Killzone
First party first person shooting – a match made in heaven?
Tags: Killzone Categories: PS2 Reviews, Reviews
Posted by Andrew on Nov 27th, 2004
| Title | Players | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Killzone (title page) | 1 - 12 | ||
| Developer | Publisher | Genre | Online |
| First Person Shooter | Yes | ||
There was a lot of hype surrounding this game, mostly created by PlayStation 2 owners. There was talk that this game would be a “Halo-killer.” I’m not going to waste time here. It is not.
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Actually, the real comparison shouldn’t be with Halo at all; if anything, it should be with Red Faction 2. The gameplay, the environments, the story — it’s a much more similar piece of “gamery.” Unfortunately, it’s no Red Faction 2 either.
Helghan, a socially isolated, colonized world inhabited by a now-mutated population of humans, has raised a great army. Visari, the leader of the Helghast, is loved by his people, but hated by the people of Earth and the other colonized world of Vekta. Now, that Helghast army is Hel-bent (heh-heh… see what I did there? Oh mercy…) on conquering the world of Vekta.
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It’s up to you and three other specialized members of the International Strategic Arms (ISA) on Vekta to stop the onslaught of Helghast forces.
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Killzone gives you the option of choosing from four different characters. You’ll start off with one, but gain more as you progress. These characters are fairly diverse in appearance and armaments. One is your standard, run-of-the-mill, male, FPS hero-type; one is a female assassin, master of stealth, sniping, silenced rifle and all; one is a beast of a man armed with a massive automatic weapon; the last is a Helghast soldier spy, used mostly to help get through situations where a Helghast is needed.
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Now, that all sounds wonderfully various. But, to be honest, with the exception of a few instances, you could get through the game with anyone of them and the game experience changes very little. The female spy is almost pointless, as no point during the game can you actually sneak around. You can be quiet and careful, and sometimes she can get through to places where others can’t, but it amounts to little and eventually you’re going to have to confront all enemy soldiers. You can’t sneak past them, only start shooting at them before they start shooting at you.
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The shooting, the guts of any FPS, is mediocre. The mechanics are awkward. Shoot an enemies legs and he goes down in a couple shots, but pump his chest full of lead, and he’s little Johnny Live-a-lot. At no point was I that blown away by the gameplay (there were a few very large guns that are initially neato). It’s not bad. It’s a functional shooter, but going through this game often feels like you’re going through the motions of games you’ve played before. There’s nothing new. That’s really the overlying theme for the entire game.
Killzone does a good job of capturing the feel of a post-apocalyptic future-world. The enemy Helghast soldiers look very cool, and their appearance — glowing red eyes, breathing apparatus, all black — does give you a feel of panic as groups of them charge you in battle.
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The best part of this game is undoubtedly the environments and the level design. It’s quite impressive sometimes, and gives a lot of variety during fire fights. But I don’t want to make the level design sound open-ended, because, with a few minor exceptions, it’s pretty linear. This makes the gameplay a bit bland, and almost seems like a waste of talented level designers.
There is little variety with enemies; they seem to attack like clockwork. Enter new area, group of enemies enters, repeat. And though the enemies look cool, and the environments look cool, this repetition doesn’t make for a thrilling gaming experience. Again, not bad, but it’s lacking a “wow” factor.
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The controls are a pretty frustrating aspect of this game. They’re similar to most modern FPS in that you’ve got your standard primary fire button, secondary fire, grenade, crouch, run, reload, etc., but it took me a good while before I figured out a comfortable sensitivity level for my vertical and horizontal joystick settings. And even then, they simply felt too loose. There’s no sense of tightness. Even after playing the game for 10 total hours, I felt like I was going into battles shooting more wildly than I should have been.
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As I mentioned, the environments and graphics are the best part of the game. Gunfights in the pouring rain, the dingy, rusted look of the industrial setting, and the shattering glass all around you in an abandoned mall — these tidbits can make the game enjoyable. Obviously, though, visuals can only take a game so far. Then, the gameplay and the story have to take you the rest of the way. But the gameplay just doesn’t quite get there.
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The story is interesting. Lets be honest, most video game stories aren’t really that captivating, even in the best titles. We can usually attribute this to over-the-top voice acting, poor dialogue, and awkward cut scenes. Killzone is not much different. It’s not on the BAD list, but it’s certainly nothing special. The Red Faction series does a much better job with its stories, and not only that, its gameplay made the stories believable and engrossing. With Killzone, you don’t feel for any of the characters, and you don’t feel like anything is really at stake.
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The sound and music are okay. They music didn’t make me want to go out and find the soundtrack, and the sound effects are standard FPS gunfire and explosions. However, I find it hard to penalize a game for using the sound that it’s really supposed to use. Gun. Gunfire sound. Makes sense. The in-game voice work is actually decent. The Helghast soldiers have this coarse, modulated voice that sounds wicked.
The multiplayer mode of this game is pretty similar to the single player mode in every way except that it’s more open. You can play online and offline, which is a nice touch. You have your basic MP modes like Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Domination, Assault, Defend. There’s also a mode called Supply Drop, where your team has to retrieve objects dropped at specific points on the map. First team to retrieve and hold all the containers from the enemy wins.
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Multiplayer is pretty fun. There are nice maps to work with, and they have the same good quality that you see in the single player levels. It’s broadband only and chat is available. My biggest grievance is that there was still some annoying lag, but mostly it went fairly smooth. My second grievance is that the gameplay mechanics are just like the single player mode, which, as I explained above, could be better. MP is always a welcomed addition, but when it’s built on a mediocre SP, it’s bound to be mediocre itself. Basically, it is, but worth a try.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
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+ Level design + Environments add luster to the experience + Online/Offline multiplayer |
7.0 |
| What Doesn't | |
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- Nothing new - Controls not tight enough - Overall feel of mediocrity |
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| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| Killzone is a decent FPS, but it lacks polish in every aspect, save maybe level design. A little extra time spent could have made this game shine. As I said, the overlying theme of Killzone is "nothing new." It's not a bad game; there's just nothing here that you haven't seen before. But still, the entire package is done pretty well. | |
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Tags: Killzone
Posted by Andrew on Nov 27th, 2004 and is filed under PS2 Reviews, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can post a comment, or trackback from your own site.
