-

true I gotta say, they got me good. When I saw the screen shots of the Man of Steel fighting a 60 foot Metallo, I damn near ruined my favorite pants. With an 80 square mile virtual Metropolis, blistering flight speed, a fully powered up Kal-El and rumors of a playable Bizarro, EA had me giddy at the prospect of finally playing a Superman game that would do justice to the iconic hero. But, like I said, they got me good. What they ended up with is a decidedly mediocre action game that makes terrible use of the source material and fails to deliver a satisfying Superman experience. Unlike previous Superman games, Superman Returns is a sandbox-style game, featuring a massive city that you’ll be able to walk or fly around at will. Sadly, that’s pretty much all you’ll be doing. There are no interior areas to explore in Metropolis, so going in buildings is out. The city is sparsely populated and while you can pick up and throw cars, set mailboxes on fire with your eyes, blow away trees and even the hurl the famous Daily Planet rooftop globe across the city, destroying property only serves to hurt your city meter, which replaces the usual health bar for our invincible hero. Superman’s flight ability is easily the game’s most satisfying feature, and you’ll probably spend most of your time just soaring above the city and tearing through the maze of skyscrapers, setting off sonic booms in your wake. The sense of speed is truly impressive, and the flight controls are surprisingly effective, creating the most convincing and exciting Superman experience you’ll find in this or any other Superman game. Sadly, flying around Metropolis is only fun for about an hour, because aside from rescuing cats from trees and picking up civilians and dropping them off on rooftops and other precarious situations, there really aren’t a whole lot of in-air options. The free roaming format is wrapped around the barest carcass of a story that echoes the movie’s plot in no way, save a cut scene at the end of the game. This “story” is broken up into chapters, each of which is a series of random battles against the same enemies over and over until you randomly meet and fight a boss you’ve probably never heard of. The lazy structure of this game is probably the most disappointing aspect in a long list of disappointing aspects. <img src="/contributed/1178118554vCq785rAzS.jpg"> Oh look, more yellow robots... The meat of the game is centered around combat. Throughout the game, you’ll fight countless robots, parasites, and (for some reason) dragons. These minions are fairly simple, each with a weakness to either heat vision, ice breath or melee attacks. You’ll quickly find yourself becoming bored with fighting the randomly appearing drones, as the combat is extremely repetitive. As the game progresses, new power upgrades and melee combos will become available, but you’ll still find yourself using the same attacks over and over. Collision detection is often a problem and the camera and lock-on feature will sometimes serve as your greatest foes. Once locked on to an enemy, you can not switch your focus without releasing your targeting button, readjusting, and hoping that you target someone else. What’s most frustrating is that with a few tweaks to this system, the game could have had a serviceable combat system. The bosses in the game do add some variety, and some are even relatively fun to battle, but you never face Lex Luthor, never save Lois Lane, and the game’s final battle is a titanic tussle against Superman’s famous arch-enemy, a tornado. Yes, a tornado is the final boss in this game. I’d make a joke here, but no witty barb would be as poignant or funny as the simple fact that the final boss is, in fact, a tornado. With the exception of some gorgeous aerial views, the game’s visuals are underwhelming overall, and in some spots just plain ugly. The Superman character model looks decent, if a bit overly muscled, but is jerky in his animations. Enemies look okay as well, but the character designs are uninspired and utterly forgettable. Metropolis’ shining towers and sprawling avenues truly look great while flying high above the city, but up close suffer from some last-gen textures, low poly counts and a jarring amount of pop-up. Frame rate issues occur any time more than three characters are on screen and, ironically during the pre-rendered cut-scenes which look exactly like the PS2 and XBox version. Sound effects are what you’d expect, and if you liked the movie’s soundtrack, you’ll like this one too. The voice acting is performed by the original cast, and with the exception of Kevin Spacey, they seem to have sleepwalked through most of the script. <img src="/contributed/1178119345zpUfJJ4JW8.jpg"> Say what you will, but this one at least had a story... Superman still doesn’t have a “good” video game to his name, but he may have a new title-holder for his “best” game. It’s a disappointing effort overall, but there are some bright spots, and enough parts that work for a sequel to be worthwhile. It’s certainly not worth buying, probably not worth renting, but it’s definitely worth downloading the free demo on XBox Live. <img src="/contributed/1179941584gmmg5YQnz2.jpg"> </img>  <a href="http://www.tkqlhce.com/click-2481309-10416249"> <img src="http://www.awltovhc.com/image-2481309-10416249" alt="Video Game Rentals Delivered" width="300" height="250"></img></a></img></img> review

2007-05-02T11:18:00-04:00

186

2007-05-03T05:13:25-04:00

2007-05-02T11:18:00-04:00

4.0

superman_returns_xbox_360 published It Might Be the Best Superman Game Ever. Hooray? -