Marc Ecko’s Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure
“Getting Up” is a lot harder than you would think.
Tags: Marc Ecko's Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure Categories: PS2 Reviews, Reviews, Xbox Reviews
Posted by David Hinkle on Mar 20th, 2006
| Title | Players | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Marc Ecko's Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure (title page) | 1 | ||
| Developer | Publisher | Genre | Online |
| Simulation | No | ||
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Marc Ecko’s Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure attempts to meld the gritty, hypnotizing world of the urban jungle with that of the thought-provoking, often underlooked, gameplay stylings of free-roaming environmental puzzles. The problem with this title, however, is that it does neither of these conventions well and instead subjects the player to constant glitches in the gameplay and total game freezes, both on the PS2 and Xbox versions.
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Mr. Ecko, best known for his hip-hop clothing line full of baggy cloth, hoods, and rhino decals, decides to attempt to strike it rich in the lucrative industry of gaming. This game of his, centering around one aspiring graffitti slinger Trane, starts off innocently enough as Big Brother themes run rampant and an oppressed ghetto forms his womb. Soon after he emerges, however, gasping for breath and finally opening his eyes to the world for the first time as he battles for brick space to lay his calling card for all of the public to see. As he leaves his grandmother’s dwelling to lay claim to his own space in the bigger world, he’ll start battling for notoriety with the local spray jockeys and, later, taking on the establishment as a whole. The story really has the promise to go somewhere in the beginning, yet eventually spirals into the Earth at great velocity.
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These glitches and freezes, however, strike right to your heart as the first of many occur during the first boss fight, in which the game would not complete the objection of defeating the boss. Upon beating his rather rotund body down, repeatedly, we were subjected to watching a trapped Trane run around a fenced-in area with the objective to defeat said boss largely displayed in the upper right hand corner, despite the fact that in reality it had occured. Other things such as animation glitches and the dreaded freezing of the entire game occur often enough that even the most passifistic of gamers will be throwing their controllers at the television with deadly force.
The gameplay itself, in slapping tags up on the brick and generally moving Trane around, is fine. Yet when it comes to jumping around the environment, Trane displays height-reaching skills that would make even Superman jealous. Trane can jump a good 9 feet from a standing position, straight up. It’s very comical.
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The differences between the Xbox and PS2 versions of the game are generally as they are with most games that release on multiple platforms. The Xbox version has the better textures, graphics, and loading times; PS2 gamers can take comfort in knowing that their controller allows them to use Trane’s unique frog-like legs more efficiently and smoothly, creating a more enjoyable experience, regardless of just how ridiculous it is. Both versions, however, have the benefit of all those wonderful glitches (note the sarcasm please).
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Marc Ecko’s Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure made a promising showing at last year’s E3, yet that game seems to have been lost on the road to retail. It’s a shame really, because the strong messages and gameplay stylings that are so few-and-far-between in gaming today really could’ve been combined to form a unique product. Instead, the subject in question is an unfinished game (riddled with the QA department’s apathy or subject to the publisher trying to just get the game out the door) that is fairly unenjoyable.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
|
+ Urban theme is spun into a positive message + Story isn't half bad + Emphasis on environmental puzzles |
5.0 |
| What Doesn't | |
|
- Bugs - Glitches - Frog legs - Bugs |
|
| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| If you like biting your controller and being frustrated at a game that freezes after you've failed to save it for 8 missions, it's for you. | |
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Tags: Marc Ecko's Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure
Posted by David Hinkle on Mar 20th, 2006 and is filed under PS2 Reviews, Reviews, Xbox 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.
