Stranglehold
Guns. Lots of guns.
Tags: Stranglehold Categories: Reviews, Xbox 360 Reviews
Posted by Mark "MadMup" Zwolanek on Oct 4th, 2007
| Title | Players | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Stranglehold (title page) | 1 | ||
| Developer | Publisher | Genre | Online |
| Action | No | ||
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Eighteen years after the events depicted in John Woo’s Hard-Boiled, gamers get treated to a proper sequel in a new medium. Chow Yun Fat reprises his role as Inspector Tequila, embroiled in a turf war that’s claiming cops and involving people from Tequila’s past. No matter the circumstances, though, it all comes down to one thing: bullets.
And lots of them.
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Stranglehold is as close to playing a John Woo movie as a person can get. Once the action stops, it only stops to load a cutscene or the next level. Hundreds upon hundreds of nameless thugs come pouring out of doors intent on burying Tequila in a hail of lead. And, in what can only be described as some sort of violent ballet, Tequila returns shot for shot, spinning out of the way of danger and using the environment to dole out punishment on his way towards revenge and justice.
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The first thing a player will notice on playing the game is the environment. Boards splinter, watermelons explode, air conditioners fall on heads – there’s so much going on in the settings that it can be easy to lose sight of the main goals. Style points are given for using the environment in creative ways – dropping a sign on someone’s head earns more than just simply shooting him would. Tables can be kicked up to provide temporary cover, but they will be quickly shot into pieces, just as columns and walls will be.
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Aside from the myriad of guns available, Tequila’s got some other tricks up his sleeve. Style points build the “Tequila Bomb” meter, which allows Tequila to pull off special moves. Precision Aim lets the player aim… well, precisely, from a distance, and the enemy reacts differently depending on where he’s been shot. Barrage lets Tequila go on a shooting rampage without using any ammo in his inventory, and make him invulnerable while it lasts. Spin Attack is for when you absolutely positively got to kill every … person in the room, and it also grants invulnerability for the duration.
On top of that, Tequila can bust out “Tequila Time,” a Matrix-like effect that slows time while allowing Tequila to pull off great stunts and shots in real-time. This coupled with the destructible environments can cause there to be a grillion things flying through the air in any given moment, and it makes from some great-looking shoot-outs.
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At least once per level Tequila finds himself in a standoff. This is played out in a minigame that occurs in Tequila Time, with the player trying to dodge shots while shooting back or shooting environmental hotpoints.
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All of this is, as might be imagined, is tons of fun. Whenever Tequila slides across a table or a counter or runs up a stair railing or slides down a dinosaur and Tequila Time automatically kicks in, it’s a rush. But… it’s best in small doses. Diving towards an enemy with guns blazing for the 100th time loses a little bit of the shine the first ten times had. After that, it starts to feel more and more repetitive, and after that, it becomes pretty evident that the game has a limited bag of tricks. Yes, it performs that bag of tricks very well, but seeing a trick over and over reduces its magic over time and can even become a kind of drudgery. The game is short, but it almost seems like a good thing, as too much more of it would have been too much. Again, the game is great fun (even given some frustrating camera issues that make it difficult to pinpoint an enemy causing Tequila damage), but it’s best in small doses.
NOTE: The game includes Xbox Live-enabled multiplayer, but in several different attempts over several days, there were no games in progress and no one joined any created games, so it is impossible to review it. There seem to be only two options: deathmatch and team deathmatch, and it would have been interesting to see how Tequila Time was handled with multiple human players.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
|
+Playing a John Woo movie? Yes, please! +Chow Yun Fat! +Great shoot-em-up action +Destructible environments |
8.6 |
| What Doesn't | |
|
-Frustrating enemy pinpointing -Action becomes repetitive -Action becomes repetitive... and a little less fun as the game wears on |
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| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| There's a lot of fun to be had in this title. | |
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Tags: Stranglehold
Posted by Mark "MadMup" Zwolanek on Oct 4th, 2007 and is filed under Reviews, Xbox 360 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.
