Enter The Matrix

[spank]

I wasn't expecting much. This is a movie based game, they rarely work as one and besides, there was very little hype around it. But Reloaded left me wanting more so I felt like I had to play it, and here are my observations:

- The graphics blow, HARD: cars' wheels are square, textures come out unfiltered (not to mention their utter lack of detail), and all that even on the topofthelineiest computer I've played it on. Bullet-time effects could have imitated the movie but they decided to only do it when it's loading the next level. This is not the same Shiny that made MDK/2. Can't be.

- The controls blow, HARD: you notice it's a bad console game conversion when get your hand on the mouse and it feels like you're mlooking on rails - especially when sniping. At least in 'hacking' they didn't do like in THPS2 where you had to click the letters you wanted to type.

- The AI blows, HARD (ironic because, after all, this is The Matrix): play as Ghost and have Niobe drive into a tunnel's support THREE TIMES IN A ROW when she could, uh, KEEP DRIVING IN STRAIGHT LINE!$!"%! Or fail a mission because your Matrix-aware friend wasn't smart enough to pull a trigger on a Matrix-challenged SWAT officer!

- IT'S FUCKING SHORT: I finished it in medium difficulty in under 9 hours, with both Niobe and Ghost, even though...

- IT ONLY HAS PER-LEVEL SAVING: yes, get killed just about as you were going to finish the level and do the whole thing over and over again!

But despite these incredibly down-bringing flaws, it still managed to capture a small corner of my heart:

- The character animation work is awesome, and the fights look very cool.

- You get to do a lot of the stuff some characters do in the movies (jumping off that building doing a corkscrew and cracking the floors - like Trinity did in The Matrix - after you meet the first agent was awesome)

- The gameplay is reasonably connected to Reloaded: it's not just an adaptation, and it has lots of (good quality) FMV that you wished you saw in the movie when you went to watch it. It really helps you understand the universe.

- The sound(track) RULES! Fluke - Atom Bomb. 'Nuff said. And those orchestral crescendoes when you're being chased, etc.

All in all, I give it 6/10 especially for the sentimental value. I'm happy I just borrowed it though.

[Amaster]

spank said:

[b]
- The sound(track) RULES! Fluke - Atom Bomb. 'Nuff said. And those orchestral crescendoes when you're being chased, etc.

Heh, that song is ancient. It's good, but odd that it's still being used.

[AndrewB]

spank said:

[b]- IT ONLY HAS PER-LEVEL SAVING: yes, get killed just about as you were going to finish the level and do the whole thing over and over again!

I think that this is generally an overlooked quality in games. When you're allowed to simply save and reload endlessly, it's practically like... being invincible. Being able to save anywhere and reload at any time kills more interesting challenges, and then they have to counter-balance it by having disproportionately tough gameplay challenges.

But other than that, it sounds like it really, really sucks.

[Linguica]

spank said:

[b]- The graphics blow, HARD: cars' wheels are square

PC, lowest detail level?

[jute]

one of my friends has it. i don't dig it at all. the fights look really rad, but everything else is either mediocre or totally horrible. which actually makes it pretty true to the films, in my opinion.

[AndrewB]

spank said:

- The graphics blow, HARD: cars' wheels are square,

Are you sure you're not playing The Life of Thor?

[Ubik]

pregnant with worms said:

the fights look really rad, but everything else is either mediocre or totally horrible. which actually makes it pretty true to the films, in my opinion.

Hah! Agreed :)

[Sharessa]

Wow, broken bold tag train up there. Um yeah. What's so great about the Matrix anyway? I dun geddit.

[Kinsie]

the_Danarchist said:

What's so great about the Matrix anyway? I dun geddit.

The fights and special effects. Screw the plot, I went to Reloaded to see some ass-kicking in style, and came out the cinema grinning.

I hope to play ETM soon.

[Lord FlatHead]

The game, not unlike the second movie, is only barely saved by the cool representation and fighting scenes. And, just like Reloaded, it gets repetitive about halfway through. Still a fairly decent game though, if a bit short - I'd expected more for my 4 Gigabytes of HD space.

[spank]

Linguica said:

PC, lowest detail level?

Not really, actually...

[dr_qui]

Played it, and thought it was okay except for the driving sections (urgh) as lord flathead said it is a bit short of content for nearly 4 meg. I reckon it's reasonable if theres nothing else you got to play.

[pritch]

heh I played the xbox version of it on a demo console in Virgin. Looked and played ok, but the controls were screwy (suxbox) and the fighting moves were way too easy to pull off IMO.

[Captain Red]

Seems like the game is a little short of great. heck, fine by me, but I will not be paying full price for it. I'll pick it up for PS2.

Oh, and anyone whose goes to see the second movie expecting have an experience that will enhance there spiritual being will get what they bloody well deserve. It is a brillante action film, but it is still just an action film. The animatrix on the other hand... amazing! If you have ever liked and anime ever, then you will love it.

[mmnpsrsoskl]

Well, I can't really give a huge opinion on it, since i've only played in down at the local games shop, on the XBox (I don't like the XBox much, therefore, the controller was very akward to me)...but from what I played, it was very good. The controls did take a few minutes to get used too, but it was pretty fun to play.

Though I don't know how going slow motion, about 2 times slower, or 3, makes you see a bullet. It would still travel fairly fast at that speed...meh, I don't know.

[Lizardcommando]

This game was overhyped. I mean... REALLY overhyped. Sure, some parts of the game was good, the rest of it wasn't really fun. It seemed to be the same thing over and over. Run up to a guy, bullet time, pull of some kung fu action, the guys dead, repeat. Oh and of course I don't want to forget the driving sequences. Drive drive drive, follow some markers or some shit like that, woooowee!!! Or in Ghost's case, let's shoot up the cars. Weeee! Ok, so that part was fun... for the first 2 minutes, but it gets boring having to shoot the same cop cars or the same other cars and more shit like that... I dunno if the controls for the PS2 version were as bad as the other versions, but I hated it. I want my Halo 2 dammit!