Author: Dr. K

Game Corner [Asterix Anniversary]: Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered (Xbox Series X)

Dr. KLeave a comment

Asterix the Gaul (and his best friend Obelix) first debuted on 29 October 1959 as a serial in the French/Belgium magazine Pilote. Since then, the plucky Gauls have had many adventures in comic books, videogames, and feature-length productions. This year, I’m spending a few days celebrating this popular and enduring character.

Released: 22 October 2020
Originally Released: 21 November 2003
Developer: OSome Studio
Original Developer: Étranges Libellules
Metacritic Scores: 53 / 5.4

Also Available For: Game Boy Advance, GameCube, PC, PlayStation 2, (Original Version); Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S (Romastered)

Quick Facts: 
With over 400 million books sold worldwide, it’s no wonder Asterix expanded into animation, movies, and videogames. In 2003, Infogrames backed a new Asterix videogame, initially titled Asterix & Obelix: Next Generation, a 3D beat-‘em-up that marked his PlayStation 2 debut. Astérix & Obélix XXL was generally praised for its gameplay but said to be visually uninspiring and tedious. Still, it spawned three sequels and was revamped for modern consoles with this Romastered version. Despite the improvements, Astérix & Obélix XXL continued to frustrate with its barebones gameplay and mediocre combat.

Gameplay and Power-Ups:
Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered is a reworked version of the original 3D brawler, offering visual tweaks and additional options. Surprisingly, considering the title and the nature of the game, Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered is a purely single-player experience, with one player primarily controlling the plucky Asterix and switching to the oafish Obelix either when prompted or automatically. Players visit six stages, recognisable to Asterix fans, each with six levels apiece save for the final stage, Rome, which is a two-level affair. After choosing the game’s difficulty and toggling various display and music options, players start in Gaul and immediately begin bashing Romans. Players attack and interact with former Roman spy Sam Shieffer by pressing X, jump with A (executing a double jump with a second press in mid-air), catch stunned Romans with Y, and perform a weak-ass dash with B. The Left Trigger has your partner throw an enemy while the Right Bumper orders Dogmatix to attack, disarming and stunning enemies. The Right Trigger switches between the original graphics and sound and the Romastered visuals, earning you an easy Achievement and allowing you to collect different sestertii coins when challenging one of the many stele time trials. Your health is measured by shields, which are refilled by smacking wild boar and collecting their meat or fully refilled, and extended up the six shields, by finding shields dotted about. Players also smash a shitload of wooden crates and collect even more Roman helmets, multiplying their load by grabbing Centurion helmets floating about. There are no lives in Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered and players must save by approaching or smacking sleepy druids, respawning either at the druid or at autosave points when they fail their mission.

Decimate nigh-endless swarms of enemies with a handful of mediocre attacks and cannons.

The core gameplay of Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered is combat. Enemies are relentless, nigh-endlessly swarming town squares or enclosed areas, with players forced to defeat up to 1500 Romans and other enemies at a time! Combat starts pretty fun, with Romans flying all over, and quickly becomes tedious as options are so limited. As you dish out beatings, a combo meter builds and, when full, you can press specific button combinations to thin out the hoards. These are purchased from a merchant and are frustratingly limited since you can only perform them when the meter’s full. All you really need is the Twister combos, which see both characters transform into devastating tornados, though you can also pound Romans and dig up menhirs. Very rarely, magic potion empowers Asterix, increasing his speed and strength and making him temporarily invincible. More often, you’ll hop into cannons, rapidly firing cannonballs with X as Obelix pushes you back and forth. Finally, glowing spots or automatic sections switch you to Obelix, who’s slower and bigger but also strong enough to smash metal crates and haul giant stones to clear passages or create bridges. Asterix, meanwhile, can carry and light torches, lighting fires and explosive barrels to clear passageways. Often, players must smack windmills to raise platforms or Obelix must pull Asterix along on elevated platforms, but I was disappointed that Obelix didn’t have more combat options, like a ground pound or menhir slam. Obelix can bounce about on special springs, while slingshots ricochet you across areas and players must hit switches to open doors, lower bridges, or earn a Golden Laurel. Combat quickly becomes repetitive and tiresome, particularly when swarmed or playing without Obelix and Dogmatix as support, with enemies having a long reach and often shielding against your ridiculously limited attacks. Gameplay is mixed up by a handful of sliding and boat riding sections, where players careen down steep slopes grabbing helmets and avoiding boulders or race across water grabbing yet more helmets and avoiding various obstacles.

It’s hard to tell what’s worse: the repetitive combat or the repetitive puzzles and tasks.

The rest of Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered is exploration and platforming, with players swimming, hopping to platforms, and searching for switches. Often, you cannot progress until you clear out all enemies or hit switches and you must activate giant springs with X to fly to other sections. Speaking of, stages go on way, way too long, throwing the same gimmicks and obstacles at you no matter where you’re fighting. Sure, some areas have more water than others, Egypt (and Rome) has a lot of insta-death lava, and spike pits become plentiful, but you’re still forced to fight endless swarms of enemies until it’s safe to light an explosive, hit a switch, or push blocks and towers. Occasionally, you step on pressure pads to open trap doors, which is a great way to take out multiple enemies. Other times, you scale towers, explore caves, or go solo to open a door or clear the way. Sometimes, you must use the cannons to take out patrolling phalanxes; other times, Sam tasks you with collecting helmets or (surprise, surprise) clearing out all enemies before he’ll open a door. I wish there was more to say about the gameplay but there really isn’t. All you do is smash crates, bash enemies, collect helmets, and perform the same simple tasks again and again. Sometimes, blasts of wind rush through tunnels and you must hide in alcoves until it (eventually) dies down and to preserve your torch. One time in Greece, you push logs to make platforms for Asterix; and you must frantically eliminate flying Romans in Helvetia to light four torches. You never play as other characters (not even Dogmatix for stealth sections), there’s no upgrades beyond the rubbish combos, and the best the game has to offer in terms of upping the challenge is more insta-death hazards and enemies. Luckily, you won’t have to clear out those hoards if you die afterwards, but my god does this game outstay it’s welcome quickly!

Presentation:
Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered has a very confused visual identity. The titular characters have been given a gritty makeover, ditching their cuddly, comic book aesthetic for a more pugilistic atmosphere, though their supporting characters and enemies oddly don’t reflect this. Both characters have basic idly poses but are strangely quiet in most cutscenes, only really chiming in when they rescue their fellow villagers. There are no pre-rendered cutscenes so you’ll be seeing the in-game models the entire time, though they do look pretty decent. It’s just a shame they don’t have many animations or attacks and, when you bust out a combo, that the game lags. The game performs pretty well, unless there’s loads of enemies and action on the screen, though I did experience moments of stuttering and where I had to reload because the game didn’t register that I’d defeated all enemies. The story is about as predictable as ever, with the two warriors searching for their kidnapped friends and travelling across most of the Roman Empire. However, Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered wastes a lot of its potential by omitting notable characters from these locations, like Cleopatra, Gluteus Maximus, and Justforkix (though Redbeard the Pirate does appear). This extends to the enemies, with you fighting the same Romans over and over; the game doesn’t even include the “Roman in a tree” trope and instances where you fight anyone other than Romans are lacking. Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered also opts for a rock-based soundtrack that feels very out of place. The music is often a bit dodgy as well, cutting off and going silent midway through the action or abruptly ending or kicking in for no reason. It’s neat that you can switch between the old and new visuals, with the original graphics obviously being far blander and more basic compared to the modern makeover, though it’s not as if the new paint job makes things any livelier.

The visual upgrade is appreciated but doesn’t improve the tedious gameplay or barebones story.

Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered plays things very safe with its locations, having you fight in the forests and through the Gaulish village before visiting the snowy mountains of Normandy, the picturesque cliffsides of Greece, the night-time countryside of Helvetia, the arid deserts of Egypt, and finally the grandiose Colosseum in Rome. I liked seeing the Gaul’s village recreated in 3D, even if it is in flames, and it’s fun spotting recognisable locations like Cacofonix’s treehouse and Unhygienix’s fishmongers, and fighting Romans by the beach. It’s a shame you don’t get to properly storm a Roman garrison, but there are plenty of encampments stationed across their empire. I enjoyed the snowy wastes of Normandy, but this location is largely squandered as you’re mostly fighting up a mountain and your exploration of the frigid, Norse caves is limited to claustrophobic, windswept environments. Civilisation comes to the forefront in Greece, where you fight through Roman baths and bash gladiators, while Helvetia is tackled mostly at night and sees you springing and jumping up a cliffside. This area emphasises elevator platforms, which often crop up, where you must defeat all enemies to reach higher areas. I had high hopes for Egypt but, rather than exploring dark and ominous pyramids and crypts, you’re mostly stuck in the wastelands or fighting through the bustling market and city squares. There’s a lot of lava, boulders, and towering statues here and a pyramid does crop up, but it’s weird that there’s no labyrinthine switch puzzle or anything like that. Rome is the smallest area, restricting you to the ornate city outskirts and then forcing you to fight a gauntlet in the Colosseum, which I suppose makes sense but it’s still a bit disappointing that you don’t explore more of the city. It’s cool fighting before Julius Caesar and hopping on his throne, but there’s little to note here since you’re forced to focus on decimating the thousands of enemies who come at you in waves.

Enemies and Bosses:
Unsurprisingly, many Roman soldiers appear in Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered. The standard Legionnaires carry spears and shields and are easily defeated, eventually donning leaves to pop up from long grass. Taller Legionnaires appear in Greece and sport larger weapons, extremely annoying “pushers” swing gladiator sticks to send you flying, some fly on jetpacks to douse your fires, others fire arrows, and you encounter many instances of multiple Roman formations. These phalanxes wander about erratically, thrusting their spears from the sides or up top, but can be decimated with cannons. A larger “Optio” Legionnaire really got on my nerves since they often appear in fours and attack when you have no support on hand, charging a combo swing that seems to always hit. This is mirrored by the gold-clad Centurions, who come in two forms (though there’s sadly no Voluptuous Arteriosclerosus variant like other Asterix videogames) and can guard against your attacks and drop health-restoring meat. You also bash apart the Romans’ rock-tossing catapults and bash numerous Roman lions and their muscular tamers, and encounter some non-Roman enemies. Namely, cutlass-wielding pirates, their long-suffering captain, and two brutish Normans: a standard barbarian warrior and a more formidable chief. Fighting them is the same as fighting Optios and Centurions, except they swing spiked clubs and have no smaller cannon fodder to ease the battle. Honestly, I was disappointed by the enemy selection as the game sported fewer enemy variants than earlier, 16-bit and even 8-bit Asterix titles, and none of Asterix’s former rivals or enemies reappear here.

When you’re not bashing swarms of enemies, you’re facing the same war machines again and again.

This means that, rather than contending with the magic and hypnotic powers of Prolix the Soothsayer, tackling Redbeard’s crew, or pitting Obelix against Gluteus Maximus, you’re left to fight Roman war machines as boss battles. The smaller one is a towering structure with two concrete block arms that it swings and crash to the ground to create shockwaves. When you first fight this towering war machine, it’s in an open area with lots of room to manoeuvre and magic potion on hand, but you’re restricted to a smaller space in Egypt. Regardless, it’s best to use hit and run tactics, dashing in to smack the cogs holding the arms and escaping before you take a hit or are flung away, repeating until both arms are destroyed and the machine is left vulnerable. While most areas pit you against dozens, hundreds, or thousands of Romans, you must defeat numerous spiked bulldozer-like “Machines of War” to rescue your fellow villagers. At first, Asterix must get up high and leap to a big red switch on the machine’s top, extending the grinder-like appendages so Obelix can carefully hop between them and destroy their screws. This is easier said than done as the machine spits explosive bombs, its spikes have a deceptive hit box, and it can even electrify itself, to say nothing of how rotund Obelix is. In the second fight, you must step on three pressure plates to raise its central column, then race to the high ground to fire cannons at this target to attack the appendages as before. The same strategy works in the third encounter, only there are lava pits, levers to hit, and Romans to worry about (just ignore them, though, as the machine dispatches them). Finally, Caesar controls two Machines of War at once in Rome, with lava streams breaking up the ground. This time, you must drag Asterix to the high ground, extend a bridge, and hop to the red button, which is extremely difficult with so many projectiles and the janky camera. Luckily, you only have to destroy two appendages this time, so just focus on one machine at a time.

Additional Features:
There are twenty-eight Achievements in Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered, with six being awarded every time you beat a stage, and an extra one earned every time you clear the game on a different difficulty. There are three to choose from at the start, with a fourth “Extreme” difficulty unlocked after you beat “Hard” mode, though these Achievements stack so maybe tackle the game on at least “Normal” to save time. Each level has up to eight Golden laurels to find for another Achievement, you’ll get another for unlocking every combo, another for getting six health shields, and two more for defeating 5000 enemies and collecting 99999. Find and defeat Redbeard in each location and you get another Achievement, bounce yourself around twenty times in thirty seconds for another, and clear all timed challenges for more. By clearing areas and progressing through the story, you’ll activate steles that task you with switching between the old and new visuals to collect coins or racing to the finish against a time limit. You can replay any level from the main map to seek out any challenges or collectibles you’ve missed. You also unlock some fun skins if you find all the Golden Laurels in each location and can purchase amusing pictures from the Great Map screen. Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered offers a bunch of options, like toggling between the new and old visuals and soundtrack and sound effects, enabling autosave when near a druid, activating a speedrunner time, and revamped animations. Sadly, however, there’s no two-player options or boss rush or anything to collect other than endless helmets and the Golden Laurels, which stunts replayability a bit since stages are such a chore to play through!

Final Thoughts:
I had high hopes for Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered. I’d seen the games floating around the Xbox Store for a while and been tempted by them since I’m a big fan of the franchise and 3D brawlers, but man was this a let-down. The game starts pretty strong, with an interesting visual makeover for the two heroes and recreating their iconic image in 3D, but it quickly outstays its welcome after just the first stage. It makes sense to focus an Asterix game on combat, but fights are so dull and repetitive here. Even if you purchase all the combos, pulling them off is really weird and barely worth the effort beyond decimating foes with the Twister combos. It’s baffling how little you utilise the magic potion, how underwhelming Obelix is, and how restrictive and tedious fights are due to the janky camera and a lack of attacks. Platforming is equally aggravating, with you constantly performing the same tasks no matter what, with only some slides and boat sections to break up the action. Getting Asterix onto platforms for Obelix to pull was annoying half the time, I got sick of searching for switches, pulling rocks is never interesting no matter how big they are, and it was incredibly frustrating to reach an area and be boxed in and forced to fight up to thousands of enemies. To make matters worse, all you do between these tasks is smash crates and collect Roman helmets, which gets old quickly. There’s little point in exploring unless you’re searching for Golden Laurels and Redbeard, Dogmatix is unreliable as a support attack, and the bosses were a major let-down. I’m truly baffled that, with all the Asterix stories told and all the characters available, the developers recycled the same enemies over and over and used the same Machines of War with little variation. While the Romastered do-over improves the visuals and the game pops at times, every area is a slog to get through and a waste of the license, reducing the Asterix brand to a beat-‘em-up platformer so mindless and repetitive it makes the arcade game looks like a sprawling epic!

My Rating:

Rating: 1 out of 5.

Terrible

Did you enjoy Astérix & Obélix XXL: Romastered and, if so…why? Were you impressed by this visual revamp or did you prefer the original? Were you also disappointed by the lacklustre combat and repetitive gameplay? Do you agree that areas went on for way too long and that the bosses were a disappointment? Did you ever find all the Golden Laurels and beat the new time trials? Which of the XXL games was your favourite and how are you celebrating Asterix this month? Whatever your thoughts on Asterix, feel free to leave a comment below, support me on Ko-Fi, and and check out my other Asterix content.

Movie Night: Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers

Dr. K1 Comment

Released: 29 September 1995
Director: Joe Chappelle
Distributor: Dimension Films

Budget: $5 million
Box Office: $15.1 million
Rotten Tomatoes Scores: 8% / 36%

Quick Facts:
After the negative reception to Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers (Othenin-Girard, 1989), producer Moustapha Akkad sought to retool the franchise, forming a partnership with Dimension Films and rejecting many pitches. The final product was heavily butchered following test screenings, reducing Donald Pleasance’s role in favour of more gore and a confusing ending that made marginally more sense in the Producer’s Cut (2014) and resulting in one of the most infamous entries in the franchise.

The Review:
Six years after Halloween 5, Haddonfield, Illinois has tried to bury the memory of Michael Myers/The Shape (George P. Wilbur/A. Michael Lerner/Brad Hardin) by banning Halloween. Michael, and his long-suffering former doctor, Sam Loomis (Donald Pleasence), are presumed dead, as is the Shape’s niece, Jamie Lloyd (J. C. Brandy), who all disappeared in some form after the fifth movie. Dr. Loomis retired from his obsession and the spotlight and apparently found some peace that’s reflected in his healed scars. Everyone was happy to let the past die except horny, excitable Haddonfield teens like Beth (Mariah O’Brien), who want to bring Halloween back to Haddonfield. Oddly, despite the ban, the town still celebrates harvest festival and houses are still decorated for trick-or-treaters, much to the anger of the abusive and volatile John Strode (Bradford English), who’s incensed that local kids keep associated his family with Michael. Of course, it doesn’t help that realtor John moved his family into the old Myers house, where young Michael murdered his sister as a child, a fact unknown to his meek and mistreated wife, Debra Strode (Kim Darby), and their kids, Kara Strode (Marianne Hagan) and Tim Strode (Keith Bogart). Additionally, Haddonfield seems happy to bring Halloween back as there is no police interference in the youngsters’ public gatherings and no objections to shock radio DJ Barry Simms (Leo Geter) capitalising on Michael’s notoriety. Whatever passes as peace for Haddonfield is doomed, however, as Michael and Jamie aren’t as dead as people would like to think. Instead, they were spirited away by the mysterious “Man in Black” and held captive during the interim under the care of doctors and the druid-like “Cult of Thorn”.

When Jamie’s unceremoniously offed, we’re left following bland Kara and her largely irrelevant son.

While it initially seemed like Jamie had inherited her uncle’s curse to become a psychopathic killer, she was then seen to share a prominent psychic link to her uncle. The Curse of Michael Myers reduces her to a mewling victim. Held captive by the Cult of Thorn for six years, Jamie was presumably raped or possibly artificially inseminated during that time to birth Michael’s replacement, a force of pure evil the cult could control. After giving birth, Jamie escapes with the aid of a sympathetic nurse (Susan Swift) and promptly flees into the rain with her child, relentlessly pursued by Michael, now driven by the “Curse of Thorn” to murder his bloodline (and anyone in his way). Unfortunately, Jamie’s presence is very brief; she gets scant moments to bond with her baby, desperately calls for help, and is then promptly butchered by Michael. It’s a pretty shitty end for her, especially as they could’ve ditched her being held captive and simply transplanted Jamie’s story onto Kara. Laurie Strode’s (Jamie Lee Curtis) adopted cousin, Kara is having a tough time here. After getting pregnant in her teens and birthing Danny Strode (Devin Gardner), Kara was forced to move back after some incident, angering her father and causing him to lash out at her as much as Debra and Kara’s little “bastard”. As if clashing with her asshole father isn’t bad enough, Kara must deal with Danny being tormented by nightmares where the Man in Black calls to him. Danny constantly sees and hears the Man in Black, who encourages him to kill his family, just as Michael apparently heard a similar voice in the same house as a child. Although this drives Danny to hold a knife up to John when he hits Kara, it largely just leaves him an emotional wreck who’s either spaced out or wailing, meaning he lacks the nuance and appeal of young Jamie Lloyd (Danielle Harris) from the previous films.

A half-crazed grown-up Tommy is aided by the frustratingly absent and ineffectual Dr. Loomis.

Tommy Doyle, a young boy who encountered Michael in the first film, has grown up into “Paul Stephen Rudd”, a damaged and traumatised youth living in Mrs. Blankenship’s (Janice Knickrehm) boarding house across the road from (and obsessed with) the Strodes. Tommy has been obsessed with Michael since 1978 and has researched the Curse of Thorn, convinced that Michael will return to finish off loose ends (the Strodes). His odd nature initially unnerves Kara and sees him largely shunned by Haddonfield, but Tommy’s the only one who recognises Jamie’s frantic call and locates her abandoned baby, Steven Lloyd (Emily Haterson), whom he’s compelled to protect. Luckily, Tommy quickly runs into the aged and hobbled Dr. Loomis, who’s pulled out of retirement after a visit from an old friend, Doctor Terence Wynn (Mitch Ryan), and news of Michael’s pending return. Sadly, Dr. Loomis doesn’t get much to do here, or much of the spotlight. His manic demeanour is considerably toned down and he mostly appears confused and exhausted, to the point where he barely reacts upon learning that Michael’s loose. He’s pretty ineffectual at helping Tommy protect baby Steven, easily being “drugged” off-camera and completely blindsided when Dr. Wynn turns out to be the Man in Black. Dr. Loomis tries to kill his colleague to stop the madness and is promptly jumped and vanishes for most of the finale, returning only to seemingly be killed offscreen. It’s a shame as I would’ve liked to see Tommy bring Steven to Dr. Loomis and for Dr. Loomis to know of the Cult of Thorn, having researched them under the guise of retirement. Instead, the filmmakers went out of their way to cut Dr. Loomis and Tommy is left to wander around acting all twitchy and weird, almost having a psychotic break when confronted by Michael.

Michael loses all terror and allure thanks to being Dr. Wynn’s lapdog and a slave to his “curse”.

As bad as Dr. Loomis’s characterisation is, Michael’s is just as bad. Rather than being this mysterious, unknowable force of evil, Michael is little more than a lap dog here. The Curse of Thorn compels him to murder his bloodline but apparently means Dr. Wynn and his pseudo-druids can control Michael, to some degree. Or at least subdue him. It’s really unclear, to be honest. Michael spends most of the film wandering the cult’s facility, killing anyone who interferes with their plans, and then going after Jamie before returning to Haddonfield. His target is Danny (which is weird as Dr. Wynn also tries to corrupt him into a new Michael, like with Jamie), but he also makes the effort to kill Debra and John. He also randomly attacks Barry before killing Beth, Tim, and, bizarrely, all the doctors and cultists at the cult facility in the finale (presumably including Dr. Wynn). The film states that young Michael “heard a voice” that drove him to kill his family and that Dr. Wynn has always protected Michael, allowing him to terrorise Haddonfield as part of a bizarre ritual. From what I can gather, the cult wants to create a replacement Michael, either through science or genetics, one that they can properly control for some unexplained endgame. Dr. Wynn wants Dr. Loomis to join their efforts, but he adamantly refuses, and the idea seems to be that Michael’s pure evil cannot be controlled, which is why he goes on a rampage, but it’s all very sloppily executed. Michael seems to be going through the motions, barely being a terrifying figure as he wanders about and catches surprises his unsuspecting prey. Instead of a dramatic showdown between him and Dr. Loomis, we get Tommy damn near going crazy upon seeing Michael and frantically beating him with a lead pipe, which shows just how far the franchise has fallen.

The focus on gore and upping Michael’s body count doesn’t equate to a fun or interesting film.

While the first movie was a masterpieceof suspense and atmosphere, The Curse of Michael Myers was the goriest Halloween film to date. Michael rams a cult nurse against a convenient spike on a wall and then tosses poor Jamie onto farming equipment, impaling her through the belly and then mulching her by activating the machine. A random trucker (Tom Proctor) gets his neck violently snapped and Barry gets brutally gutted in his van and left strung up in a tree to “[rain] red” on an unsuspecting little girl (Raquelle Anderson), but it’s the Strodes who get the worst treatment. After being visited by Dr. Loomis and warned of Michael, Debra finally stands up to John and prepares to leave with the kids, only for Michael to hack her head off with a hatchet (off-screen, of course). When John stumbles home drunk, demanding his dinner and genuinely surprised to see Debra’s finally had enough of him, he’s jumped by the Shape he so openly mocked and stabbed in the gut. Michael then hauls John’s gurgling, dying ass into the fuse box, violently electrocuting him to the point where froth and blood bursts from his orifices and his head inexplicably explodes! When Beth and Tim return to the Strode house to wait for Barry, who decides it’d make for better ratings to have his Halloween special at the notorious Myers house, they have a bit off off-screen sexy time (in Kara’s bed, no less!) before Michael attacks them. He gets Tim after his post-sex shower, duping him with a towel and cutting his throat, then Kara’s forced to watch from Tommy’s creepy telescope as Michael repeatedly stabs Beth. Michael also slaughters the cultists in the finale, randomly cutting through them as they’re performing some vague operation for equally vague reasons, leaving a pile of bloody bodies before bashing some surgeon’s head in against some steel bars.

This mess of a film becomes nigh-incomprehensible in the finale.

It’s weird, really. You’d think added blood and bodies would make this one more enjoyable, but it really doesn’t. All it does is turn the once nuanced and genuinely terrifying Michael Myers into a poor man’s Jason Voorhees (Various), which is ridiculously ironic considering their origins. At first, The Curse of Michael Myers seems like it’s retreading ground from the previous films, with a child being targeted by the “curse” and Michael hunting down his remaining family. While redundant, this makes some sense (though the whole “impregnating Jamie” doesn’t. Why not just kill her and end the Myers bloodline?) I don’t even mind the Cult of Thorn as it ties into themes hinted at in previous Halloween movies and adds a supernatural wrinkle to Michael. However, none of it is developed much beyond a few random images on Tommy’s computer and some half-baked exposition. Dr. Wynn’s dramatic reveal leads to nothing as he simply vanishes from the finale. We never explicitly get told what his plan is or what’s going on, so the finale boils down to Tommy and Kara trying to rescue baby Steven. They easily infiltrate Smith’s Grove Sanatorium to do this and evade Michael, despite Tommy’s fear of the Shape. Kara and Tommy take turns bashing Michael with a metal pipe in the basement after tricking him with baby Steven, and then they just flee after beating him up. Dr. Loomis randomly returns only to say he has unfinished business, and then the film ends with the vague suggestion that Michael survived and has killed Dr. Loomis offscreen. The film even has the audacity to end with a tribute to Donald Pleasence, as though it was a fitting swansong for his iconic character!

Final Thoughts:
I often hear about bad movies and wonder if they’re really as bad as people claim. Sadly, Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers isn’t just as bad as you’ve heard, it’s worse! It takes everything that was bad about the previous films (derivative retellings of the original film, uninspired kills, unnecessary lore, etc) and dials them up to eleven, desperately trying to explain the notoriously unexplainable Michael Myers and failing miserably. It’s obvious to anyone with eyes that this film has been hacked to pieces. Characters come and go, scenes jump about, and it’s full of sub-plots and moments that either go nowhere or make no sense. This is most noticeable in the criminally reduced screen time for Dr. Loomis, who jumps in and out of the film so sporadically that at times I wondered if he was a figment of Tommy’s imagination. Paul Rudd fails to impress as the older Tommy, being a creep at best and a nut case at worse, but at least he tries to do the right thing and recognises Michael on sight. Kara was ridiculously bland and Danny may as well have been excised from the film since his plot fizzled out without any payoff. All the outrageous, gory deaths in the world can’t keep Michael from being at his most pathetic here. He’s just not scary and is largely treated as a lap dog. I’ve always believed there was some potential in the Cult/Curse of Thorn but it’s so poorly executed that it makes little sense. It’s lazily crammed in to explain Michael’s motivations, poorly explained, and has no payoff in the end since it’s never really clear what Dr. Wynn’s trying to do. This is a travesty of a film, one as hacked up by editors and studio interference as Michael’s victims, and an insult to the Halloween franchise. Don’t even watch it out of morbid curiosity: just avoid it and watch the original again.

My Rating:

Rating: 1 out of 5.

Terrible

You know you didn’t enjoy Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers so don’t pretend like you did. You agree that this is clearly the worst in the series, yes? That the film was hacked apart and full of nonsensical nonsense? Tell me how much this annoyed you, how frustrating it was to see the series fall from grace. While you’re at it, tell me how are you’re celebrating Halloween this year in the comments and donate to my Ko-Fi to ease my pain at enduring this shit again!

Mini Game Corner [Back to the Future Day]: Super Back to the Future Part II (Super Famicom)

Dr. K1 Comment

In Back to the Future Part II (Zemeckis, 1989), Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) travels to October 21, 2015, which is known as “Back to the Future Day” to celebrate the franchise and science.

Released: 23 July 1993

Developer: Daft

MobyGames Score: 6.3

Quick Facts:
Celebrated as one of the most beloved, successful, and influential trilogies, the Back to the Future films expanded into decades of mediocre to aggravating tie-in videogames. Annoyingly, this sadly obscure, Japanese-exclusive release (originally intended to be a top-down adventure game), could’ve turned the tide with its colourful visuals and simple, but fun gameplay.

The Review:
Super Back to the Future Part II is a 2D, sidescrolling adventure in which you guide Marty McFly through six levels (known as “Rounds”), each with two to five stages and based on locations from the film. Although the game has no difficulty options, you can make things harder by limiting your lives, though I’d recommend selecting five as the game gets a bit brutal with its enemy and hazard placement. Each Round has a super simple (if sometimes nonsensical) password to continue your progress or skip tricky sections. Marty is essentially a slower, clunkier imitation of Sonic the Hedgehog, spinning about on his hoverboard to defeat and bounce off enemies, hitting springs to get higher, and avoiding spike pits, hazards, and ceilings. Players jump and perform Marty’s somersault with A and hold B to speed up, essential for climbing the game’s many slopes and making the longer, trickier jumps. Unfortunately, you must often hold B to jump to moving, temporary, and stationary platforms, which can be very finnicky. Marty doesn’t carry his momentum when jumping, can be very weighty and unwieldy, and is also very floaty, so you often zip past platforms, plummet to lower areas, or struggle to jump to a simple platform because Marty won’t move his ass. Players grab gold coins to exchange to helpful items at vending machines, restoring their health and gaining a temporary shield or invisibility, or earning an extra life. Oddly, there is no high score system so there’s not much replay value beyond the obscurity and visual appeal. It does offer a “Lesson” mode and the usual sound test options, though these are the bare minimum I’d expect. Unfortunately, there’s not much gameplay variety here. There are no bonus rounds or autoscrolling chase sections, for example, or opportunities to play as other characters, which is a shame.

Guide Marty in a colourful adventure through time that desperately tries to ape Sonic’s action.

Super Back to the Future Part II follows the movie plot very closely, starting in the far future of 2015, visiting the dystopian 1985, and ending in 1955 in a race to recover the Grays Sports Almanac from Biff Tannen. This mainly involves dashing up and down slopes, making blind leaps, awkwardly hopping to moving, falling, and temporary platforms, and hitting switches to lower barriers. While there are no bottomless pits, the knockback is unreal and can set you back quite far, or see you trapped down spike pits or hit by enemies until you rage quit and use a password. Marty’s sprite may be colourful and expressive, with a fun, super-deformed aesthetic, but his hit box is huge and you’re often required to spin into falling hazards or hop against walls to clumsily escape pits. Still, Marty is much more fun to control in the open, where a good run-up can see you hurtle or plummet past most stage hazards. When confined to the sewers or Biff’s luxurious casino hotel, Marty struggles, especially when there are ceiling spikes and moving platforms as it’s all-too easy to simply pass through these or slip off because of the dodgy jump mechanics. You’re occasionally asked to bounce off enemies to clear gaps, which is kind of fun, bombs and balloons sometimes fill the screen, and some Rounds see you riding wind currents (though you drop like a stone if you hit an enemy or obstacle). “Round 4 -2” sees you heading left, some Rounds are almost maze-like in their sprawling, samey layouts, and all these gimmicks are recycled in aggravating ways in “Round 6-1” (alongside massive falling boulders and more spikes than ever) to present the toughest challenge. While the gameplay is fun, the difficulty ramps up due to the awkward controls and how unreliable Marty is to control. Without a duck and with a massive hit box, it’s easy for him to take damage when riding platforms and such, and it doesn’t help that he sometimes gets a bit stuck on (or clips through!) the environment, or that he’s sent flying from the smallest of hits!

While the controls can be janky, the game has an undeniable visual appeal.

However, the game has an undeniable visual appeal and is visually the best looking of all the Back to the Future games released back in the day. Super Back to the Future Part II is ridiculously colourful, featuring chibi-style sprites that give everyone oversized heads and bring the game to life with an anime aesthetic. Marty is super expressive and has fun idle and victory poses where he taps his foot impatiently and flips and holds his hoverboard. Doctor Emmett Brown, Lorraine and George McFly, and different versions of Biff appear in the sprite-based cutscenes to advance the plot, and most Rounds start and/or end with either a sprite-based cutscene or some fun detailed (if unfortunately static) sprite art that tells a truncated version of the film’s story. Accordingly, the environments mirror the film and are just as vibrant and chunky as the sprites, reminding me of Amiga games, though some elements were a bit bland and some levels were a bit confusing to navigate. The game’s at its best in recognisable locations like variations of Hill Valley (the far future, with the courthouse and fountain, the desolate present, with its broken windows and ominous atmosphere, and the jaunty 1950s with its blood orange sky). There are a handful of these beyond the town square, such as the Café 80’s where you fight Griff, Biff’s garish casino hotel and neon-drenched rooftop, the haunting cemetery, and knobbing about backstage at the Enchantment Under the Sea dance. Sadly, these are juxtaposed with generic locations like sewers and warehouses and the level layouts rarely take advantage of their settings. There is very little to the casino stage, for example, which could’ve featured unique gimmicks like slot machines or elevators. Hitoshi Sakamoto offers a lovingly faithful, chip tune rendition of the film’s classic overture. Though this is reused in multiple levels, others sport jaunty little tunes or fun remixes of it and even a “Johnny B. Goode” soundalike in “Round 5-3”. While the interludes and cutscenes are fun, there’s no real ending and sadly we must rely on fan-made hacks to play translated versions, though the game remained gorgeous to look at, at least.

Wacky, super deformed versions of the film’s villains take full advantage of your massive hit box.

Marty dispatches a bunch of random shite in his adventure. He bops off various robots, trigger happy cops, and hoverboard (and hoverbike) riding goons in 2015, beats up Biff’s taser-wielding security detail in 1985, battles ninjas, dodges cans tossed by delinquents, and even comes across baddies wielding assault rifles, shotguns, or tossing dynamite! Each Round boasts at least one boss battle, with you facing Griff in “Round 1-2” and “Round 2-2”. In the first fight, he spins two baseball bats, slamming them to the ground to rain Pepsi bottles, and you must simply attack him or hit the television monitors to damage him. In the second, he floats above firing projectiles and occasionally ramming into you, protected from below by his hoverboard and forcing you to rely on switches to activate the central fountain and send him hurtling into the courthouse. You fight a musician in “Round 3-3, dodging little black balls and musical notes and utilising falling platforms and pipes to lands hits, and some dude with a hammer and some circus performer in “Round 3-5”. You can hit a switch to separate them, but it’s easier to focus on one at a time than chase them around. You fight the alternate 1985 Biff on the casino rooftop, hitting switches to send electrical sparks across the neon sign in the background to hurt him (though these can also hurt you!) and avoiding his pistol and rapid baton attack. Biff’s buddies Matches, Skinhead, and 3D await in “Round 5-4”, with each patrolling a different level of a three-tier environment. One holds a champagne bottle and fires a cork at you, another attacks with party poppers and such, and 3D runs back and forth laying a projectile trap. The hardest thing about this fight is getting Marty to each level without slipping or falling, though! “Round 6-2” sees you fighting Biff in a quasi-autoscroller where you’re actually confined to one area by trucks either side. Biff occasionally tackles you and tosses projectiles, and there are crates and other junk to avoid, but this wasn’t much of a challenge. Sadly, the hope of a second phase where you desperately race away from him was dashed as this is simply a cutscene, making for a bit of an anticlimactic ending.

Final Thoughts:
I’ve known about and wanted to play Super Back to the Future Part II for a long time but never got around to it back when I was emulating games as a hobby. It was really exciting to get into it for this review as it is a gorgeous and wacky title. It’s bizarre to me that this game was never released outside of Japan as I can’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be easy to translate and ship overseas. It’s doubly annoying as the franchise really needed this game back in the day as the other 8- and 16-bit titles were borderline unplayable. Sure, this game has flaws, but it’s clearly the best Back to the Future game of its time, even if Marty is a clunky-ass bag of sand with a massive hit box. It’s a shame the game didn’t do more with its mechanics. It’s clearly borrowing from Sonic so it would’ve been fun to sprinkle in some autoscrolling chase sections, perhaps a bonus stage where you control the DeLorean, or a level where you guide Jennifer Parker through the 2015 McFly house. Considering when the game released, it also might’ve been fun to have it feature levels from all three films, with Marty using a traditional skateboard, hoverboard, and perhaps gaining a pistol in 1885. Instead, the game relies heavily on the gold coins, which isn’t all that great and strangely limits your options for pick-ups. Add to that some finnicky jumping and platforming mechanics, some odd clipping issues, and the general lack of polish to the gameplay and Super Back to the Future Part II is undeniably a disappointment in terms of its gameplay. However, it’s so colourful and visually appealing that you almost don’t mind that aggravating aspects, especially as the level codes are so simple to enter. Overall, yes, it’s a flawed game that need a bit more polish, but Super Back to the Future Part II is still very appealing and enjoyable and I’ll always be mad that it never got released outside of Japan or ported to other consoles.

My Rating:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Pretty Good

Did you ever play Super Back to the Future Part II? Do you agree that it’s the best of the Back to the Future games released back then? Would you have liked to see it released outside of Japan or do you think it’s too janky for a wider release? Did you also find the jumping and momentum awkward to deal with? Which Back to the Future videogame is your? How are you celebrating Back to the Future Day today? Whatever you think about Super Back to the Future Part II, share your thoughts below and donate to my Ko-Fi if you liked this review.

Wrestling Recap: DDP vs. Savage (Halloween Havoc ’97)

Dr. KLeave a comment

The Date: 26 October 1997
The Venue: MGM Grand Garden Arena; Las Vegas, Nevada
The Stakes: Las Vegas Sudden Death match

The Commentary: Bobby “The Brain” Heenan, “The American Dream” Dusty Rhodes, Mike Tenay, and Tony Schiavone
The Referee: Randy Anderson (and Nick Patrick)
Dave Meltzer’s Rating: 3.25

The Build-Up:
In 1996, wrestling icon Hulk Hogan shocked the world in 1996 by turning his back on the fans and disrupting World Championship Wrestling (WCW) with the New World Order (nWo). Despite being no fan of Hogan, “Macho Man” Randy Savage eventually joined the super team and led the charge against “Diamond” Dallas Page, who famously rejected the group. Savage quickly made things personal, revealing DDP’s marriage to his manager, Kimberly, and trading victories in increasingly volatile matches. DDP even humiliated Savage by impersonating La Parka on WCW Monday Nitro, drawing the ire of Hogan and culminating in this grudge match.

The Match:
This match was one of many where DDP was sporting his iconic taped-up ribs, which were injured by Savage in the build-up. It always makes me laugh seeing wrestlers wrap a flimsy bit of bandaging around their abdomen when they have “broken ribs”. I’m not a medical doctor but I question how that would help, but it’s a great reminder that DDP has a weak spot, if nothing else. Regardless, DDP was moving pretty spry at the start of the match, in which the only way to win was for one of the competitors to knock the other out or fail to answer a ten count (so, it’s essentially a Last Man Standing match). Savage started by leading DDP outside for a slugfest by the barricades but, when Savage targeted his injured ribs, DDP ferociously rammed the Macho Man’s head off the barricade, ripped off his shirt, and stomped his ribs. However, Savage regained control in the ring, dropping DDP’s midsection on the ropes and laying in the boots and fists in a corner. When Savage wasted time posing, DDP manhandled him into the corner and beat him to the canvas with a flurry, resulting in a double clothesline spot. DDP kept the pressure on with a swinging neckbreaker, but the Macho Man avoided the Diamond Cutter and fled outside, where DDP aggravated his injury with a springboard body splash. Savage turned the tide by dropping DDP’s throat across the top rope and landing a diving axehandle from the top to the outside. Savage then took the fight into the crowd, only to be tossed into (and slammed through) the fake tombstones and coffins set up around the entrance way.

Despite fighting through his injured ribs, DDP was undone by typical nWo shenanigans.

As Savage staggered down the aisle, DDP laid in some forearm shots before being whipped into the barricade and chucked into the steel steps. With DDP writhing in the ring, the Macho Man stole a cameraman’s camera and went to smack it into Page’s midsection, but DDP kicked the camera back into Savage’s face. However, Miss Elizabeth smashed a serving tray over the referee’s head to interrupt the ten count and choked Page with an extension cord, prompting his wife, Kimberly, to drag Miss Elizabeth away as Nick Patrick raced out to take over as the referee. DDP clobbered Savage with strikes, an inverted atomic drop, and a modified piledriver but didn’t get all of the Diamond Cutter as the Macho Man grabbed the ropes. Although Savage dropped his patented diving elbow, Page got up at six so Savage landed another one to DDP’s ribs. Incredibly, DDP stumbled up right before the ten count and hit the Diamond Cutter, but the referee was slow to start his count thanks to being blindsided, which was enough for the Macho Man to get up at eight. As DDP went for another Diamond Cutter, Savage countered with a mule kick to the groin that sent Page tumbling outside, where “Sting” cracked Page’s ribs with a baseball bat. This kept DDP down for the ten count and gave Savage the victory, with DDP being stretchered out. This was an okay match but surprisingly toothless considering its colourful name. I would’ve liked to see more weapon shots and plunder used, especially around the entrance way, to heighten the animosity between the two, which was otherwise conveyed pretty well.

The Aftermath:
This marked the end of Diamond Dallas Page’s feud with the Macho Man. Shortly after Halloween Havoc, it was revealed that “Hollywood” Hulk Hogan had cost DDP the match by masquerading as Sting, leading to a match between the two on Nitro that ended with Page getting beaten down by the nWo. DDP and Savage were lumped into the 60-Man “World War 3” match at the following World War 3 event, though neither managed to win to earn a title shot, and both went their separate ways by the 1997 Starrcade. At that event, Savage won a six-man tag team match and DDP bested Curt Hennig to become the WCW United States Heavyweight Champion, which he held for about four months. DDP and Savage only fought one more time after this match, in a steel cage match on an 1998 episode of Nitro, which ended in a typical WCW clusterfuck as representatives from the nWo black-and-white and Wolfpac interfered and caused it to end in a no contest.

My Rating:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Pretty Good

Did you enjoy the clash between DDP and Randy Savage at Halloween Havoc? Who was your pick to win at the time? Do you agree that the match needed more plunder? Who did you think was dressed as Sting at the end? Were you a fan of the nWo storyline? What are some of your favourite Halloween Havoc matches and moments? Whatever you think about this Las Vegas Sudden Death match, leave a like and a comment below, check out my other wrestling reviews, and donate to my Ko-Fi to suggest other Halloween Havoc matches you’d like to see me cover.

Back Issues: Halloween #1-3

Dr. KLeave a comment

Story Title: “Halloween”
Published: November 2000
Writers: Phil Nutman and Daniel Farrands
Artist: David Brewer

Story Title: “Halloween II: The Blackest Eyes”
Published: April 2001
Writers: Phil Nutman and Mickey Yablans
Artist: Jerry Beck

Story Title: “Halloween III: The Devil’s Eyes”
Published: November 2001
Writer: Phil Nutman
Artist: Justiniano

Quick Facts:
One of the most influential horror films ever made, John Carpenter’s Halloween (1978) inspired a handful of comic book continuations and spin-offs over the years. Published by Chaos! Comics, these three issues bridged the gap between Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers (Chappelle, 1995) and Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later (Miner, 1998) and provided additional insight into Michael Myers/The Shape and expanding the series mythology in interesting ways.

The Review:
Like Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers, Chaos! Comics’ Halloween continuation begins (and focuses on) a grown-up Thomas “Tommy” Doyle. Tommy contacts Michael Cyphers at Smith’s Grove Sanatorium in hopes of getting Doctor Samuel Loomis’s notes on Michael Myers to use in a book about the famed serial killer. Cyphers is so distracted by the grisly photos of Michael’s murders that he doesn’t notice the masked killer looming and gets impaled through the neck with a kitchen knife. Michael’s then briefly transfixed by a photo of his older sister, Judith, whom he killed on Halloween night in 1963. Lurking in the shadows, reliving that fateful night, Michael goes unseen by Tommy when he comes by for Dr. Loomis’s notes, and by the security guard who ushers Tommy out. When Tommy returns to Haddonfield to read the documents, the story flashes back to when the stoic, remorseless seven-year-old Michael first came to the sanatorium and was placed under the doctor’s care. Immediately troubled by the boy’s disturbing nature, Dr. Loomis recommends that Michael be moved to a private room rather than be amongst the other violent juvenile inmates, only to be categorically shot down even after Dr. Loomis is backed up by his colleague, Doctor Jennifer Hill. Michael immediately catches the ire of Tony O’Malley, a violent teenage psychopath who becomes fixated on making the “dummy” talk…or cry…and pays for it by taking a crayon to the eye (though God-fearing self-harmer Roger takes the credit). During therapy, the mute Myers disturbs and delights the naïve Dr. Loomis by drawing his crimes, giving Dr. Loomis pause to think the boy wasn’t insane. Dr. Loomis makes Michael his top priority (alongside romancing Dr. Hill, of course) and notes that the other boys seem placated by fear after O’Malley’s “accident”.

While reading about Michael’s background, Tommy is attacked by the Shape himself!

No other incidents followed until a year later, on Michael’s eighth birthday (the day after the one-year anniversary of Judith’s murder), when Michael punished gluttonous Wade/Donut for ruining his birthday cake by causing him second-degree shower burns that lead to his death. Over the next few years, Michael was so docile and placid that many forgot why he was even there. By age fourteen, Michael was the “model inmate” but his fellow inmates either died horribly or went hopelessly insane for seemingly no reason. Dr. Loomis is incensed when his superior, Doctor Carpenter, insists on throwing a Halloween party, convinced that it’s too great a risk despite how placid Michael appears. Dr. Loomis gets distracted by his wedding plans with Dr. Hill, expressing regret for not trying harder to stop the party, which sees Nancy drowned during a convenient power cut while bobbing for apples. Although Michael was nowhere near when it happened, she had taunted him right before it and Dr. Loomis is so convinced that Michael is behind it (or “the Devil”) that he nearly lays hands on the boy. Dr. Hill stops him, insisting that he’s better off distancing himself from Michael and starting a private practice, only for Jennifer to get tossed from the hospital roof one night. Heartbroken, Dr. Loomis dedicated his life to proving that Michael was evil incarnate and doing everything in his power to keep the boy from being transferred to an open facility to avoid giving him the chance to escape. Though disturbed by Dr. Loomis’s writing, Tommy pushes on and is thus caught completely off-guard when Michael breaks into his house brandishing a kitchen knife. Amazed and horrified to see Myers still alive, Tommy unloads with a pistol, getting a bitch slap for his efforts, and then ignites a bottle of Jack Daniels in Michael’s masked face. Tommy follows up by smashing a chair across Michael’s back and the Shape, his face aflame, tumbles from Tommy’s first-floor window, disappearing soon after and leaving Tommy vowing to destroy him once and for all.

Brackett reveals key insights into Michael’s cursed past before being murdered by Myers,

Relieved to find Dr. Loomis’s notes undamaged from the fight, Tommy reloads and heads to the old Myers house, where Richie Castle (one of the boys who bullied Tommy as a kid) is currently sitting outside and thinking about his run-in with Michael, an encounter that has haunted him for twenty-four years. Bitter, the inebriated Richie decides to “burn down the past” only to be accidentally gunned down by Sheriff Leigh Brackett, who’s also skulking around the house looking for revenge and closure after Myers murdered his daughter, Annie, in 1978. After stealing a car from his other childhood bullies, Tommy spots Brackett and follows him to a pumpkin field outside town, where he buries Richie and tells Tommy of Haddonfield’s sordid past. It turns out the town’s name is derived from “Hayden” (or “cursed”) and that fanatical druids (the Cult of Thorn), led by Murphey Myers, fled there to escape the New England witch hunts. Murphey carried the “curse of Samhain”, which led to the women of his bloodline to be “touched” by visions and some telepathic ability and the men to carry the “seed of Samhain’s evil”. Unlike most of the townsfolk, who were descended from those druids, Brackett’s family moved to Haddonfield in 1901, but he still knows (thanks to Dr. Loomis’s private diaries) that the druids regularly sacrificed people to their dark Gods. Although the Myers family knew peace for three generations, that changed when Audrey Myers gave birth to Michael at 23:57, Halloween night, 1957. Fated to be the “vessel to carry the ultimate evil”, Michael jerked to life at 12:06 after being stillborn, apparently possessed by a dark entity. Although Michael was a normal little boy for most of his life, his evil unleashed itself when he was compelled to murder Judith, Brackett’s ex (who was a bit of a slapper, it turns out).

Framed for murder, Tommy reunites with Lindsey to discuss Michael’s evil.

While Michael murders Richie’s friends after they trespass in his home, Tommy and Brackett are jumped by the Cult of Thorn (led by Mrs. Blankenship) and tied up in the church basement. While Mrs. Blankenship debates what to do with the two with the local priest, Michael freely walks the night-time streets amidst the trick-or-treaters, murdering some random girl while being drawn to the church, where he butchers the priest just as he’s freeing Tommy and Brackett. Tommy stuns Michael with another chair shot and Brackett gathers his courage to toss a lantern at the Shape’s head, being stabbed in the heart for his trouble. However, Tommy fights Michael with a fire extinguisher and knocks him into an electrical box, electrocuting Myers and causing the church to dramatically explode. Discovered by the Cult of Thorn, Tommy is framed from Brackett’s murder and tossed into Smith’s Grove Sanatorium. Two years later, in 2001, Tommy (still haunted by Halloween 1978) is scheduled for execution by Doctor Terence Wynn (somehow still alive after Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers). Determined to finish Michael, Tommy fights off Dr. Wynn and his bulbous henchman and briefly encounters Myers (despite him having been beheaded a couple of years prior) while escaping the hospital. Meanwhile, Lindsey Wallace, Tommy’s childhood friend who was also there on Halloween 1978, returns to Haddonfield as a reporter to expose Michael’s evil and search for Laurie Strode, who vanished after Halloween H20. Naturally, Lindsey is suspicious when Tommy approaches her as he’s been accused of all sorts of awful stuff, but he protests his innocence and uses Dr. Loomis’s diary as proof that Michael has inexplicably survived. The diary details an incident in 1970, where Dr. Loomis met with the aged Hattie Bartok and learned of Michael’s chilling birth, which saw his stillborn body possessed by an evil spirt and that Michael had another sister: Laurie Strode.

Laurie takes up her brother’s mantle, indicating that the Myers curse is never-ending.

Startled by a noise, Lindsey and Tommy head upstairs to find a severed head hacked up like a jack-o’-lantern and three desiccated corpses arranged on a bed before their tombstones. Michael then gets the drop on Tommy and stabs him in the shoulder. Lindsey flees in terror, injuring her leg after a tumble down the stairs but disarming Michael by trapping his wrist in a door. Fleeing into the deserted streets, Lindsey barely avoids being run down and finds herself running right to the deserted Myers house. Against her better judgement, Lindsey enters and heads to Judith’s old room, where she lures Michael in by posing as his sister. Although he briefly hesitates, Michael reacts violently when Lindsey tries to take his knife, smashing her through the dress mirror and leading Lindsey to stab him in the eye with a shard of glass. This allows Tommy to shoot Michael, unmasking him to find their attacker is Laurie! Overcome with a mindless, murderous rage, her one good eye as black as Michael’s, Laurie lunges at Tommy and the two take a spill to the outside with a fall that apparently breaks Tommy’s neck, judging by the art. Four weeks later, the injured Laurie is in a padded cell in Smith’s Grove Sanatorium under the care of Doctor Block. Lindsey visits and learns that Laurie has regressed into a docile state, apparently having undergone a “textbook case” of “psychotic personality transference”. After beheading Michael, Laurie took his head as a “trophy” but, as she couldn’t survive without Michael, she effectively “became him” to give her life purpose. Dr. Bloch believes the Myers family is “cursed” by mental illness caused by generations of alcohol and incest, believing Dr. Loomis became so obsessed by Michael’s evil that it skewed his perception. Unconvinced, Lindsey gazes upon the stoic, apathetic Laurie and ponders just how deep the madness runs in the Myers bloodline and its ties to whatever ancient evil tainted the family all those years ago.

Final Thoughts: 
The Halloween franchise has always been a mess. While I can just about give Halloween II (Rosenthal, 1981) a pass as it desperately tried to end the story, it destroyed the mystique surrounding Michael Myers by making Laurie his sister. Ironically, I don’t mind this twist (mainly because it was a cohesive glue through four of the original sequels), but every sequel since has tried to explain more about Michael’s past and his motivations. This culminated in Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers, which delivered on the “Samhain” tease from Halloween II by tying Michael to the ancient Cult of Thorn and making his actions explicitly supernatural. This was messy no matter which version of the film you watch and thankfully never revisited, and it was the popular canon before Halloween H20 ignored all the sequels but Halloween 2. Chaos! Comics made a valiant attempt to recanonise those sequels, however, starting soon after the end of whatever version of Halloween 6 you prefer and seemingly leading into (or providing an alternative version of) Halloween: Resurrection (Rosenthal, 2002). Although Michael is said to be explicitly supernatural here, he is inarguably dead in “The Devil’s Eyes” and Lindsey ponders if his madness or curse has spread to Laurie, an interesting development that echoes when the franchise teased replacing Michael with his niece, Jamie Lloyd (Danielle Harris) in Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (Little, 1988). Considering I was all for that idea, I wouldn’t have minded if these comics had been tweaked slightly to all take place after Halloween H20 and had the “Michael” stalking Tommy always be Laurie. We still could’ve had the flashbacks to Michael’s past and such and this would’ve tied closer to the themes of the nature of evil and the cursed Myers bloodline.

An interesting take on Halloween‘s messy lore that doesn’t quite live up to its potential.

Tommy was oddly characterised here. He doesn’t seem to fit with either version of Halloween 6 and the art constantly depicts him in different ways, with him starting off as a fairly unassuming guy, appearing much older in “The Blackest Eyes” and looking completely different in “The Devil’s Eyes”. I think it might’ve been better to follow Lindsey as she works to discover Michael’s background for a story. She could’ve liaised with Tommy after he was committed following Halloween 6 and he still could’ve escaped in “The Blackest Eyes” for the final showdown with “Michael”. I quite liked seeing Michael’s childhood in Smith’s Grove Sanatorium and the twist that Dr. Loomis’s vendetta against him was made personal when Myers murdered his fiancée (as odd and ill-fitting it was to see Dr. Loomis in love). It was interesting seeing the supernatural creep into Michael’s time in the hospital, how his actions were framed as accidents and fuelling the scepticism regarding Dr. Loomis’s wild claims about the otherwise docile patient. I was also glad to see Sheriff Brackett return, but he’s basically here to dump exposition that could’ve easily been related in Dr. Loomis’s otherwise pointless meeting with Hattie Bartok. It might’ve been cool for Tommy and Brackett to team up, dealing with Richie and the others as they try to intercept Michael at his house and the Cult of Thorn try to regain control of him. It was weird featuring Dr. Wynn, especially considering the ends of Halloween 6 and that there’s no explanation of what happened to Dr. Loomis. Michael is basically the saving grace of these issues, appearing as a silent, unstoppable wraith who mercilessly stabs and manhandles anyone in his way. There’s a fair bit of gore here (I especially liked the depiction of Michael and his flaming head in “The Blackest Eyes”) and a decent attempt to make sense of Halloween’s messy lore. This story isn’t perfect and it’s definitely better than either Halloween 6 and Halloween: Resurrection, but I couldn’t help but think something was lacking. The focus on exposition and backstory bogged it down and robbed us of either more Myers action or placing Laurie as his successor, meaning it’s an interesting curio in the wider Halloween mythos that doesn’t quite live up to its full potential.

My Rating:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Pretty Good

Have you ever read Chaos! Comics’ Halloween? Did you appreciate the attempt to make sense of the nonsense Halloween lore? Do you think it would’ve been better if Laurie had been the killer in this story? Were you a fan of the Cult of Thorn or do you prefer Michael’s backstory to be more mysterious? Do you agree that Lindsey should’ve been the main character here? Would you like to see this era of Halloween make a comeback? What horror-themed comics are you reading this Halloween? Whatever your thoughts on Halloween, comment below, check out my other horror content, and donate to my Ko-Fi if you want me to review more Halloween comics.

Game Corner: Quantum of Solace (Xbox 360)

Dr. K1 Comment

Released: 31 October 2008
Developer: Treyarch

Also Available For: Nintendo DS, Nintendo Wii, PC, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3

Quick Facts:
When Activision secured the rights to the James Bond franchise, they immediately developed a videogame tie-in to the largely divisive Quantum of Solace (Forster, 2008), handing the project to Treyarch. Their Call of Duty (Various, 2003 to present) game engine provided a basis for enemy behaviours and gameplay mechanics. Though reluctant, star Daniel Craig also appeared in and offered feedback on the game, though Quantum of Solace released to mixed reviews that criticised the rushed narrative and repetitive gameplay.

Gameplay and Power-Ups:
Quantum of Solace is a first-person shooter (FPS) that retells key events of the movie of the same name, while also featuring a massive interlude that recaps Casino Royale (Campbell, 2006). For anyone hoping for a classic FPS 007 experience, you may be disappointed to learn that Quantum of Solace has more in common with the Call of Duty games, setting a precedent for Activision’s subsequent 007 titles in the process. Accordingly, players fire with the Right Trigger, reload with X, toss grenades and flashbangs and such with the Right Bumper, and press the left stick to briefly sprint. You use the Left Trigger to “aim down the sights”, using this alongside a mild auto aim to quickly target enemies even when they’re behind cover, while the Left Bumper switches weapons (of which you can carry only three). Bond vaults over obstacles and gaps with Y, crouches with B to either sneak up on enemies or use cover, and “snaps to” cover with A. While under cover, players can either pop up to return fire, shoot around whatever they’re hiding behind, or use A to quickly dash to alternative cover, with the game adopting a third-person perspective for these moments. The directional pad (D-pad) alters your weapon’s fire rate and equips a silencer (if possible) and cycles through your different grenades. Bond can bring up his hand-dandy smart phone with the “View” button, receiving an overview of his objectives, cycling through any security cameras he’s hacked, reading data files, and consulting a pretty substandard map as a compass guides you towards your objectives. By default, Bond automatically regains health when taking cover or staying out of harm’s way, though Quantum of Solace is pretty generous with its checkpoints so it’s hardly an inconvenience when you die.

Take cover in firefights, hack locks, and shimmy past guards in this substandard COD clone.

When sneaking up on enemies, players can press in the right stick to perform a silent “takedown”. This initiates a quick-time event (QTE) where you must hit the right button to subdue your target, though enemies will be alerted if they spot the body, if you make too much noise, or if you’re spotted by cameras. Thus, it’s better to disable these by holding X when prompted rather than shooting them. Bond also shimmies along balconies to bypass guards, with the game often employing a picture-in-picture perspective to make it easier to time when to hop past windows and such. Occasionally, players must maintain their balance on beams using a pendulum mechanic, jump larger gaps with Y when prompted, and use a mounted turret to mow down enemies with no danger of it overheating. X interacts with the environment, retrieves phones for data files, activates switches, opens gates, and hacks PCs. When used on certain locks, a hacking mini game is initiated where you must press a direction on the D-pad when the number appears in green. Naturally, Bond has a small arsenal of weapons to choose from, either by grabbing guns dropped by enemies or opening special crates. You’ve got his standard-issue Walther PP9, of course, and similar variants alongside the high-impact Super Magnum, two heavy-duty shotguns, and a super fun grenade launcher. There are a couple of sniper rifles, with Bond able to hold his breath for a short time to steady his shot, and a whole bunch of machine and submachine guns. Some come with silencers and special scopes, some burn through ammo faster than others, and some are pretty weak and inaccurate or take longer to reload. I quite enjoyed the Uzi-like Mantis, the hefty TLD22, and the heavy-duty 8-CAT, but the M14 can go die in a ditch. You won’t have to worry about buying upgrades or add-ons or anything so just grab your favourite weapon and go for it.

It’s rare, but some missions offer unique objectives and mechanics to mix up the tedious gameplay.

While some sections promote stealth, being spotted usually just raises an alarm and sees more enemies swarm in, which can end your run pretty quickly so it’s better to pick enemies off with your silenced PP9 or sniper rifle. When stealth is necessary, you must crouch-walk around deactivating cameras and subduing enemies, though this can be tricky if you’re impatient like me. Other times, you’re forced to “survive” against waves of enemies who dive and crouch behind cover or toss grenades if they see you camping. You can shoot electrical boxes and explosive targets to thin out their numbers or occasionally shoot specific targets to drop boats onto them or collapse their rickety platforms. When Dominic Greene’s elaborate estate catches fire in the finale, you must shoot fire extinguishers to dose the flames, crawl though vents in the science centre, and quickly take out enemies before they separate your speeding train from Vesper Lynd’s. You get thirty seconds to do this and there are other similarly timed challenges to contend with, like when you’re given twenty seconds to run, crouch, and escape the tunnels before turncoat Craig Mitchell sets off his explosives or forty-five seconds to kill Greene. There are a couple of chase sequences, with the game (mostly) recreating the famous parkour chase from Casino Royale, forcing players to take alternative paths when the way is blocked or the ground gives beneath them, or when you chase Mitchell across the rooftops and through the houses of Siena. To infiltrate the opera house, players must sneak around disabling cameras and putting down enemies, heading under the docks and manipulating the gantries with switches, and finally sidling along on precarious ledges to avoid being spotted by snipers. The train missions see you taking ladders to the roof to take out and get the drop on enemies, you must snipe the guards outside the science centre, and stumble across a busy road to cure Bond of his poisoning in Casino Royale.

Presentation:
Quantum of Solace does a fairly decent job of bringing the movie’s locations and major action sequences to life, with environments showing a lot of life and detail if not really rewarding or promoting exploration. It tells an extremely truncated version of one of the weaker Bond stories, jumping from place to place and moment to moment and assuming the player is familiar with the film before derailing things to flashback to Casino Royale. When Bond and his MI6 cohorts do appear, they all reflect the likenesses of their actors but are little more than emotionless marionettes, quickly running through key moments of the plot to get back to the action. To make matters worse, most cutscenes are simply voiceovers placed over animated menus as MI6 and Mister White review or listen in on Bond’s actions. As ever, this remains a disappointingly cheap way to advance the plot, so I generally just skipped these when allowed. On the plus side, the movie’s awful theme song is replaced by a far less grating alternative from Kerli, the classic Bond themes punctuate the action, and Bond’s death animation is delivered through the classic gun barrel sequence. Enemies are quite lively, wandering around without a care in the world and leaping into action when they spot you, diving to and shooting around cover and even climbing ladders after you. They occasionally ragdoll about, comically toppling over balconies and such, which is always fun to see. Two of my favourite moments were when the drugged Bond stumbles through Casino Royale, his vision blurred and his body woozy, and your desperate climb up a sinking building in Venice. You also Vesper through the streets, automatically alternating between armed and unarmed if civilians are about, and I was very impressed with the opera house sequence. The environment is large and ominous, with opera music echoing in the background, and Bond must carefully sneak about behind the scenes to progress.

While character models are soulless puppets, the environments are surprisingly faithful to the movies.

After recreating the ending of Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace opens with an all-out firefight at Mr. White’s luxurious estate. You start in the gardens, blasting baddies between flowerbeds, through the greenhouse, and through Mr. White’s fully stocked wine cellar. A new version of the film’s title sequence follows this and then you’re chasing Mitchell through claustrophobic caverns and across rooftops in a pretty impressive sequence as the environment is full of market stalls, drying clothes, and the sounds of football from televisions. The sinkhole mission is unremarkable by comparison though there is a section where you briefly protect Camille Montes from Greene’s goons and it leads to a Casino Royale flashback that starts with an exciting and fairly accurate recreation of the parkour sequence, with you crashing, jumping, and balancing about a construction site, and leads you into the visually unique science centre. The airport sequence is a stealth mission in the first half and a firefight in the second, with you frantically clambering up stairs to take out the would-be suicide pilot. The train mission was once of the most visually impressive as you start in the passenger carriages with Vesper and venture onto the roof during a torrential downpour, hopping to a cargo train and picking off goons as you go. While we never see the poker game, players do sneak Bond into Casino Royale, pushing laundry carts, shimmying across ledges, and using the vents to reach the spa for a firefight. The visuals take a bit of a hit on the barge, though it does add to the tension as you race to find Vesper and the Venice mission makes up for it by being in broad daylight. Like the movie, the game culminates with Bond and Camille infiltrating Greene’s impressive, ring-shaped Eco Hotel lair, which both catches fire and is rocked by explosions that force you to find alternative paths to avoid being roasted.

Enemies and Bosses:
As one of the duller James Bond movies to adapt to a videogame, Quantum of Solace features a forgettable slew of goons to mow down. While they will take cover, hunt you down, and toss grenades and their gunfire can ignite explosive barrels, their behaviour is generally predictable, and most can be put down with a few well-placed shots. If you’re spotted, they will shout for backup, generally bringing in better armed goons or perhaps guys in body armour, so it’s usually advised that you use stealth. At first, you’re just gunning down Mr. White’s bodyguards, but you do attack his helicopter to keep him from escaping, at least, and Bond can be easily put down if he runs head-first into an ambush. As you pursue Mitchell, he plants explosives and calls in goons to hold you off, with the game occasionally enforcing a “bullet time” sequence or rattling your senses when they use flash grenades. As ever, snipers can be the bane of your existence, especially at the opera house and science centre, so you’ll want to master the shimmying mini games and the sniper rifle to even the odds there. The science centre, especially, can swarm with machine gun-wielding guards if you’re not careful and the level layouts don’t always make it easy to spot who’s shooting you or from where. Even regular enemies can be troublesome on the train mission as you’re facing a strict timer to reach Vesper and they’re firing from all sides, making it easy to get caught in a crossfire. When infiltrating Greene’s Eco Hotel, you’ll encounter more of his “elite” guards (heavily-armed, armoured military types) who take a few more shots to put down. When pursuing Vesper through Venice, you’ll often get caught in a kill box as enemies bustle around courtyards and stick to the upper levels.

When you’re not taking out choppers and completing QTEs, you’re left to just gun foes down.

Sadly, boss battles are few in Quantum of Solace, with the game generally tossing in a timed challenge, a QTE, or forcing you to fend off waves of enemies either with your equipped weapons or, one time, a mounted turret. Helicopters crop up a couple of times, with you easily downing Mr. White’s chopper by blindly blasting at the cockpit and later using a convenient grenade launcher to take out another chopper at the science centre. This is a tougher objective, however, as the available cover doesn’t help much against the chopper’s guns and enemies drop in to cause you more grief. Another one pops up in the sinkhole mission, though there’s more cover and you can use a sniper rifle to target the pilot. Other bosses are reduced to simple QTE sequences that somewhat mirror the fight scenes from both movies. You battle Mitchell in a crumbling tower, for example, and machete-wielding Steven Obanno in a staircase at the Casino Royale. Naturally, you’ll want to pay attention to what’s happening as you’ll fail if you press the wrong button and you’re sometimes asked to mash a button. While Vesper’s busying drowning, Bond is jumped by Adolph Gettler, who stands there and unloads with his pistol. Since Bond is so desperate and grief-stricken, you’re only option is to take aim and fire with a nearby nail gun before you’re killed. As in the movie, Camille finishes off the depraved General Luiz Medrano, but you must shoot an explosive target to give her the chance. These same targets appear when you finally have your showdown with Greene, who wisely takes the high ground and calls in his elite guards to bombard you with gunfire. Since there’s plenty of cover and your objective is to kill Greene, and you only have forty-five seconds before the Eco Hotel explodes, you can just shoot the explosive targets to put him down and then make a break for it with Camille for a different, but equally unsatisfying ending.

Additional Features:
There are fifty Achievements in Quantum of Solace. While many are now unobtainable as the Xbox Live network is down, these are still the only reason to sit through his forgettable game as they’re pretty simple. You get Achievements for completing each chapter and four for beating each difficulty mode. You’ll get an Achievement for finding some and all cell phones, hacking every lock, scoring fifty headshots, and executing fifty takedowns. Best of all, every level features a unique Achievement tied to it to encourage a replay (easily done after clearing the game and unlocking the chapter select). These require you to use only the P99 on the train, reach the Casino Royale spa and airport server room without being spotted, destroy every overhead light in the science centre, shoot down seven satellite dishes on the rooftops of Siena, and rescue Vesper in less than two minutes on the barge. The multiplayer mode offered standard options like free-for-all-team-based combat, and capture the flag. You could pick different maps based on the game’s missions, customise weapon loadouts, choose to play as either Bond/MI6 or the mysterious “Organisation”, and fight for control of the legendary Golden Gun or to disarm bombs. You would also earn points by playing the multiplayer mode, which could be spent on weapons, gadgets, and attachments, all for additional Achievements and to add a bit more spice to your deathmatches.  

Final Thoughts:
I first played Quantum of Solace years ago as part of my research for my Master’s degree (I did an essay about James Bond videogames). The experience was so shallow and by-the-numbers that I shied away from modern James Bond videogames for many years, only playing them out of sheer morbid curiosity or content for the website. Going back to it now, it’s not as bad as some later games (mainly because Bond isn’t using his damn cell phone for everything), but it’s still a dull and ultimately forgettable experience. It’s telling that so much of the game is based around Casino Royale as Quantum of Solace just isn’t interesting enough to carry the action. The gunplay and basic mechanics are serviceable, but the weapon selection is largely uninspired and there’s not a lot of meat on its bones as it’s simply another hastily thrown together cash-in title that ends up being a poor man’s Call of Duty. I could forgive the lifeless character models if Quantum of Solace didn’t cheap out with its fancy PowerPoint cutscenes, which are just so cheap and insulting that there’s little point in paying attention to the story. There’s little incentive to explore unless you’re desperate to find all those cell phones, what few “bosses” there are are just bog standard QTEs, and you’re barely encouraged to do more than just barge through all guns blazing. It’s a shame as the environments are pretty good, especially for the time, and there’s the ghost of some decent mechanics here. Sadly, knowing these would be both convoluted and driven into the ground by subsequent Bond games only drags Quantum of Solace down further as it set a bad standard for the franchise. As ever, you’re better off sticking to the classics rather than wasting time on this one, unless you fancy boosting your Gamer Score for an affordable price.

My Rating:

Rating: 2 out of 5.

Could Be Better

Were you also disappointed by Quantum of Solace? Did you enjoy the Call of Duty-inspired gameplay or do you agree that it set a bad precedent for the franchise? What did you think to the stealth mechanics and gimmicks like the hacking mini game and balance beams? Did you also find the Casino Royale missions the most enjoyable? Did you ever play the multiplayer mode and, if so, how was it? Which James Bond videogame is your favourite? How are you celebrating 007 this month? Share your thoughts down below, check out my other James Bond content, and go suggest anther Bond videogame for me to review by donating to my Ko-Fi.

Back Issues [Brightest Day]: Green Lantern Vol 2 #16

Dr. KLeave a comment

Although February 2014 was dubbed “Green Lantern Day” (because, by the American calendar, the date mirrored the space sector assigned to Earth in DC Comics, “2814”), the significance of this date has since passed so I prefer to celebrate the October 1959 debut of perhaps the most popular Green Lantern, Hal Jordan.

Story Title: “The Secret Life of Star-Sapphire!”
Published: October 1962

Writer: John Broome
Artist: Gil Kane

Quick Facts:
When fighter pilot Harold “Hal” Jordan reinvented the concept of the Green Lantern into an intergalactic lawman, he quickly amassed a colourful rogues’ gallery, but perhaps his most personal enemy was the gorgeous Star Sapphire. Debuting alongside Hal in Showcase #22, Carol Ferris served as Hal’s love interest during his early years but was upgraded to reluctant supervillain in this issue. While possessed by the Zamarons, Carol committed unspeakable evils as Star Sapphire but also became a force for good when DC expanded the concept into an entire corps.

The Review:
Hal Jordan’s first encounter with Carol Ferris’ seductive alter ego begins with Carol, the “pretty young boss” of Ferris Aircraft, taking her personalised aircraft, the Lady Carol, out for a flight. Carol was taught to fly by her best pilot, hot-shot Hal Jordan, a man who’s constantly on Carol’s mind as she’s tempted to marry him. However, she’s equally drawn to the dashing Green Lantern, unaware they’re the same man. While pondering this conundrum, Carol is shocked when her craft is suddenly ensnared by an invisible energy beam and forced to the desert floor with such force that Carol’s knocked out. The source of this invisible beam? Why, aliens, of course! Beautiful, armour-clad warriors from the planet Zamaron (or “Land of Lovely Women”) who approach Carol with an enticing offer. Heralding her their queen, they tell Carol all about their world, a scientifically advanced civilisation populated exclusively by immortal women…except for their queen. For whatever reason, the Zamarons are always ruled by a mortal and their queen’s successor must be an exact physical duplicate, so they revealed across the galaxy to recruit Carol rather than, say, using their amazing technology to produce mortal clones. Though amazed, Carol refuses to leave Earth and be crowned “Queen Star Sapphire” because she’s so deeply in love with Green Lantern. Unimpressed that their would-be ruler is distracted by a “man-creature”, the Zamarons offer to prove how superior females are by temporarily empowering. Using an organ, of all things, Carol is transformed into a magenta-clad warrior and given incredible powers thanks to the Star Sapphire in her crown.

Green Lantern is perplexed when an alluring foe who seemingly matches his incredible powers.

Amazed that she can fly at will, Carol’s compelled to obey the Zamaron’s command that she confronts Green Lantern, who’s currently back at Ferris Aircraft worrying about her. After consulting his mechanic, the poorly named Thomas Kalmaku/Pieface, Hal takes to the sky as Green Lantern, musing over his desire to win Carol over as himself rather than by revealing his secret identity. In the space of one panel, Green Lantern bumps into Star Sapphire, who cannot help but challenge him to stop her from breaking into the “exhibit of ancient glass”. Though he dismisses her, Green Lantern’s forced to pursue Star Sapphire when she immediately makes good on this threat, stealing an ancient mirror placed in the exhibit by the Zamarons and giving Green Lantern no choice but to use his awesome power ring against her. Star Sapphire answers back with a “repelling ray” that strikes Green Lantern with such force that he’s knocked out after bashing his head off a ledge. Carol’s glad to see that his ring automatically cushions his fall and promptly vanishes, leaving Green Lantern perplexed by his alluring, and strangely familiar, new foe. The Zamarons are astonished when Carol begs to give Green Lantern another chance to stop her, reasoning that he was felled by an accident, and allows herself to be telepathically induced to confront Green Lantern again. This same telepathic power is employed by the Zamarons to clue Green Lantern into Star Sapphire’s location: the Coast City art gallery. Though sceptical of the mysterious voice in his head, Green Lantern figures following it is better than just hanging around like an idiot and sets off to stop the masked marauder.

When Carol fails her gender, the Zamarons strip her of her powers and memories.

Star Sapphire causes a stir in the art gallery by swiping a priceless miniature painting (also planted by the Zamarons). Though initially disappointed to see Green Lantern nowhere in sight upon her escape, Star Sapphire is immediately held prisoner within a cage constructed by Green Lantern’s willpower. However, she showcases her ability to teleport at will by escaping the construct and the two take to the skies to match their powers in a beam struggle, Green Lantern trying to not be distracted by Star Sapphire’s beauty and Star Sapphire employing “every super-scientific device” provided by the Zamarons. This sees her fire a second repelling beam that Green Lantern quickly protects himself from with an energy shield. Thanks to encouragement and the will of the Zamarons, Star Sapphire also conjures a shield to block Green Lantern’s ring beam, one he crumbles through sheer willpower. Somehow, this stuns Star Sapphire and causes her to plummet from the sky, allowing Green Lantern to use his ring to detect a strange radiation emanating from his foe. Thus, Green Lantern encases Star Sapphire within an impenetrable barrier to block the radiation, draining her power. As Carol is so besotted with Green Lantern that she cares little for being a strong, independent woman, she secretly rejoices at being defeated, leading the Zamarons to rightly brand her a “disgrace to [their] sex”. As they’re incapable of penetrating the barrier, the Zamarons simply teleport Star Sapphire back to their ship to berate her, disgusted that a “mere man” defeated her so handily and stripping her of her powers…and her recent memories. Carol’s returned, woozy and confused, to her craft, where she’s found by Green Lantern. After returning her home, Green Lantern ponders the connection between Carol and the mysterious Star Sapphire he found by her plane, apparently too stupid to put two and two together!

Final Thoughts: 
I try to be lenient on classic comic book stories, especially those of this era, where the focus was more on colourful, whimsical adventures than anything else, but “The Secret Life of Star-Sapphire!” is a pretty awful and inauspicious debut for one of Green Lantern’s most complex villains. The art is atrociously simplistic, with many backgrounds being basic colours and locations and the characters appearing more like limited action figures than striking costumed heroes and villains. The entire concept is like something ripped out of the god awful Superman’s Girl Friend, Lois Lane (1958 to 1974), where the ever-annoying reporter stooped to bizarre means to catch the eye of Clark Kent/Kal-El/Superman, abandoning any shred of dignity or decency to try and force him to marry her. To be fair, Carol doesn’t want to be Star Sapphire, rule the Zamarons, or even fight Green Lantern but that almost makes it worse! When presented with the argument that living her life for a man is a fool’s errand and that she must take control of her destiny and realise her full potential as a queen and ruler, Carol would rather pine for a man seemingly beyond her reach (Green Lantern) and even champions Green Lantern’s virtues above her own, and those of all woman. Interestingly, despite Carol admitting to being attracted to Hal, he’s the furthest thing from her mind when the Zamarons offer to make her their queen, showing that she is besotted by a man she can never have, to the detriment of more suitable options and even her sense of self. Carol believes that Green Lantern is so awesome and inspiring that no one can compare, a concept the Zamrons find deeply insulting since, in their culture, woman are superior. The Zamarons have a lot in common with the Themyscirans in that regard; hell, they even resemble them in their decidedly Greco-Roman armour and mentality. This makes the Zamarons far less unique and interesting since they’re just Themyscirans from space and it would’ve been far more interesting to present them as visually distinct alien warriors.

A poor debut for Star Sapphire, who comes across as weak as Green Lantern does stupid!

Although Carol delights in her newfound powers, she’s merely a vessel for the Zamarons. She’s partially brainwashed by their telepathic commands and compelled to commit “crimes” and battle Green Lantern, but never delights in her abilities or feels tempted by their offer. Incredibly, she downplays her defeat of Green Lantern and begs them to give him another chance to prove himself rather than the other way around. Carol wants Green Lantern to succeed, and the story at least partially implies that this contributes to Star Sapphire’s defeat as much as the Zamarons apparently pushing Carol’s mental and physical abilities too far. Their desperate urge to prove their superiority apparently overwhelms Star Sapphire and this, coupled with her subconscious desire to lose, see her briefly pass out and be subdued. It’s an anti-climactic end, one that makes little sense in context and is ultimately rendered moot when Carol’s memories are wiped. Despite Green Lantern feeling as if he knows Star Sapphire and literally finding a Star Sapphire by Carol, he doesn’t realise Carol was the “masked marauder” he fought! This nickname is equally ridiculous as Star Sapphire barely does anything. She steals a couple of things, big deal! Green Lantern’s right there to stop her, the items were props provided by the Zamarons, and nobody got hurt by Star Sapphire’s actions. It would’ve been far better to have Carol inwardly horrified at being forced to endanger civilians and/or attack the city, and to aggressively attack Green Lantern with more than just her “repelling ray”. Have her go nuts, cause real chaos, and be depicted as Green Lantern’s true equal, forcing him to think of ways to stop her beyond just firing his ring. Instead, we get a few mediocre showdowns between the two, some atrocious characterisation for Carol that indirectly paints all Earth women as subservient to men, and an idiotic outing for Green Lantern.

My Rating:

Rating: 1 out of 5.

Terrible

Did you enjoy Star Sapphire’s debut story? Do you agree that the Zamarons were too similar to the Themyscirans and that Star Sapphire should’ve been portrayed as a greater threat? Were you also annoyed that Carol was so besotted by Green Lantern? Did you enjoy the battles between Star Sapphire and Green Lantern or did you also find them lacking? What are some of your favourite Star Sapphire stories and moments? Which Green Lantern is your favourite and why? How are you celebrating this pseudo-Green Lantern day today? Whatever you think about Star Sapphire, or Green Lantern in general, leave your thoughts below, support me on Ko-Fi, and go check out my other Green Lantern content.

Game Corner: RetroRealms: Ash vs. Evil Dead & Halloween

Dr. KLeave a comment

Released: 13 September 2024
Developer: Wayforward
Metacritic Scores: 78 / 6.5; 78 / 6.4

Also Available For: Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Steam, Xbox One, Xbox Series S

Quick Facts:
Despite being one of the most influential horror films of all time, John Carpenter’s Halloween (1978) has seen surprisingly little representation in videogames. Conversely, Sam Raimi’s controversial Evil Dead films (1981 to present) spawned ten videogames before the acclaimed television series merged with the Halloween franchise in this throwback release. Produced in tandem and designed to pay homage to both franchises and seemingly as a platform to showcase future works, both games were bolstered by additional downloadable content (DLC) and largely impressed.

Gameplay and Power-Ups:
RetroRealms is a throwback to the classic 8- and 16-bit era, bringing two of horror’s unlikeliest franchises together for the first time. It’s certainly an odd fit, placing elements from the Evil Dead franchise into the largely grounded Halloween series rather than, say, Friday the 13th (Various, 1980 to present), but it works surprisingly well. It probably helps that both franchises are technically separated, with the collection presenting them as two cabinets in a long-abandoned arcade, though they share enemies, playable characters, and controls. No matter which game you play, you can pick between two characters (Michael Myers/The Shape and Ashley “Ash” Williams), with two more available via DLC. Non-intrusive in-game tutorials and signposts explain the mechanics and controls, which you can review from the pause menu. Every character shares the same controls, though they have different attributes and abilities to help them stand out. So, while every character attacks with X, charges a strong attack by holding X, and jumps with A, their charged move differs. Ash, for example, unloads with his “boomstick” while Myers performs a dashing stab with his trademark kitchen knife. Characters automatically clamber over ledges and can hop down by pressing down and A on certain flooring, and all progress upwards with a wall jump. You can attack upwards and in mid-air, even bouncing off them similar to the 8-bit classic DuckTales (Capcom, 1989). As you dispatch enemies, you’ll grab collectibles for cash. After clearing a World, you visit the shop to purchase upgrades and additional moves, allowing you to boost your maximum health, add combos to your attacks, and unlock fancier attacks. This adds a spinning slash to Ash’s arsenal to send heads rolling, sees him crash down on enemies with his robotic hand by pressing the Left Bumper in mid-air, and flinging his chainsaw arm upwards to extend his jump.

Hack-and-slash your way through two realms teeming with demons and Deadites alike!

Similarly, Myers unlocks a standing spin to decapitate enemies, slams on them from above with LB, or performs an upwards slash with the Right Bumper to reach higher ground escape bottomless pits. Pressing down and A when stationary performs a dash to fit in narrow vents, with characters becoming temporarily invincible as a bonus. Players also press B to enter the “Shadow Realm”, a Hellish dimension where Deadites roam, lava burns, and monstrous boils cover every surface. This lasts as long as your meter, which automatically refills, and you must switch between the two realms to reach hidden areas or progress further as some walls and platforms are intangible in different realms. You must be careful, though, as shifting realms can place you inside walls, which sets you back and costs you some health. Defeated enemies may drop partial or full refills for your health or meter and you’re granted unlimited lives, but only a single checkpoint per stage as each stage is split into two levels. You’ll also come across non-playable characters who gift you a sub-weapon, thrown with Y (though you can only hold one at a time). Ash attacks with his chainsaw and shotgun, gaining extra weapons by smashing coloured crates. These see him hurl the Kandarian dagger, toss a flaming lantern to set enemies and vicious roots alight, fire a nail gun to stun enemies, or chuck an axe. Killing innocent bystanders grants Myers similar sub-weapons, with him tossing a pitchfork or a hammer, though he also utilises a boomerang-like sickle and bolas. Each sub-weapon costs a different amount of ammo to use, which you find in crates or by slaughtering enemies, and the axe and hammer even bounce to hit multiple enemies. Both games include propane tanks to hit to take out groups of enemies and weighted pallets to release, which crush those beneath, and fire hydrants to blast enemies with a water jet. Some enemy attacks, particularly exploding gas canisters, also kill enemies and you instantly explode them into a shower of gore if you realm shift where they’re standing.

Use wind currents, avoid spikes and flaming oil, and move between realms to progress in both games.

While you mostly slaughter Deadites and escaped mental patients (and random bystanders as Myers), you’ll switch between realms more as each game progresses. This largely comes to an apex in the final World, where players wander the Deadite dimension, with previous stages mostly offering some tricky platforming challenges. Both Ash and Myers must jump to moving and temporary platforms, with some exploding beneath you and others carrying you across spike pits or bottomless drops. Vertical and horizontal wind currents push you to higher ground or carry you across larger gaps, though they also hinder you if you push against them. You’ll crash through windows, cutting through trailer homes and dilapidated cabins, leap to rickety towers, floodlights, and construction towers to progress, and uncover hidden paths by realm shifting to snag hidden goodies. Ash fights through an S-Mart Value Store, Myers clears out his family home, and both dodge and jump to falling chandeliers. Ash fights through the haunted forest, avoiding acidic water and being set upon by redneck zombies, while Myers cuts through Haddonfield, crossing huge bottomless pits caused by roadworks. Toxic gunk, acidic water, and fireballs are regular hazards but seem more prominent in Ash vs. Evil Dead, where fireballs often mess up your jumps. While rampaging through Phelps Garage, Myers slips about on oily ground that bursts into flames when enemies toss petrol canisters from the background, hazards that dog Ash as he fights through Elks Grove. Players also jump to conveyor belts, either being carried along by them, gingerly wall jumping or being carried up vertical belts, or even using them as moving platforms. Crushing hazards spell instant death in the Overlord’s castle, and you’ll be dodging spike pits and spiked walls, either by using platforms or riding wind currents, gnashing your teeth when your jumps are a single pixel off and drop you down a pit.

Presentation:
RetroRealms offers a fun, if somewhat sparse, hub world that expands as you clear Worlds. It’s a fun little 3D background to the retro stylings of both games. Neither game includes voice acting beyond anguished screams or monstrous roars, so dialogue is conveyed entirely through text. The story changes depending on who you play as, with Myers being comically silent and Ash providing snappy retorts. Ash vs. Evil Dead mostly pulls from the show’s first season, with him battling through Mossy Haven Trailer Park and even encountering Vivian Johnson, tangling with Eligos in Books from Beyond, and returning to the haunted cabin to confront Ruby Knowby, all while hacking and slashing through hordes of Deadites. Likewise, Halloween is a purely sprite-based, arcade-style adventure, featuring a chip tune rendition of the iconic theme tune and minor idle poses for the Shape, where he yanks down his mask, breathes deeply, and cocks his head inquisitively. While Myers has a larger hit box than Ash and is noticeably slower and clunkier, it’s to be expected of the Shape, who lumbers about slaughtering orderlies and Deadites alike. Blood splatters, heads roll, and bodies litter the backgrounds, with many enemies respawning once you move slightly off camera to either hinder you by sapping your health and knocking you down pits or help you by allowing you to “farm” resources. The realm gimmick is fun, essentially giving every World two skins, with the Nightmare Realm being a dimension of pure suffering and chaos. While you only spend a brief time here, it’s enough to see gaping maws, pillars of viscera and blood, rivers of lava, and hordes of Deadites lurking in the background. The Deadites are much stronger and more aggressive here, with the standard enemies constantly resurrecting, and it can be tricky discerning where you can go since everything’s so twisted and awful. It’s impressive, however, especially in the Overlord’s challenging castle. While the games run smoothly for the most part, I did experience some odd moments where the music cut out and an annoying glitch where Ruby stopped summoning demons, so I had to reset the game.

Pick your game and enter a bloody, action-packed throwback to the games of yesteryear.

After crashing through trailer park homes in Mossy Haven, splattering blood over the gaudy garden furniture and flamingo ornaments, Ash returns to the creepy woods, with the bridge, crooked trees, and even skewered bodies visible in the raging background. While his time in the iconic cabin is brief, all the weird, haunted furnishings appear and Ash’s severed hand crawls in the foreground. Deadites also tear apart military personnel and vehicles on the streets of Elks Grove. Players venture into the rusted, dilapidated Sunny Meadows Asylum, where scrawled renditions of the Necronomicon line the walls, before fighting through the wrecked laundry room and fending off vicious little Mini Ash’s. Similarly, Halloween begins in Smith’s Grove Sanatorium and sees Michael hack through guards and inmates as patients flee across the rainswept fields. Myers then rampages through a garage and junkyard before terrorising Haddonfield. A storm rages in most backgrounds, trick-or-treaters can be seen in the streets, and you’ll cut down the trespassers in Michael’s childhood home. Myers then ventures into a creepy cemetery and crematorium, passing crypts and catacombs, and wades through disgusting sewers and dilapidated tunnels. It perfectly captures the visual aesthetic of the original movie, right down to including sprite recreations of Michael’s first kill and his sister’s tombstone. When each character reaches the Overload’s castle, they’re greeted by a desolate, gothic, Hellish landscape and battle through a fully stocked dungeon, including Iron Maidens, chains, and propane tanks to clear out Deadite hordes. Huge, ominous structures, hooked chains, and gruesome bloody imagery are everywhere in this hellscape, which includes basically every previous hazard and stage gimmick. This means you’ll ride conveyor belts past crushing hazards, wall jump between and precariously hop to those same hazards, and dodge flames, acid water, and fireballs galore to reach the Overlord’s throne room.

Enemies and Bosses:
Ash’s primary enemy are those possessed by the Necronomicon, meaning he must cut down zombified trailer park trash, civilians, and lumberjacks. Most just wander about, but the ghoulish females and other variants spit phlegm and some of the possessed Value Store employees take a couple of hits to put down. Others, like the red-clothed employees and mad scientists carrying Ash puppets, explode after you deal damage, flinging you across the screen if you’re close. Ravenous little Mini Ash’s and killer dolls cling to you, stunting your jump and keeping you from attacking unless you shake them off. Michael Myers, meanwhile, cuts down guards, crazed inmates, construction workers, cops, and groundskeepers. While the inmates simply run around, security guards and other enemies toss projectiles that leave a flaming hazard on the ground, which can be aggravating. Mechanics and vagrants burst from doors and the background to charge you (which I found surprisingly difficult), gravediggers shovel up dirt, and injured bystanders crawl along the ground to whittle down your health. Naturally, players must also tangle with a host of monstrous Deadites, with projectile-firing eyeballs being a constant headache, respawing flying eyeballs screwing up your jumps, and zombie-like Deadite grunts springing to life after being put down. While the more troublesome Deadite variants are limited to the Nightmare Realm for most of the game, they do seep into the main game as you progress, with vicious spider-like Deadites charging across the ground, weird little cherubs screwing up your controls, bulbous mounds of fatty flesh sending you flying, and these weird phallic monsters spitting acid. You must also avoid flaming hazards, spike pits and walls, fireballs, acidic water, and bottomless pits, which become doubly troubling when platforms explode beneath you…or you forget to keep an eye on your meter.

Ash must put some of his old enemies back into the dirt to reach the monstrous Overlord.

At the end of each World, Ash battles a demonic entity conjured by the malicious Deadite Overlord. First, Ash’s neighbour Vivian is transformed into a gangly grotesque that scuttles about, leaving herself wide open to your pogo attack, before tricking you by hiding behind hanging sheets. When back in the cabin, players battle not Ruby Knowby, but the swarms of ghoulish Deadites she summons into the basement. Clear out each wave to damage her, taking advantage of the restorative cocktails when they appear, if necessary. After battling through Elks Grove, Ash faces a rematch against Eligos, a terrifying little demon who constantly teleports about the bookstore and tosses energy orbs. After a few hits, it returns to the store’s inner sanctum, speeding up and keeping you on your toes with spiralling lightning bolts. In the asylum, players face Evil Ash, an exact duplicate of Ash who uses the same moves and sub-weapons alongside a ground pound that can be tough to avoid. Though Evil Ash stops to laugh at you, he’s fast and hits hard, so it can be tricky to put him down. Similarly, the surprise battle against Ash’s possessed 973 Oldsmobile Delta 88 Royale can be challenging as there’s no checkpoint before it and it takes up a lot of screen space. The axe is essential here, as is your dodge roll, and memorising the pattern of the tyres it fires. The Overlord forces you to battle the gigantic demon Kandar, who fills the background, spews fire, and slams the ground with its massive fists, causing flaming debris to fall. You must toss axes or use Ash’s chainsaw uppercut to hit the demon’s giant face, taking care to avoid as much damage as possible as the Overlord interrupts halfway through to finish the job! This sees you hopping to moving platforms over a giant pit, slashing and striking the grotesque eyeballs on the Overlord’s Kaiju-sized body and avoiding the orbs he fires, which can be tricky if you miss-time your jumps or enter the fight with low health.

Myers battles some familiar, if demonic faces, before cutting through the Overlord.

The Overlord also conjures a few fitting challenges for the maniacal Michael Myers. First, he pits Myers against the hulking Mister F, a deranged mental patient who stamps around outside the asylum, headbutting you, stomping the pavement tiles in a shockwave, and calling in the crazies to rush the screen. It’s best to keep your distance with your sub-weapons, then dash in with Myers’ charge attack, as Mister F has a large hit box. Next, the Overlord furnishes Phelps Junior with a demonic vehicle that switches between firing spikes, drilling into the ground to lure you in, rolling along with a giant wheel, and producing a shockwave with a huge weight. Regardless of the configuration, the charged jumping strike is your best bet as the vehicle can only be damaged by hitting the main cab. World 3 offers a battle against Michael’s archenemies, Doctor Samuel Loomis and Laurie Strode, with both throwing Molotov cocktails and a spread of knitting needles, respectively. While it can be tough avoiding these as Myers is so big, it’s best to focus on one enemy at a time, launching your projectile to stun or attack the other when you can. After fighting through World 4’s cemetery, Myers is finally reunited with his sister, Judith, now a gigantic, monstrous Deadite banshee who’s a fun homage to Mega Man 2 (Capcom, 1988). Accordingly, you hop to platforms as she chases you, avoiding dropping down the pit and her flame pillars, then use platforms to toss projectiles and slash at the ghoul, switching to different platforms when she sets them alight and avoiding her large flame attack. Before you battle the Overlord, he forces Myers to face a shadowy reflection of himself. Shadow Myers teleports, slashes, tosses pitchforks, and proves a troublesome foe, doubly so as you’re left to face the Overlord with whatever health you have left and must fight Shadow Myers again if you die. However, if you simply stand still, Shadow Myers will explode, making the Overlord much easier. The demonic entity floats about raining fireballs, conjuring pillars of energy, swirling fireballs about the screen, and disappearing into the darkness, but your Darkness Rising and hammer sub-weapon will make short work of him.

Additional Features:
There are fourteen Achievements in the base game for RetroRealms, twenty-three in both Ash vs. Evil Dead and Halloween, and a further seven in each game’s DLC, for a total of seventy-four Achievements! You’ll get Achievements for simply loading the game, trying to exit the arcade, viewing the credits, watching the developer videos, buying a souvenir, or viewing a diorama. Achievements pop when you clear each World, use each character’s charge attack 100 times, using each sub-weapon in different ways, pogo off enemies, and kill a certain number of enemies, or visit the Nightmare Realm 300 times. Additional Achievements pop if you finish a stage without your weapons in any way, quickly defeating bosses or Worlds, and for finding every collectible. Each World has three pages of the Necronomicon or three jack-o’-lanterns to find that are tallied for this Achievement, though you’ll also find tickets to purchase souvenirs in the hub world. You can compare your times and scores against others using the online leaderboards (though there’s no online play here) and get some fun collector’s cards and all the DLC if you buy the physical version, which adds Laurie and Kelly Maxwell as playable characters. Each has similar Achievements tied to them (use sub-weapons, clear Worlds, be active for 300 minutes, etc), alters the dialogue and the story (Laurie’s trying to rescue Tommy Doyle from the Overlord, for example), and has different attributes and sub-weapons. Kelly attacks with a meat cleaver, giving her a shorter reach than Ash, but makes up for it with a machine gun as her charged move, which can be fired in multiple directions, and using a rocket launcher in place of an uppercut. Laurie attacks with knitting needles, firing them in a spread as her charged attack, has a handy double jump and a ground dash, and is smaller, faster, but weaker than Myers. Both have similar sub-weapons to each other and compared to the main game, though they have unique items that let them slow down enemies for a short time and Kelly gets a flaming shield to protect her.

Final Thoughts:
I was excited for RetroRealms when I first heard of it as I’m a sucker for retro throwback titles, especially hack-and-slash games, and a big fan of both franchises. While it is really weird seeing these two worlds collide, I got over it pretty quickly and found it amusing seeing Michael Myers basically ignore everything the Overlord says and go on a rampage! It was super fun revisiting locations from Ash vs. Evil Dead but, as I haven’t watched the show for a while, it was World 2 that stuck with me the most as you return to the infamous forest and enter the iconic haunted cabin, a location sadly underutilised here. The star of the show, for me, was Halloween, since the franchise has far less videogame adaptations compared to Evil Dead. Halloween does a fantastic job of adapting the first film into this surreal narrative, recreating key locations and even splicing in elements from other films, such as a mechanic resembling “Big Joe” Grizzly from the 2007 remake (though there’s sadly no reality TV stars in the Myers house). While platforming can be clunky and challenging due to Myers’ size, it was extremely satisfying hacking heads off and slicing through innocents and Deadites alike. The bosses were very fun, particularly the battle against Dr. Loomis and Laurie and Shadow Myers, being just the right level of challenge. While it’s frustrating taking damage, being knocked down a pit, or trapping yourself in a wall, it’s all very much in the spirit of old school games like the Castlevania (Konami/Various, 1986 to present), Mega Man (Capcom/Various, 1987 to present), and Metroid (Various, 1986 to present) videogames. I really enjoyed the realm-shifting gimmick, to the point where I kind of wish the games included a hard or alternative mode where you primarily play in the Nightmare Realm, and the gruesome imagery and bloody effects. The sprite work and environments are all fantastically well realised, especially in Halloween, and the gameplay was tight and responsive, with the games providing just enough challenge to keep you going without being too frustrating. I’d love to see more franchises added to the RetroRealms arcade but, as is, these were really fun, bite-sized offerings that brought a smile to my face.

My Rating:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Great Stuff

Which of the two games included in the RetroRealms arcade was your favourite? Were you surprised to see these two franchises mashed together like this? Did you enjoy cutting Deadites up as Ash? Did you also struggle to fight his Oldsmobile? What did you think to the sprite reaction of Halloween? Did you enjoy the fight against Dr. Loomis and Laurie? Did you ever find all the collectibles and purchase every souvenir? Which horror franchise would you like to see remade in this way? What horror-theme videogames are you playing this Halloween? Whatever your thoughts on these games, drop a comment below, check out my other horror content, and donate to my Ko-Fi to suggest more Evil Dead and Halloween reviews.

Game Corner: Hellboy: The Science of Evil (Xbox 360)

Dr. K1 Comment

Released: 24 June 2008
Developer: Krome Studios

Metacritic Scores: 44 /2.8
Also Available For: PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable (PSP)

Quick Facts:
Having brought his trademark gothic art style to both independent and mainstream comics, monster-loving artist and comic creator Mike Mignola got his big break in 1993 with the distinctively Lovecraftian Hellboy, whose first live-action venture became an instant cult classic. Hellboy’s first jump to videogames was a poorly reviewed bomb and, despite roping in the creative forces behind the first feature films, The Science of Evil didn’t fare much better and was almost universally lambasted for its poor graphics and gameplay.

Gameplay and Power-Ups:
Hellboy: The Science of Evil is a third-person hack-and-slash (more of a “bash-and-smash” thanks to Hellboy’s signature Right Hand of Doom) that primarily follows Hellboy’s quest to track down a malicious witch but which features flashbacks to his earlier cases and run-ins with Nazi forces and ends with him confronting crazed Nazi commandant Herman von Klempt at his gothic castle. While the developers may have hoped to make something akin to the Devil May Cry (Capcom/Ninja Theory, 2001 to present) and God of War franchises (Various, 2005 to 2024), they instead lumbered players with a repetitive brawler that features no skill tree to expand upon, few collectibles, and a far too short campaign mode that drags out its runtime with mindless brawling and dodgy platforming. Players make Hellboy (or his allies, fishman Abraham “Abe” Sapien and pyrokinetic Elizabeth “Liz” Sherman in the co-op multiplayer mode) jump with A (holding it to jump higher and tapping it to clamber over ledges) and attack with X (for quick, light strikes) and Y (for heavier strikes or hold it for charged “Boom” attacks that stun enemies). You can dive roll by pressing A and X together (though its use as a dodge is negligible), perform a jumping strike or ground pound (at the cost of some energy), and grapple with the Right Trigger. You can then pummel and toss enemies or instantly kill them with B if you have enough energy. If knocked down, you must tap Y to recover and you must also do this if you respawn after a death. There are no lives here and plenty of checkpoints, and Hellboy’s health automatically refills after a short time (or if you perform a jumping ground slam). Smashing enemies or the environment sees you collecting blue energy to fill your meter, which lets you instantly kill enemies and perform some moves, and you’ll extend this meter by finding artefacts in each area.

Whether playing alone or in co-op, the action quickly becomes tedious and repetitive.

You shoot Hellboy’s versatile handgun, the Samaritan, with the Left Trigger. Although you can freely aim with the right stick, I wouldn’t recommend this as the aiming reticle is as tricky and unreliable as the grapple, which often failed to register my inputs. Hellboy can shoot lots of ammo types, with some being more effective against certain enemies, from regular rounds and the shotgun-like shots to grenades, flame rounds, and magic crystals. You cycle between these with the Left Bumper and collect ammo from crates dotted (or hidden) about, repeatedly tapping RT until your ammo is full. When your energy is full, you can enter “Hellmode” by pressing in both control sticks. This temporarily boosts your speed and attack power or unleashes a flaming shockwave, though I found this to be relatively useless as it doesn’t last long. Hellboy can also grab various weapons (barrels, stone slabs, massive warhammers, drainpipes, swords, and such) to use or throw at enemies. Though these are great for crowd control, can light lanterns or defeat certain foes, and will stun larger enemies, they break pretty quickly. Performing your grapple finish on certain enemies disarms them, gifting you a unique weapon like a machine gun or an exploding round, and you can execute a few basic combos by mashing different combinations of X and Y. However, most enemies take a hell of a beating and continuously swarm the area, to the point where I often felt like the game was glitching. Different enemy types attack each other, which is helpful, and a friend can help you out in the co-op mode, but combat becomes very tedious very quickly as it’s primarily slow, uninteresting punching. It might’ve been nice if you gained experience points to trade in for some fun new moves, like spewing hellfire or some kind of spinning attack, or could upgrade Hellboy’s Hellfire mode to see him go on a rampage as Anung Un Rama. Instead, you’re left with the same moveset for the whole game, with Hellboy acquiring new ammo and little else.

Puzzles and combat often boil down to mashing the same buttons or performing the same actions.

There are no difficulty modes here, though you can enable “friendly fire” to make co-op more frustrating interesting. The game is divided into six chapters, each containing a handful of sub-chapters and asking you to follow a fairly linear path. Along the way, you’re beset by enemies you can largely ignore unless a “ghost barrier” blocks your way. In these instances, you must defeat all nearby enemies to dispel the barrier. Other times, you must cut through ghost tentacles with a special crystalline sword or blast them with your crystal rounds. Occasionally, you activate levers to open gates, stop toxic gas spewing into the arena, or create new walkways. You do this by holding RT and tapping X, which is the go-to method for every “puzzle”. Spot a glowing wall? RT+X to smash through it. Path blocked by fallen trees, rocks, or stalled vehicles? RT+X to clear them. Need to ring a giant bell or push over a column to make a path? RT+X. You get the picture, I’m sure. The game gives the illusion of offering side quests by having Hellboy interact with corpses who ask him to do a task for them to open gates or doors. These generally amount to smashing up some enemies and, you guessed it, holding RT and tapping X. Cursed graves endlessly spawn enemies in the first chapter, but they’re easily destroyed with exploding Bambini heads. Enchanted coffins also appear here, though your “release” ammo will remove their threat and allow you to RT+X to open them for such rewards as…nothing or some ammo. While platforming challenges are light, they’re annoying due to the useless camera, which often switches to different perspectives and angles to screw up your controls. Chapter two introduces the lantern mechanic, where you must light torches and get rid of gnarled roots blocking your path, but this is more aggravating than fun as you must often backtrack for torches. Chapter four also sees you hurling frog monsters down pits to light torches and open gates.

Presentation:
I was somewhat optimistic about Hellboy: The Science of Evil when I heard Marco Beltrami’s Hellboy (Del Toro, 2004) theme on the main menu and saw that Ron Perlman, Selma Blair, and Doug Jones were reprising their film roles. However, the game has a very confused identity and isn’t sure if it’s a movie tie-in, a spin-off from the comics, or something else entirely. While Hellboy looks and sounds like he does in the film, this world seems very different and closer to the comic books, being full of witches, ghosts, zombies, and other supernatural threats. While Hellboy’s stone arm lights up and even bursts into flame, and he adopts different outfits for each chapter, he has no idle poses and repeats the same one-liners and nonsensical statements throughout the game. There are no pre-rendered cutscenes and, strangely, barely any story. There’s some text between chapters and a handful of cutscenes that use the in-game models, but I was very confused about what was happening as there’s no real introduction, chapters abruptly end and jump to the past with little explanation, and the game essentially has no ending, either, as Hellboy’s just blasted into the water after defeating the final boss and the credits roll! I didn’t play in co-op so I have no idea if Abe and Liz appear in cutscenes, but it seems like they don’t, which is weird, and the story felt very disconnected and slapped together to me. This was a shame as it could’ve taken more inspiration from the source material or even retold key moments from the first movie to better tie things together. While the game performs relatively well, I did have some odd moments where the camera got stuck, Hellboy wouldn’t build energy, and the music cut out or oddly looped.

The visual style is somewhere between the comics and the first film, making for a confused game.

While you visit various locations and time periods in Hellboy: The Science of Evil, they’re all very drab and repetitive but I give the game kudos for evoking the dark, gothic aesthetic of the comics over the slightly more polished and sci-fi-esque presentation of the first film. You begin in the Carpathian Mountains of 2007 Romania, smashing your way through a mausoleum and emerging in a crooked, foreboding graveyard full of crypts, gravestones, gnarled trees, and dishevelled woods. A cauldron of bats often swarms in doorways or as you enter new areas, which serve as the calling card of the crazed witch Hellboy’s pursuing, and you’ll find crypts home to loquacious skeletons, a sentient gate who demands a password, and flame pits in dank caverns. Chapter two flashes back twenty-three years to a misty forest in Japan, where Hellboy follows a magical kitsune, encounters a mysterious, isolated monk who offers some exposition, and follows snaking cobblestone paths and fights through a bamboo forest. Pagodas are dotted about and this is where you experience how destructible much of the environment is, though it largely amounts to building your energy meter and discovering the odd collectible. Chapter three returns you to Romania, depositing you in an abandoned village beset by a thunderstorm. I liked the rain effect and lightning flashes and fighting in the narrow streets and on the precarious rooftops in this area. You also detour through a house to encounter a tortured suicide victim and eventually land in some dank catacombs home to disgusting frog monsters. This sewer-like area is alive with slimy egg sacs and razor-sharp tentacles (which helpfully target enemies), scurrying rats, and vaguely Lovecraftian statues. Chapter five flashes back to 1967 Tunisia, where you battle Nazi zombies in the ruins of an archaeological dig, smashing apart their camps, odd crystalline growths, and crashing through ruins. You end up in von Klempt’s gothic castle, a distinctly Mignolaian setting full of 1930s style laboratory equipment, Nazi paraphernalia, and the leftovers of their atrocious experiments with the occult.

Enemies and Bosses:
While there are only a handful of enemy types in Hellboy: The Science of Evil and the game is more likely to toss mini bosses at you and quickly make them regular enemies than wow you with big, action-packed boss battles, most enemies are somewhat unique to their chapter to give each setting a distinct personality (though they all show up in chapter six). At first, you’re beset by pigmy-like Bambinis, mischievous little imps who toss their explosive heads and scamper all over you. They’re relatively harmless unless they clamber onto your back; I had trouble working out how to throw them off before they drained my health. A slightly bigger variant wielding a chain also shows up and the Bambinis chip away at you as you face a pack of werewolves (though these guys look more fearsome than they are and simply swipe, howl, and bite). In Japan, you battle spear-carrying kabuki warriors (whose weapons can be stolen to light lanterns) and encounter troll-like oni, who guard against your attacks, bash your head in with their large metal clubs., and push you back with a sonic blast. You also battle katana carrying demons who swipe and charge with their blades. These guys introduce a mechanic where you must stun them, grapple them, and hit Y to counter their attacks, mash X to pummel, and finish them off with B when prompted. This strategy works on the giant Bambinis (who tackle you, toss exploding Bambini heads, and grab you and throw you into walls), the horned frog monsters, and the cybernetically enhanced apes you later encounter. You fight frog monsters in the sewers (through they’re easily tossed onto spikes) and various Nazi zombies. These guys can take a hell of a beating in chapter five and wield machine guns, electrifying blade arms, grenade launchers, and even these weird, steampunk-esque buzzsaw weapons!

Bosses are as disappointing as the gameplay and lack the visual spectacle I’d expect from the license.

Hellboy constantly encounters a witch in Romania. Each encounter takes place in a different arena but is essentially the same, with her always teleporting as a cloud of bats and tossing exploding Bambini heads. You must throw these (or other objects) back to send her packing and, in the final battle with the witch, you chase her to the rafters and finally corner her in the church attic, where you can get close enough to hit her. Hellboy’s hounded by a volatile cyborg ape…thing in chapter two and is trapped inside a pagoda with it at the chapter’s end. The large ape is deceptively fast with its leap and charge and has a hell of a reach thanks to its mechanical arms (which it fires and swings on chains). If you get too close, it grabs you and throws you about and, instead of fighting it, you attack pillars to drop down a few floors and eventually bring the whole structure down on it. Variations on this enemy appear in chapter six, with one surprising you on a narrow castle wall (however, I fled back and it seemed to despawn!) Chapter four ends with you dispatching some frog monsters and their horned giants, eventually destroying the central chamber of their lair, while chapter five culminates in a more aggravating boss battle against a large, Lovecraftian worm-thing. In the first phase, you must avoid the Nazis swarming the chamber and toss crystals at its mouth when it roars, then use RT+X on the nearby pillars to blast it with lasers. In the second phase, ignore the Nazis and attack with your unbreakable flaming sword, dodging its whipping tentacles to put it down. The game’s final boss is a demon unleashed by von Klempt that’s essentially fought like other giant enemies. You must stay away to avoid being pounded or eaten and dodge its erratic mouth laser, using any nearby debris to stun it or unloading with combos and your gun. Eventually, it’s joined by frog monsters and toxic gas and you must grab von Klempt’s floating cybernetic torso to finish it off, but this was a lacklustre end to a disappointingly mediocre game.

Additional Features:
There are twenty-seven Achievements in Hellboy: The Science of Evil, with one awarded each time you complete a chapter. You can also kill twenty-five enemies with different weapons for some more, kick fifty Bambini heads for another, and toss fifty enemies onto spikes for another. Every chapter hides a hidden artifact and finding each nets you another six Achievements (then a seventh for finding them all). Fall off a cliff twenty times for an Achievement and invent time travel to go back to when Xbox Live was a thing to snag two more for finishing a multiplayer chapter with Ape and Liz. Artifacts and lore that boost your energy gauge are hidden in each chapter  and playing through the game unlocks behind the scenes extras, interviews, and artwork. Completing each chapter unlocks it for you to replay from the main menu and finishing the game allows you to replay the main campaign with all the extra energy and ammo you’ve found. Although there was downloadable content planned where you’d play as Lobster Johnson and Achievements were programmed for this, it never released (not that you’d be able to get it now, or that I imagine it would’ve been that good!)

Final Thoughts:
I’m a big fan of the Hellboy movies, and the character (despite not having read many of his adventures) so I was excited to get into Hellboy: The Science of Evil. Since it’s only tangentially related to the films and released soon after the first movie, I had high hopes it’d avoid the stigma of movie tie-in games. Unfortunately, this really was one of the most disappointing, barebones, cash grab licensed games I’ve ever played. There’s barely any story here and no effort put into any of the cutscenes or even the script, with Ron Perlman muttering statements that seem strangely disconnected to what’s happening and the game seemingly failing to tie into the films or the comics. While Hellboy looks great and the environments are okay, evoking both the movie and Mike Mignola’s distinctive art style, nothing interesting happens with the character or where he goes and the game just feels like a series of events loosely tied together. The combat is so boring and gets old super fast. With no skill tree or additional combos or attacks to learn, Hellboy feels underpowered and frustratingly limited. If the developers were aiming for something akin to a Devil May Cry or God of War title then they missed the mark by a wide margin with the slow, lumbering combat and unsatisfying gunplay. The puzzles were a joke, with every solution to any problem simply being to hold RT and tap X until you win. The quick-time-event-like moments with bigger enemies and bosses were as finnicky as the camera angles and the grab, leading to some frustrating moments. The bosses were laughable as well, with only one offering something more than what you’d get from a larger enemy, and the collectibles and replay value were sub-standard, at best. I’d say this one’s only worth playing if you can get it cheap (a tall order these days) but you’re better off sticking to the Devil May Cry or God of War games for a satisfying hack-and-slash adventure.

My Rating:

Rating: 1 out of 5.

Terrible

Are you a fan of Hellboy: The Science of Evil? If so…why? Were you disappointed that the game didn’t have more to do with the movies and comics? Would you have liked to see more unlockable combos and attacks? Which of the bosses and ammo types as your favourite? Did you ever play the game in co-op? Which Hellboy videogame is your favourite? Leave me a like and drop a comment below, then donate to my Ko-Fi to suggest more Hellboy content for the site.

Game Corner [Global James Bond Day]: 007 Legends (Xbox 360)

Dr. KLeave a comment

To celebrate the release of the first of many filmic outings for James Bond, October 5th is officially recognised as “Global James Bond Day”.

Released: 16 October 2012
Developer: Eurocom
Metacritic Scores: 45 / 4.6

Also Available For: Nintendo Wii, PC, and PlayStation 3

Quick Facts:
After James Bond 007: Blood Stone (Bizarre Creations, 2010) eased the sting of Activision’s poorly received GoldenEye 007 (Rare, 1997) reimagining, Activision were keen to develop a new title to coincide with the franchise’s 50th anniversary. Built on their pre-existing game engine, 007 Legends saw Daniel Craig lend his likeness to six classic James Bond adventures alongside some returning faces. Sadly, 007 Legends was widely criticised for its repetitive gameplay, awful stealth mechanics, and slapdash narrative. Though the multiplayer options were praised and the game was bolstered by an additional downloadable mission, 007 Legends is largely considered to be one of the worst 007 videogames ever made.

Gameplay and Power-Ups:
007 Legends is an infamous first-person shooter (FPS) in which players revisit truncated and largely reimagined versions of five classic James Bond films – Goldfinger (Hamilton, 1964), On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (Hunt, 1969), Licence to Kill (Glen, 1989), Die Another Day (Tamahori, 2002), and Moonraker (Gilbert, 1979) – in the guise of the Daniel Craig version of the character, completing anywhere from one to three missions for each. You might be wondering why the films are ordered like that and that’s a great question. The films are presented as flashbacks Bond relives during a near-death experience in Skyfall (Mendes, 2012) and, as such, there’s nothing cohesive linking them together (beyond some recurring characters) and no logic behind presenting Moonraker last except to have a finale in space!! Anyone who’s played Activision’s previous Bond videogames, or the Call of Duty franchise (Various, 2003 to present) will recognise 007 Legends’ control scheme and basic gameplay mechanics, though you can select different presets. By default, players jump and hop vault over low walls with A (though be careful as Bond takes fall damage!), crouch behind cover or to sneak up on enemies with B, reload with X and hold X to interact with the environment (to open doors, activate switches, or hack terminals), and switch weapons with Y (double-tapping it to quickly whip out Bond’s signature Walther P99). The Right Trigger fires while the Right Bumper tosses your primary explosive. The Left Trigger aims down your sights (and offers a partial lock-on when used correctly) and the Left Bumper throws your secondary explosive. You can briefly sprint by pressing in the left stick, perform melee attacks and quick takedowns by pressing in the right stick, and use the directional pad (D-pad) to activate gadgets and add-ons. These apply a silencer to your weapon, whip out Bond’s multi-use dart gun, use his wristwatch as a radar or to disable security cameras, or pull out his smartphone to hack terminals or scan the environment using different filters.

Whether you go in all guns blazing or use stealth, you can upgrade Bond’s abilities with XP.

Players can pick between “Modern” or “Classic” health systems, with the former seeing Bond’s health regenerate if he avoids damage for a time and the latter having him collect med-kits and body armour. Bond has an array of weapons (though he can only hold three at a time), with many found in MI6 cases scattered throughout each environment. You can utilise various pistols, from the standard Walther P99 and its variants to the high-impact Iguana .44, close-quarters shotguns like the Camara US6 and super fun Drumhead Type-12, and different sniper rifles (one boasting an infrared filter) for long-range combat. You’ll also grab different Moonraker Laser rifles (which boast infinite ammo), a rocket launcher, various grenades and mines, and a wide assortment of submachine guns and assault rifles. While these are great for thinning out hordes of enemies, many quicky burn through their magazines or are widely inaccurate, though you can compensate for this by purchasing upgrades with experience points (XP). Each weapon and weapon group as an “XP Challenge” tied to it where you’re awarded XP for “eliminating” different numbers of enemies or performing headshots and such. This XP is spent in the XP store to either upgrade Bond’s maximum health, durability, recovery time, sneaking ability, weapon switching and such or on attachments for each weapon class. You can buy bigger magazines, silencers, scopes, stocks, laser sights, a rapid-fire mode and more, however you can only apply three upgrades at a time to each weapon (and to Bond). Bond will also take the controls of a mounted mini gun during On Her Majesty’s Secret Service to mow down Ernst Stavro Blofeld’s minions and can use his dart gun to subdue, shock, or distract enemies. Although largely optional, some areas force you to stealthily avoid enemies or cameras, subduing them with takedowns, your silenced pistol, or your dart gun. This was incredibly aggravating in Licence to Kill, where guards and scientists kept spotting me, but was surprisingly easy in Moonraker. It’s generally beneficial to use stealth when prompted to avoid being set upon by reinforcements and to earn additional XP.

Sadly, there’s more focus on hacking than driving or exhilarating gameplay mechanics.

007 Legends quickly establishes its repetitive gameplay loop, tasking you with gunning down various guards or sneaking through areas, liaising with or fighting alongside non-playable characters (NPCs), and exploring various offices. As was the style for Bond videogames, Bond’s smartphone is a key component as you must either photograph evidence or use the camera’s different filters to locate hidden switches (and thereby hidden doors) or analyse objects of interest. You’ll also hack many devices using the phone, holding LT and RT to keep each bar blue or rotating coloured circles to complete a circuit, or rotating segments on Bond’s watch to crack safes. In Moonraker, you must wander through side doors and laboratories, sneaking through ventilation shafts to disable security turrets, while Licence to Kill relies far more on critical stealth sections. You’ll often follow or fight alongside the likes of Felix Leiter and Giacinta Johnson/Jinx and these guys more than hold their own, gunning down guards (occasionally alongside soldiers or marines) and leading you in the right direction. Other times, you must protect your ally, covering Doctor Holly Goodhead or Pam Bouvier as they said you. As far as I could see, these missions only fail if you die or leave the area as your allies seem invulnerable, though I could be wrong. Licence to Kill and Die Another Day offer two driving sections, with you holding RT to accelerate, pressing LT to break, and executing a handbrake turn with A. In Die Another Day, you use the D-pad to activate threat indicators, traction control, and the car’s missile lock-on systems (fired with B). Moonraker’s finale is played entirely in zero gravity, with you flailing about using A and B to ascend or descend and destroying Hugo Drax’s space station turrets. Finally, some enemies and nearly every boss is fought in a janky first-person fist fight sequence that basically amounts to a quick-time event (QTE). You must use the left or right stick, LT and/or RT, or tap A when promptly to land blows, parry, block incoming attacks, and disarm your foes.

Objectives and gameplay mechanics quickly become tedious as the game lacks innovation.

Naturally, every mission is loaded with a few objectives, with Bond having to complete more depending on what difficulty you’re playing. Secondary objectives also pop up, earning you additional XP, and your accuracy, completion count, and performance is ranked at the end of each mission for more XP. The onscreen radar and compass guide you towards your primary objective, but secondary ones must be sought out yourself and range from successfully bypassing enemies and cameras without triggering the alarms, analysing samples, destroying Blofeld’s anti-aircraft defences, and taking out Franz Sanchez’s terrorist cronies. You’ll hold X to open doors and plant bombs, analyse nerve gas, download data from terminals, plant tracking devices, gun down enemies, take out snipers, and automatically switch to night vision to explore certain areas. This is most prominent in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, where Bond and Marc-Ange Draco explore Blofeld’s maze-like lair to find Contessa Teresa di Vicenzo/Tracy. This mission also begins with a high-speed ski sequence where you frantically dodge trees and rocks and take out Blofeld’s jet-skiing minions and helicopters to catch up to Tracy (easier said than done). Some objectives are timed, such as when you enter serial numbers into terminals in Moonraker to stop Drax launching his poison pods, or when you race into Gustav Graves’ jet, or a nail-biting escape from Drax’s shuttle launch that I barely cleared! Die Another Day starts with you mingling around and investigating Graves’ ice hotel alongside Jinx then taking out his guards in his impressive biodome before dodging lasers from his Icarus satellite and mortars from Zao. Occasionally, players “breach” areas, setting off a slow-motion sequence where you gun down everyone in sight, or you must shoot overhead pipes to dose flames blocking your way. Other times, you can interact with the environment to cause distractions or take out enemies. Some missions take nearly an hour to get through while others last about ten minutes, some rely more on stealth or shooting, and others take your weapons and gadgets away entirely in a desperate attempt to keep things fresh.

Presentation:
007 Legends continues to trend set by GoldenEye 007: Reloaded (Eurocom, 2001) in replacing past Bond actors with Daniel Craig (likeness only here) and having his stoic, no-nonsense Bond relieve classic Bond adventures. Although Timothy Watson does a striking job emulating Craig, his delivery is robotic to the point of apathy, robbing iconic Bond lines like “Do you expect me to talk?” of all their gravitas. All of Bond’s returning villains are modelled after their respective actors (except for Blofeld, who’s modelled after the Donald Pleasance incarnation) as are some of his allies, meaning Michael Lonsdale, Richard Kiel, and Toby Stephens all return alongside the voices and/or likenesses or Carey Lowell, Gert Fröbe, Honor Blackman. Oddly, while Dame Judi Dench, Naomie Harris, Rory Kinnear all return, Jeffrey Wright is recast as Felix Leiter, completely ruining even a slight chance that this game is supposed to fit into Craig’s Bond canon. Bond isn’t seen often but, when he is, he’s little more than a marionette, like his supporting cast. Lacking Halle Berry’s allure and charisma, Jinx is robbed of any memorable characteristics, characters simply go through their motions with little fanfare, and line deliveries are about as disinterested as the soundalike score, which evokes some of the memorable Bond themes but never fully commits to any. The game feels very slapped together, with each mission providing very little context and relying on the player already being familiar with these Bond movies. This might be fine if they didn’t change some elements around, such as Pam infiltrating Sanchez’s organisation in Licence to Kill and ignoring Graves’ true origins in Die Another Day. The flashback bookends and interludes are a cheap way to tie these stories together and I would’ve much preferred that the developers try to rewrite these movies into a cohesive narrative, perhaps using Quantum as a common thread (as the rights to the Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion (SPECTRE) were still up in the air at this time).

The game does a decent job of reimaging classic locations and characters despite some inconsistencies.

On the plus side, 007 Legends does as commendable a job as GoldenEye 007: Reloaded at updating and reimagining locations from each movie. Things start off pretty strong, recreating the gold-painted Jill Masterson and dropping Bond outside Auric Goldfinger’s Swiss airbase (which is alive with guards and explosions). Players eventually storm Fort Knox alongside Leiter and some troops, battling down to the vault and encountering the same bomb as in the movie, and eventually confront Goldfinger on his private jet just like in the finale. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service sees you racing down the Swiss Alps and launching an all-out assault on a faithfully recreated version of Blofeld’s mountainside lair, complete with brainwashing bedrooms and underground laboratories. Licence to Kill starts you at the ruins of an Otomi temple, where you stealthily take down guards to infiltrate Sanchez’s elaborate drug operation. This, again, closely mirrors the film but is obviously expanded to incorporate the heavy reliance on stealth in this mission. Licence to Kill ends with you securing a helicopter, chasing Sanchez’s truck on a highway, and even mounting it to take out pursuing Humvees. Die Another Day impressed considerably with its near-identical recreation of Graves’ ice palace, which featured a gaggle of NPCs at the bar, bedrooms and offices, and leads to a man-made jungle environment housed within a high-tech biodome. The laser cutters and ice field Bond drives across even return, as does the finale within Graves’ jet. Moonraker continues this trend, recreating Drax’s ridiculous henchmen and their yellow jumpsuits and seeing Bond sneak through his astronaut training facility, complete with gyrospheres, treadmills, and spare suits. Bond and Dr. Goodhead must escape a launching shuttle’s exhaust flames and sneak aboard another shuttle to board Drax’s space station, where the Earth, other shuttles, and a full-blown laser battle take place in the void outside. This was probably the most visually impressive section, however I did encounter a dramatic and nearly game-breaking period of slowdown during my playthrough. Textures also often warped or popped in out of nowhere, and enemies tended to comically ragdoll when shot.

Enemies and Bosses:
You’ll gun down a small continent’s worth of nameless, faceless, repetitive goons in 007 Legends, each of whom appear slightly different depending on who they’re working for but all follow predictable behaviours. Enemies patrol laboratories, facilities, and areas in a pre-set loop, becoming alerted to your presence if they spot dead bodies or you make too much noise. They call for reinforcements by triggering alarms (which sometimes instantly fails the mission), though you can negate this by disabling overhead cameras or quietly subduing them. Scientists and other NPCs also alert guards if they spot you, costing you the mission or kicking off a gun fight, and enemies are more than capable of taking and firing over cover, opening doors, and climbing ladders to pursue you. If you linger in one spot for too long, enemies toss grenades that can be tricky to avoid, though you can throw your own or blast explosive barrels to take out large groups. Enemies wield machine guns, pistols, and even rocket launchers, firing from afar like the ever-annoying snipers (distinguishable by their laser sights). As you progress, enemies wear more obvious body armour, necessitating the use of more powerful weapons, and they’ll even shred you with mounted guns and hit you if you get close. Occasionally, random guards will surprise you and force a fist fight, often with one or both of you swinging a pole or a wrench or something, which can be annoying as these fights quickly get tedious. Very rarely, enemies will race around in Humvees or on jet skis or attack from helicopters, rappelling down or firing from above and requiring you to blast them from the sky with a rocket launcher. I found Drax’s laser-firing goons particularly difficult to tag in Moonraker thanks to the disorientating zero-gravity, Graves’ suited-up bodyguards were surprisingly durable, and the security turrets will cut you to ribbons unless you disable them.

Every boss is fought in a tedious and all-too-easy fist fight and QTE sequence.

Any time an enemy forces a fist fight, this essentially counts as a mini boss, I guess, or a reminder of the clunky fighting mechanics for the real bosses. In Goldfinger, this means throwing hands with Goldfinger’s stout, mute bodyguard/assassin, Oddjob. Just like in the movie, you swing a pole at Oddjob and must dodge his razor-sharp hat (which instantly kills if you don’t react to the QTE fast enough). Like every fist fight, though, it’s a simple affair made even easier as Bond finishes Oddjob in a cutscene, though you must remember to hit LT to send Goldfinger packing. After cutting down Blofeld’s soldiers and beating up his goons hidden throughout his lair, you’ll get into a fist fight with SPECTRE’s head honcho in a cable car. Blofeld throws hands and an axe, which you must parry and then take from him, but it’s the same fight you have every time, just dragged out more. Similarly, after making it through aggravating critical stealth sections in Sanchez’s drug lab, you fight his sadistic right-hand, Dario, who swings a pole and ends up falling into the machinery. You must then succeed a QTE on Sanchez’s tanker truck and fist fight him, too, parrying his machete when prompted. Die Another Day mixes things up by having you race from and then fire missiles at Zao across the ice, dodging his mortars and Icarus lasers. Though the mission again ends in a fist fight, Graves is at least wearing his ridiculous cybernetic suit and you must complete a few more QTEs to dodge his electrical blasts. Moonraker not only employs aggravating critical stealth sections but has you circumventing and disabling overhead turrets to infiltrate Drax’s operation, where you’re naturally attacked by Jaws. You must tap A to avoid being bitten, tap RT to toss a screwdriver at him to save Dr. Goodhead, bash his head with a metal pole, and finally hit RT to electrocute him. When pursuing Drax, Bond must float around destroying six mechanical arms to stop his poison pods launching, which is tricky because of his disorientating zero-gravity is, the enemies firing at you, and the small window you have to attack the arms. You can destroy the pods as well, but the gas will chip away at your health, and this is basically it as Drax is finished in a cutscene.

Additional Features:
There are fifty Achievements in 007 Legends and most of them are pretty easy to obtain, meaning this is the only real reason to play the game. You’ll get an Achievement for finishing each movie and two for finishing on “Agent” difficulty or higher or using “Classic” mode. You get another Achievement for fully upgrading one weapon, gadget, and buying all of Bond’s health and gameplay buffs, another for earning 10,000 XP, and another for scoring “eliminations” with every weapon class. There’s a bullshit but also amusing 0G Achievement, another for photographing Graves’ alligator and completing the Die Another Day driving section without gadgets, and another for sending Drax’s gyrosphere haywire. Every location has intel and biographical items hidden in it, usually in the bad guy’s office, which you must collect for additional Achievements and to unlock character bios and models. You can also view concept and production art, input cheat codes (mostly to unlock multiplayer extras), and tackle various “trials” for each mission and difficulty. These task you with having high accuracy, finishing each mission in a set time, utilising stealth, and amassing certain “eliminations” for a higher score, more XP, and a handful of Achievements. Similarly, you can take on the “Challenge” mode to revisit missions with less resources or certain restrictions in place. 007 Legends also offers local multiplayer (I assume the online functionality is long gone), featuring additional classic characters and some familiar gameplay modes, such as a free-for-all, capture the flag, team-based gameplay, limiting your lives, or offering more points for using the fabled Golden Gun. Though no longer available, there was also an extremely short, downloadable Skyfall mission (that had no new Achievements) that saw you pursuing the Patrice on a motorcycle (in first-person, no less) across the rooftops and through the streets and buildings of Istanbul, tracking the assassin to a skyscraper, and using cover to engage in a shoot-out against his sniping skills rather than offering another fist fight.

Final Thoughts:
I’d heard all about how bad 007 Legends was and, having been disappointed by Activision’s previous James Bond videogames, I was very reluctant to try it for myself, especially as it’s priced too high for its reputation and the Skyfall mission is now lost media. However, I finally relented, reasoning that the Achievements would be worth my time and it couldn’t be all that bad. Truthfully, it’s really not that terrible; it just continues the trend of these games being painfully repetitive and generic. It lacks the excitement and fun of Bond’s classic Nintendo 64 outing, fails to stand up to the celebrated (if equally uninspired) Call of Duty franchise, and, worst of all, doesn’t do anything interesting with the license. Recreating classic Bond movies was a great idea, but presenting them as disconnected, truncated flashbacks suffered by Craig’s Bond robs them of all context. While there’s some impressive attention to detail at times and fun little Easter Eggs dotted about, this is a cheap, clearly rushed celebration of the franchise that doesn’t even include an end cutscene! The shoot outs are quite fun, for the most part, but dulled considerably by the tedious hacking mini games and boring fist fight mechanics that reduce every boss to a painfully easy and tiresome slugfest. The stealth sections are even worse, raising the alarm and costing you the mission at even the slightest hint of your presence, and the pacing is all over the place, with some missions taking ages to finish and having multiple sections and others being over in the blink of an eye. The upgrade system is alright, I guess, but somewhat redundant given you can recover health, but it doesn’t take long to get everything you need. I don’t know if paying for the likenesses or the other Bond actors would’ve salvaged 007 Legends but it’s certainly a disappointing, half-assed, and forgettable experience that’s really only worth it to say you tried it and agree with the general consensus…and to add to your Gamer Score.

My Rating:

Rating: 2 out of 5.

Could Be Better

Do you agree that 007 Legends is one of the worst James Bond videogames? What did you think to the movies selected for the title? How do you think it holds up compared to other Bond games from this time? Did you also struggle with the critical stealth sections? What did you think to the hacking mini games and repetitive fist fights? Did you ever play the Skyfall mission? What’s your favourite James Bond game and how are you celebrating the character this month? Whatever you think about 007 Legends, please share your thoughts in the comments, check out my other James Bond content, and suggest a Bond movie or videogame for me to review by donating to my Ko-Fi.