Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Chaos Bleeds (PS2)

Like it or loath it the television series of Buffy the Vampire Slayer should be a good source to make a decent game from, vampires, kung fu, good vs evil and half decent looking women seem like a near infallible combination from which to create an entertaining piece of software. The original Xbox title was decent enough without really being anything truly notable and if you are not a fan of the series there was little to attract you to it, so when the second installment in the all kicking slayer’s gaming adventures fell onto the desk there was a hope that it could actually be ok. Oh dear how wrong we where…

So we have a game which should at least be slightly above average, large levels full of monsters to be hacked and staked, a wide range of weapons and enemies and numerous characters to take control of. Yet despite all of this what emerges is one of the worst games to have ever been made, so let’s begin the postmortem.

First of all, if a developer is making a game closely related to a very popular television show it would seem common sense for you characters to look something like their on screen images, not here though, out of proportion bodies coupled with distorted faces means characters just do not look how they are should. Furthermore, all the voices used are not from the real actors so again instead of Michel Geller you get some strained American half sound alike girl, now this is far from satisfactory when making a title which is predominantly for fans and is lazy and inexcusable.

Let us move onto the next abomination- how the characters play. While each character has a fairly solid, if limited range of punches and kicks there are big gameplay spoiling issues all over the place. First of all every character seems to play almost exactly like every other character which just is not right considering Buffy is a massively strong slayer, Willow is a weak but magically strong witch and when Xanda punching a vampire sends them spinning around in the air it just reinforces the idea that different skins have been placed over the same combat template.

Combat itself has its own set of problems, for a start punches and kicks do not flow very well meaning you are always open to attack after landing your initial strikes and when surrounded by a large amount of opponents you can find yourself being knocked around without ever having a chance to fight back. The title also contains one of the most fascinatingly awful cameras in history. The camera is fully movable by the player but somehow always manages to be right in front of your character so you cannot see a thing and no matter what, enemies will always attack from somewhere you cannot see them, seemingly spinning out of thin air from a place you walked past two seconds before.

So that is bad controls, camera, graphics, sound and combat what’s left?  Level design. Where to start? If you’re not walking around levels that seem completely out of place with the series doing frustratingly dull things that were dull ten years ago then it’s the incredible long levels where you get attacked endlessly by vampires and demons that look exactly the same. It would not be so bad but when a level near enough takes one painful hour of your life to get through it would have been nice to be able to save your game before the end of it. There are continue points but you can only stop the pain and turn the machine off after completing one whole section of shocking boredom.

Buffy: Chaos Bleeds is a shocking game, a turgid stinking pool of primordial ooze that would take millions of years to evolve into anything remotely resembling something that is worth playing. Truly, they just do not make games this bad anymore; in fact they never made games this bad (perhaps with the exception of ET). The only good thing you can say is that it does not contain any ‘bugs’ but then again there is not exactly anything that feels finished about this title to have bugs in.

It’s hard to express how terrible this game is and it is made all the worse due to the fact that it should be near impossible to create such a shocking result from such a rich resource. Avoid it at all costs as you will have more fun sitting in a chair rocking back and forth, strangely the effect this game has had on almost all that have played it.

Overall 2/10

The Simpsons Hit and Run Review (PS2)

In recent memory the Simpson’s licence has been tacked on to just about any old piece of tat going, from the ‘alleged’ ripping of the crazy taxi formula in road rage to rubbish wrestling games. In fact the last time the Simpson’s got a proper run out was way back in the days of eight bit gaming with platformer Bart vs. the Space Mutants.

One of the better attempts came in the form of this Grand Theft Auto based game. Now on the surface this may seem a strange choice and a fair few changes have had to be made to keep everything from getting too violent. So GTA without the violence in a Simpson’s world? Dear lord what have we let our selves in for?

Hit and Run may be a copy of yet another popular and commercially viable formula with a tacked on gimmick but it would be harsh to dismiss the title out of hand. In reality Hit and Run only borrows certain things from GTA and in fact bares little resemblance to Rock Star North’s classic title.

The game sets players a number of missions in a set area. Driving from one place to another and then driving somewhere else is generally all that is needed to complete these tasks. There is little in the way of the on foot sections found in GTA and even the driving missions are only recognisable in an abstract sense.

Each area of the game has players controlling one of the Simpson’s family as they go about their driving, once a set number of missions have been completed it’s onto the next area where a different member of the family does much the same. While there are things to do other than the main missions the freedom of other titles in this genre really show up Hit and Run, indeed apart from looking for collectible cards and the odd hidden gag event to trigger there really is not anything worth aimlessly wondering the streets of Springfield to find. This really effects the long term appeal as the missions will only take an experienced player a couple of days to get through.

However, what the game does, it does relatively well with the environment of Springfield well recreated with everything more or less where is should be and recognisable characters from the series all making themselves present at one point or another. The handling of the cars is very much in the realms of arcade, but the vehicles handle well and generally do what you want them to. At least the basics have been completed to a competent degree, something that cannot be said about almost every other Simpson’s title.

Unfortunately there just is not enough in the game to make it a worthwhile purchase as a game in its own right. After the first few areas, missions begin to feel repetitive and moments of humour are too far apart to keep players wanting to go on to see what happens next. This coupled with the fact that most missions seem to have nothing to do with the overall plot and the fact that said plot is so dull that you do not care anyway only pulls the title down further into the realms of the exceedingly average.

For fans of the series there is the odd bit of replay value, new costumes and vehicles can be purchased and there is always the hope that the next gag event that you find will actually amount to more than something simply falling over or blowing up. For the real diehard fan there is an unseen episode of the Itchy and Scratchy cartoon to be bought once all the collectible cards have been found. Apart from these odd bits there is really little else here apart from the samey main missions, even going on a wild spree of knocking down innocent people holds little reward as the cops simply come and fine you before letting you on your way again.

Overall, Hit and Run is both a surprise and a disappointment. It is nice to see a Simpson’s game that finally is worth playing. Unfortunately, it is only worth playing for a few hours because anything after that falls into the realms repetition. The basic gameplay dynamic has been implemented competently but that isn’t really enough.

Overall 5/10