Posts Tagged ‘Lightmass Bomb’
Gears Of War 2 Video Game Review: A Broken COG
Let me preface today’s review by saying, with a note of smug certainty, that I am NOT one of those gamers that thinks Cliffy B. is some kind of genius because he came up with Gears of War. In fact, after playing Gears of War 2, today’s game of note, I’m left feeling about the same way as I did before about the franchise.
This time around, it’s time to take the fight to the Locust, who were NOT in fact destroyed by the Lightmass Bomb (just a good chunk of them). Actually, the Lightmass Bomb did about as much damage to humanity as it did to the Locust, causing a fatal respiratory disease called rustlung after people breathed in vaporized liquid Imulsion. And better yet, the remaining Locust have figured out that emergence holes aren’t just for moving troops any more, and figured out a way to make holes the size of cities, pretty much sealing humanity’s fate. The last human stronghold, Jacinto, is under siege by the Locust hordes, and thus, humanity’s got to go blast up some Locust in order to keep the ground under their feet intact. Meanwhile, Dom’s still looking for his wife Maria, and the Locusts have a whole host of new and horrible devices to rain death and misery on humanity.
You see that? That’s a PLOT. In fact, if the inevitable movie version–last I heard slated for 2010–is anywhere near as deep and as rich as that plot description I just put up was, then the movie’s going to be a downright WONDER. There’s plenty of character development, good voice acting, and everything that’d make a good movie out of this game.
The only problem, however, is that it’s really not much of a game. Seriously–you spend most of Gears of War 2 roadie running from one patch of cover to the next while occasionally blasting at Locust. This is then broken up by some of that sweet, sweet plot. How this thing won Best Xbox 360 Game at the Spike Video Game Awards AND at the Diehard GameFAN Awards when there were perfectly good copies of Fallout 3 hanging around is utterly, utterly beyond me.
Oh, sure…the gameplay is a whole different horse on multiplayer mode, with plenty of interesting modes to play including the new Horde Mode, in which you take on steadily expanding waves of Locust in a battle so big that “epic” sounds weak beside it. And of course there’s all the standards like Deathmatch and Capture the Flag, modes that are downright SOP (standing operating procedure, in case you don’t habla) for first person shooters these days.
There’s even plenty of downloadable content, with fresh maps and dashboard themes and for some reason a gold-plated Hammerburst rifle for use in multiplayer modes (and Oblivion took flack for horse armor? Where’s the justice?). A glitch-busting patch has also been released.
While I love the plot of Gears of War 2, I can’t help but feel let down by my involvement in it. I mean, sure…my steady succession of run, duck, shoot, repeat is saving humanity from bloodthirsty monsters, but man, is it ever DULL. I’m half tempted just to let the Locust have Sera and tell whoever’s left on the planet to just pack up for Earth already and nuke the site from orbit.
It’s the only way to be sure.