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Bionic Commando Game Review–Taking Fun And Completely Destroying It

At the risk of dating myself horribly, I remember when Bionic Commando, now available for PC, Playstation 3, and Xbox 360,  was an arcade game.  Like in actual arcades.  In case you haven’t seen one lately, arcades were places where people would go to play video games.  Sure, they had video game systems at home–most of them did, anyway–but arcades were the place to go to play the newest, the latest, and the best.  They even had specialized interfaces–racing games would offer you a molded bucket seat with a steering wheel in front, and so on.  But enough of my geriatric doddering–the takeaway here is that I remember Bionic Commando when it didn’t look like a cookie-cutter of EVERY OTHER GAME ON THE MARKET.

This is a direct sequel to the original Bionic Commando, as well as to Bionic Commando: Rearmed, so of course some advancements are to be expected.  The plotline even manages to dovetail successfully with the original: ten years after the original, the “bionic commandos”, of which there were apparently more than one, are facing a sizable public backlash.  Hunted like dogs and in most cases killed, few people remember the legendary Super Joe who once saved the world. But recently, pro-bionic terrorists set off a “weapon of mass destruction” in the middle of Ascension City and proceeded to occupy the rest.  Now, it’s up to Nathan Spencer, former bionic commando, to swing in and retake the city.

Seriously—when was this giant rush started to make almost every game a shooter in which your perspective was either perched over a gun barrel or staring at some guy’s—or on rare occasions some girl’s—pixelated ass?  That may well be the biggest problem with Bionic Commando: sheer mind-numbing unoriginality.  Sure, the plotline’s great but the gameplay is so cookie-cutter as to be downright nightmarish.

The graphics and sound are just fine—if you like technical superiority in your games, then you won’t be disappointed here.  In this case, sadly, it’s just pretty wrapping over a lousy package.

Though in the end, it may be my own memories that are to blame here.  I didn’t have much fun with this game because it wasn’t the Bionic Commando I knew and loved.  Instead I got some pretty third-person shooter with some good action but some really buggy portions too.  I remember when the Bionic Arm would clamp onto nearly anything and let me swing.  I certainly DON’T, however, remember the Bionic Arm being useful in only a handful of situations, and the rest of the time, the arm simply refusing to attach.  It’s like the Delorean of bionic implants—sure, it LOOKS awesome but it really doesn’t perform all that well.  What point is there in only being able to attach onto a limited handful of surfaces?  Bionic Commando, with only a few exceptions, is basically almost two games—a shooter, and a timed button press round of swinging.

And even the timed button presses of swinging don’t always ensure success—more than once my swing indicator told me “Great Swing!”, but what that lying bastard failed to tell me was that it wasn’t good ENOUGH, as I fell into the abyss well short of where I’d intended to land.

So yes, I’m very disappointed with this second-rate retread purporting to be a sequel of a game I enjoyed so very much way back when.  Maybe my memories make me biased, but one thing’s clear, this is an unworthy successor.

Soul Calibur IV Game Review–Long Or Short Term, Still A Value

Fighting games seem to be thinning out of late, buried under a slew of first person shooters and sports games, but one particular gem has managed to emerge from the fray to continue a following that goes back decades, back to a simpler time when there were arcades in malls and most people got their head-to-head action from a room full of bleeping machines.  Today we’re talking Soul Calibur IV, part of the long running series.

Featuring all your favorite fighters, and a panoply of new ones (including for reasons that still escape me Garen Malek, Darth Vader and Yoda depending on what version of the game you buy and whether or not you go in for the downloadable content), you’ll plunge headlong through the stories of all the various fighters, which is why you’re not getting a plot synopsis of the game this time around.  It would just, plain and simply, take too long.  Each character has his or her own individual story, and occasionally, it even overlaps with other characters’ stories to make this strange sort of massive latticework of plot over the whole game.  I’m actually very impressed that this ridiculous brawler game is getting THIS kind of plot.

And your involvement with that plot won’t even feel all that minimalist.  You’ll be fighting all the other characters, sometimes one on one, other times two on two, and sometimes even four against one as you advance through the stages to find out what your character’s particular connection to the legendary cursed sword is this time around.

I’m actually very surprised by this—normally fighter games, for me, have been pointless button mashers where you try to memorize lists of moves for use against opponents of varying and in some cases downright ridiculous skill levels, but this time I got access to a whole array of moves that required little more than a controller direction and a button press, plus a whole bunch more if I wanted them.  I could use Yoda’s force powers to fling myself headlong around the screen, or if I wanted to, I could just use his surprising agility to make short hops and bash my opponent into oblivion with my light saber.  There was a LOT of variety here, and frankly, I was glad for the opportunity to just sit down with the game and let the smack down go on.  I even got little nuggets of plot regularly as I beat an opponent or series thereof, just enough in just close enough increments to make me want to keep moving.  I got through Yoda, Voldo and Ivy’s plotlines in maybe a half-hour’s play time, but man, I wanted to catch everybody else’s plots too.

This game might be a bit big for just one rental—and if you’re a party game sort you may want to buy a copy just to keep it on hand—but even just a short time with it won’t leave you disappointed or missing a whole lot of the plot.  This is a game with lots of surprises that looks beautiful and plays even better.  I don’t recommend fighting games very often—maybe because I don’t get many of them TO recommend in the first place—but I can’t see a way you won’t have fun with Soul Calibur IV.