slower in reality leading to a slow, boring stretch when there should be pulse pounding action.
The levels are also uninspiring with few notable set pieces apart from when agents appear and one really weird level where you fight vampires with a table leg, which is at least different (too bad it makes hardly any sense unless you've watched the second or third movies, which at the time of playing I hadn't).Remember how the style of the matrix was mainly grey and black with occasional green? Well someone decided to move the green to loading screens only and leave it all black and grey. Whilst this might hold up for a movie after several hours of game-play the levels all seem to blend into one, not particularly interesting, grey corridor.
http://games.softpedia.com/screenshots/6-25_1.jpg
Finally there are the car chases. I don't know why they put these in here since whatever character you choose you have to rely on your partner for something. If you are Ghost, Niobe drives and you ride shotgun and if you are Niobe you have to hold down a button to make ghost pop out and shoot things and doing so whilst driving causes some problems. There are about three stretches of driving in the whole game and none of them are impressive and at worst they are irritating as you wish your partner could hold up their end properly and that the damn things would just end. Tied in with the driving is the last level where you pilot Niobe's ship whilst being chased by sentinels. This is definitely the worst part of the game where, like in the driving, Ghost shoots and Niobe drives. Driving this ship is frustrating to the extreme and it was the only thing that prevented me from completing the game as Niobe as it handles awfully in the narrow tunnels you have to go through. Playing as Ghost doesn't improve it either as all you do is blaze away at sentinels who fly at you en masse and rarely actually do any damage. It's not fun and it's long, very long.
Conclusion: This game is not for you unless you want to revisit some of the worst parts of the series with extra scenes. Unless you're a great fan of the series' already disjointed plot then this game will do you no favours.
Comments: Are still welcome along with criticisms, great and small.
, Fanboy did an excellent job on it
