“Friday Old Games” is a series of articles in which we review a game from the older generations of consoles, share why we picked it, and whether or not it holds up with time.

By 1991, games on the NES were already starting to be overlooked. The onset of fancy new 16-bit game consoles like the Sega Genesis stole a lot of their thunder. Heck, the Super NES launch was right around the corner!

Even games that were critically successful would often fall to the wayside. Sadly, Metal Storm suffered this fate. It didn’t help that it was also published by Irem, the people that brought us Deadly Towers, the game popular satirist Seanbaby refers to as “the worst Nintendo Game of all time”.

The good news is Metal Storm is no Deadly Towers. It’s an action platformer where you control a mech that must navigate some very tricky levels.

On the surface, Metal Storm seems like your average NES platformer/shooter. You are a robot, you shoot the other robots before they shoot you. But their is a very clever mechanic in the mix that really adds to the gameplay: you can control the gravity.

Simply by jumping and hitting A and either up or down, you can switch between walking on either the top or bottom of the screen.

"Crazy Upside Down Gravity"

It not only changes your own orientation, but that of many of the enemies in the game. There are also some levels where the gravity will also effects certain doorways. It takes some quick reflexes to properly use the mechanic, and is completely necessary to your successful progression through the game.

Stages are broken up into two sections and a boss battle. I was surprised to find that when I had to continue (which was a lot), I started at the stage I left off on rather than the first one of the set. Boss battles, however, do start at the level immediately before them if you have to continue. Since there is no limit to the number of times you can continue (and you restart play extremely quickly), I found my constant deaths less frustrating than I would have if there were an arbitrary limit of continues, or forced you back to the beginning of the set of levels, etc.

The real key to the game is memorization. You die in one hit (except for when you get a second hit from power ups) and while most of the stages are pretty tough, they are also fairly short. It takes more platforming than shooting skills to make your way through Metal Storm.

Why did I pick this game?

This is another game I picked up while hanging out with Dave at his place of employment, purely based on cover art. We were looking for something to do when the store was slow and he said, “You should play something for a FOG review.”

We initially threw in Judge Dread for the SNES, but it was a little too terrible to stick with for more than a few minutes. I noticed Metal Storm sitting on the back shelf, a recent enough trade-in that it didn’t even have a price tag. The giant mech on the cover made me curious as to what kind of game it would be.

How does it hold up with time?

I was pleasantly surprised with how much fun Metal Storm is. Indie darlings of today like Super Meat Boy, I Wanna Be the Guy, and VVVVVV owe their existence to games of yore like Metal Storm. The fast paced action, instant deaths, and super quick retry times make it just as accessible as any of these newer games in the genre.

In fact, if you like those games at all, you should go back and give Metal Storm a try. I think you will be as pleasantly surprised with the game as I was. It even has a rocking soundtrack to compliment the package.

It has come to our attention that some people still haven’t picked up the excellent action/shooter, Vanquish. With all the great games 2010 has brought us thus far, it would be easy for people to forget to try Platinum’s new IP. But make no mistake, we will… stop that from happening.

We’re giving away a copy of Vanquish for the Playstation 3 to one lucky commenter. To prove to us that you’re man enough to take the game on, read the rules below and give us your best grunty, space marine line below. Examples from the game include “I’m gonna need a bigger gun!” and “This fight is for the men going home in pine boxes!” Just keep you’re lines PG (unlike the game) and make sure to grunt a lot while you type them.

Contest Rules:

1. Leave a comment below and give us your best, gruntiest space marine line (example: “I think I’m gonna need a bigger gun!”)
2. Limit one entry per person
3. All entries must be made by legal U.S. residents
4. Entries must be accepted by 5:00pm PST on Friday, November 19th. We will then randomly select one winner

Good luck! And don’t forget to check out our review!

When Shinji Mikami first described how Vanquish would blend the third person shooter genre with the fast pace of an action game, my interest was immediately piqued. I loved the concept, but at the same time I had no idea how it could successfully be pulled off.

Amazingly enough, they found a way. Vanquish has all the normal concepts of a cover based shooter, but polished up to be incredibly smooth. They then added an insane sense of speed and mobility for both you and your enemies, creating a game that really evolves the genre into something truly special.

One of the reasons Vanquish is so satisfying to play is that the core mechanics are such a potent recipe for fun. You can’t help but enjoy yourself no matter what situation the game presents to you. You take control of Sam Gideon, a researcher from a special organization known as DARPA, equipped with an Augmented Reaction Suit (ARS). This robo suit let’s Sam do some amazing things, provided he’s got the juice.

Don’t worry, you don’t need to collect anything to power up the suit. It uses a simple energy bar that begins refilling as soon as you stop using it. However, use the entire bar up and the suit will overheat, causing it to have to completely refill before you can start using it again. Since so many of Sam’s abilities use this gauge, you’ll want to be careful to avoid overheating.

Often you’ll use Sam’s robo suit to go into bullet time. Since the action in Vanquish is so fast and frantic, it might be more accurately described as “Normal Time”. Besides initiating it while stationary, you can also slow down time while rocket boosting at insane speeds across the battlefield or flying through the air.

All your actions chain together surprisingly well. You can rocket boost right into cover. You can then easily walk away from cover without having to press the cover button again, so you never feel stuck when you’re trying to move around. And cover isn’t just chest-high walls. Some cover is so low that you’re practically laying down behind it.

If you don’t mind a guaranteed overheat, you can do a melee attack from a rocket boost as well. This will often cause you to backflip off the enemy, allowing you to go into bullet time in the air to finish them off if they’re still alive. Speaking of melee attacks, what Sam does actually changes depending on which weapon you have equipped. There’s only one melee button, but your equipped gun will determine whether it lets you perform a barrage of fast punches, a kick, or another close combat maneuver.

The cool ideas don’t stop there. If you pick up a weapon you already have full ammo with, that weapon will level up. These levels stay with you throughout the campaign, so it pays to look for guns lying around. Besides in boxes, you can also get weapons from reviving fallen soldiers on the battlefield. You’ll have to be quick, though. Leave a fallen soldier alone too long and he’ll die.

Then there’s Sam’s transforming gun. At first, I thought the gun’s ability to transform into the various weapons you collect was purely aesthetic. However, this allows you to switch weapons with no delay. Almost used up the clip in your assault rifle? No problem! Switch to the heavy machine gun with no break in your fire, then reload both when you’re done and have a free moment. This lets you take an even bigger advantage of an enemy’s most vulnerable situations.

Sam isn’t the only one who’s agile. Often times, enemy robots will leap great distances (sometimes aided by a jet pack) over cover. Some of these robots ARE cover, but transform into laser shooting spiders. In fact, a lot of different enemies transform. Some turn from mini helicopters into bipedal robots. Others roll around like invulnerable bouncy balls before unfolding into death machines. And these are just examples of some of the small enemies.

There are a ton of large enemies that I figured were one-time boss fights. To my surprise, some of these turned into normal encounters. One such enemy can be described as some sort of panther/scorpion hybrid that (surprise!) transforms into a giant bipedal bot with a lance made out of what use to be its tail. Oh, also it can shoot flying turrets at you! The first time I encountered one was intense, but later I encountered two at once, which was (for me) one of the most difficult portions of the game. Later I made my way through an empty looking hallway only to have one jump at me from behind cover.

Remember that giant spider boss from the beginning of the game? Well, sometimes he’ll just come crashing in through a wall to say hello while you’re dealing with swarms of other enemies. With a few exceptions, the characters often viewed as “bosses” are seamlessly worked into levels instead of making a huge deal out of their arrival.

Taking place on a space station creates the opportunity for some interesting set pieces. Everything has an appropriately futuristic look to it. One section had me traveling through a cylindrical area where I could walk up the side of the walls/floor, unhindered by gravity. Another section had me running to stay alive across a crumbling highway. I thought at one point I had found the cliche “two trains shooting at each other” section, until one of the trains started riding on the ceiling track, upside down above me.

Whether it’s any combination of the stages, the enemies, or the incredible speed of the gameplay itself, Vanquish is a constant adrenaline rush. Sure, the story is forgettable and all the voice work is downright silly, but none of that will matter when you’re being shot at from every direction and a giant mech is dashing toward you with drill arms.

It’s a bit on the short side (I finished the campaign in six hours), but would you honestly rather have the campaign diluted just to make it longer? Vanquish makes sure you’re constantly having fun during the entire campaign. Even when you’re dying repeatedly like I did, you’ll be happy to retry knowing that the scenario will never play out the same way twice. It’s a campaign you’ll want to play again and again, especially after unlocking God Hard mode.

You’ll also get more time out of the experience by tackling the Challenge Stages. These stages re-purpose a few set pieces from the campaign to make challenges where you must destroy several waves of enemies in order to get the best clear time and shame your friends’. That is, if you can even survive. The waves get exponentially more difficult and they’re no walk in the park to start with. But any excuse to play more with Vanquish‘s fantastic combat is welcome.

If you’re a fan of shooters or action games, you’re going to want to play Vanquish. Games this satisfying don’t come around that often. The pace is relentless, never letting you feel safe. You’ll definitely want to take breaks to catch your breath, but you’ll be happy to know that no matter where you are in the game when you return, you’ll be coming back to “the good part”.

This review is based on a copy of the Playstation 3 version of Vanquish provided to us by SEGA.

Last May, I finally got around to finishing the original Mass Effect. This was mostly so I could do a write-up on the game for WingDamage.

Boy, am I ever glad I did. As I mentioned in that review, I was very interested to see how things were going to shake out in the sequel. Bioware had mentioned that you would be able to transfer your save file from the original game into Mass Effect 2. What I thought that meant was that your character would look the same and maybe a few key decisions would carry over. The reality blew my mind.

In Mass Effect 2, you once again take on the roll of Commander (Insert Name Here) Shepard. Only this time, he/she is not just some random space adventurer trying to save the galaxy. This time, if you brought over your character from the original, it is your Shepard.

"Coletrain Shepard"

I don’t want to get too much into the story, as fans of these types of science fiction are the kind that will burn you at the stake for giving away spoilers. I will say that even minor story events from the first game will be referenced in either small ways or with major consequences in this one; much more so than I was expecting. It will also lead directly into the third game. They even handled your character being returned to level one in an interesting way.

It seems that every gripe I heard about the first game was resolved. The Mako, your ground vehicle with spotty controls, is gone. You now take a shuttle directly to your destination. The massive piles of gear with a disorganized inventory system has been removed. You now find a few upgradable weapons. The upgrades work across all the guns in a category for all characters. Special bullet types are now powers that you gain through leveling up.

Another huge improvement over the original is the combat. Rather than having your accuracy based on a dice roll, your third-person shooting skills will be put to the test. Leveling your character will add powers and increase your health. This aspect of the RPG elements have been minimized quite a bit. Each character only has a few categories to spend your points on, rather than the original’s ten-ish.

Some have argued that the changes have made Mass Effect 2 less of an RPG than it’s predecessor. I say this is just a different kind of role playing. Rather than being stat driven, it is story driven. You play the roll of a space marine that can save the galaxy by doing whatever it takes, or by taking the moral high ground. All roads may lead to the same place, but each of them tells an interesting story.

What makes Mass Effect 2 really shine are the characters. Like any modern media, critics will nitpick what aspects of the character and story are “borrowed” from other sources. It all comes down to using those elements in fun and interesting ways, which Bioware has done exceptionally well. Even characters that I hated at the beginning of the game became vital members of the crew by the end. The addition of each party member’s personal quest helped a lot with this. It really allowed them to flesh out each of the characters. Near the end, when you have to make the difficult choices and characters can permanently die, you will find yourself thinking hard about each decision.

I normally don’t spend a lot of time going on about graphics, but in this case it should be mentioned how much better Mass Effect 2 looks than the original. The texture popping, which was horrible in the first game, is almost completely gone. Everything from the textures to the lighting effects have been revamped in amazing ways. This is one of the prettiest games I have ever played.

If you haven’t played the first Mass Effect, you will probably be a little lost in the sequel’s story. I recommend tracking down a copy and playing through it first if you want the full experience. If you really hated the first one and just want to skip to the much improved sequel, I suggest tracking down the key scenes in the first game on YouTube. Either way, play this game.

Are you too embarrassed to go to the counter of your game retailer of choice and ask for a game called Wet while dozens of onlookers show faces of disgust and parents cover their children’s ears?

Fortunately, WingDamage has your creepy back covered! Enter our contest and you could have a free copy sent right to your door step! To enter a chance to win a fun, but dumb action game, simply follow the rules below and tell us your favorite equally fun, equally dumb action movie.

Contest Rules:

1. Leave a comment below and tell us what your favorite dumb action movie is
2. Limit one entry per person
3. All entries must be made by legal U.S. residents
4. Entries must be accepted by 5:00pm PST on Friday, December 11th. We will then randomly select one winner

Good luck! And don’t forget to check out our review!

The airport scene in Modern Warfare 2 is the single most upsetting moment I have ever experienced while playing a videogame. Infinity Ward realized that the level might be too much for some people, so before the game starts a message pops up asking you if you want to experience this controversial level or skip it with no penalty. If you don’t want the level spoiled for you I suggest skipping this article with no penalty, until you have played it for yourself.

You are an undercover CIA operative working to infiltrate a very bad organization. The level starts with you and a group of heavily armed men strolling into an airport. Very quickly the men begin firing into the crowd.

My jaw dropped, as I realized what was happening. As they started to mow down innocent people, my first reaction was to turn and shoot the bad guys, but the game restarted the level telling me not to shoot them because it would blow my cover. I was forced to walk along with them as they murdered countless people. Some of them begged for their lives, others that had been wounded tried to crawl away, only to be gunned down.

I am no gamer saint. I have gleefully mowed down civilians in GTA and giggled as blood spewed out of the heads of pedestrians. I don’t usually think twice about killing little digital representations of people, but this was different. This didn’t feel like anything I have ever experienced in a game.

I didn’t feel bad. I felt wretched.

It was like a punch to the gut as it dawned on me that I couldn’t stop this. The level doesn’t feel like it was included for shock value or to create controversy. It felt like the developers wanted the player to feel powerless as they witness this atrocity.

I will leave it for another time to debate the question of whether or not a video game can be art. But I will say that there are very few works, in any medium, that have had the sort of impact that the Airport had on me. I was outraged, shocked, pissed off, and powerless all in the same moment.

Maybe it was a question of timing. The nation is still reeling from the tragedy at Fort Hood, and a level where you kill innocent people as they scramble to run and crawl away feels a little too real. I can understand why they included the option to skip the level entirely. I can imagine that for some people, the level might be more than they can handle.

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves is one of the big Playstation exclusives this holiday season and as such has received all kinds of hype. Even my mom, who doesn’t follow games at all has seen enough commercials to ask me about it. Sony and developer Naughty Dog have high hopes for Uncharted 2. The game even made WingDamage.com’s distinguish list of anticipated games.

Let’s get the gushing out of the way. Uncharted is a roller coaster thrill ride. It feels like an awesome Hollywood blockbuster movie. The game moves from awesome set piece to awesome set piece, pausing just long enough to get you to laugh before throwing another huge action sequence at you.

If you consider yourself a gamer you need to see and experience the train level. Drake makes his way over, through and around a speeding train while an attack chopper tries to murder him. This is just one of several moments throughout Uncharted 2 that distinguish it from other games.

One of the main reasons the game works so well is the protagonist Nathan Drake. He is genuinely likable and funny without feeling like Naughty Dog was trying too hard. Even when he is acting a little shady you find yourself pulling for him. The other characters also work well and add little touches of humor to the proceedings. The story takes you from Turkey to Tibet to mythical locales, and each one is gorgeously rendered.

The game is beautiful, and I don’t just mean in a ‘wow that game has a really high poly count or super nifty textures’ sort of way. Uncharted 2 is beautiful in the way a sunset is beautiful. The game takes you to all sorts of exotic locales and the views are simply stunning. This is one of, if not the best looking game I have ever seen. What really sets the game apart is the animation. Drake braces himself against walls, he slips, he stumbles, he moves more realistically than just about any other game character out there. There are a few moments when you’ll see the game take a little skip to make sure you grab the ledge but these are more for gameplay purposes.

Uncharted 2 can best be summed up as Tomb Raider meets Gears of War meets Metal Gear Solid meets Steven Spielberg circa 1981 (the year Raiders came out). I know that’s a lot of meets, but it really does blend together all these disparate styles. You want to sneak around and take out guards silently? The game lets you do that. You want to go all guns a-blazing? The game let’s you do that too. Unlike a lot of games that try to cram different style of gameplay together, Uncharted 2 executes each style to perfection.

Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune seemed to be broken up into platforming parts, then shooting parts, then some more platforming. Uncharted 2 does a better job of integrating the two segments together. At one point I was hanging off the side of a billboard trying to shoot hordes of machine gun toting bad guys.

My only complaint is that sometimes it is tough to figure out what Drake can grab onto versus what is background textures. I plummeted to my death a couple of times because what looked to me like a handhold was actually just a path to doom. It is frustrating when you are in the platforming zone, then suddenly plummet to your death because the game decides that you can’t hold those particular bricks.

The biggest surprise was the multiplayer. Matches were fast and fun. They play out like a faster paced Gears of War match with players lobbing grenades, taking cover and rolling around trying to shoot. The biggest difference is in the games verticality. Characters can jump up on ledges and shimmy to new locations which changes up strategies when you have to think in three dimensions. My favorite match type was Survival, where your team tries to survive wave after wave of steadily tougher enemies.

There is some talk circulating out amongst the interwebs that the Uncharted franchise is going to be made into a Hollywood blockbuster. I seriously doubt that any movie could really capture the intensity and fun of this game. When you play this game you will understand. This is my number one contender for game of the year right now. This is more than just a game, this is an experience. If you own a PS3 you need to play this game.

We all have those games that we miss the first time around. With the busy release schedule of modern gaming, no one has time to play everything. That is why we at WingDamage present to you “Fashionably Late Reviews“. This is our series on games from the current generation of consoles that we may have missed on their initial release, but have gone back to experience now.

Ratchet and Clank is a series that is known for it’s charming characters, odd-ball sense of humor, and over the top weapons. While I was aware of all this going in, I had never experienced it for myself. I think I had always confused them for those other two similarly named mascots, Jak and Daxter (a decent series in it’s own right).

On Dave‘s recommendation, I decided to finally give the series a chance. When I recently finished Uncharted, I realized Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction was the other PS3 exclusive that I was near the end of, but had not yet finished.

The fact that I was able to pick up right back where I had left off several months ago says a lot about how easy this game is to pick up and play. Right out of the gate, you get a good feeling of who these characters are and how visually interesting their world is. I’ve heard the game described as a Pixar film you play and I can’t say that description is far off.

When it comes to storytelling and humor in games, I am a stickler. Most of the time, games that attempt humor fall flat. Not only is the writing in Tools quick witted and genuinely funny in the old Warner Brothers cartoon sort of way, but the voice acting is top notch. To have humor in your dialog work, it’s all about the timing. This is one of the few games to pull that off.

It is also graphically stunning; part two of the Pixar comparison people like to make. Insomniac really used the cartoony style of the series to highlight just how vibrant and imaginative you can be with your games on Sony’s hardware.

Tools of Destruction is a platformer/shooter hybrid which has you exploring strange alien worlds. You, as Ratchet, are trying to discover clues as to what befell his race, the Lombaxes. This is another area where the performances shined through, making the strange alien creatures of the Ratchet and Clank universe come to life in a believable way.

While the platforming is competent, the fall speed on the normal jumps seemed a little faster than I was anticipating. It took a little time for me to get used to, but the jumps were made easy enough that it wasn’t a source of frustration. The game’s main focus is on combat and the platforming works well enough that you can focus on the enemies in front of you. There are no pixel perfect jump requirements here.

Throughout the course of your adventure, you collect an arsenal composed of a wide variety of strange weapons and gadgets that help you defeat your enemies. These range from a simple energy pistol to the much more elaborate nano-swarm (a swarm of nano-robots that attack enemies within a certain radius).

You can purchase upgrades for all your weapons giving them more ammo, higher amounts of damage against enemies, and even increase the radius of attack. They also level up through use, which encourages you to not stick with only one or two of the ridiculously large assortment of firearms. This really made me think differently about which weapons I was using in each situation. I normally play pretty conservatively with my ammo in shooters, but Tools does a great job of rewarding you for breaking out of that shell.

There are also a lot of gadgets that are fun to play around with like the Disco Ball, which makes all the enemies dance (even bosses), and Mr. Zurkon, an ornery robot companion that fights alongside you for a limited time.

There are also a few segments where you use the SIXAXIS to control Ratchet as he freefalls, or Clank as he glides. These worked pretty well and are less offensive that most games’ use of the PS3 motion control scheme. Other gameplay elements include controlling a rocket bike called the “Gyro-cycle” and a space combat rail shooter.

As the story unfolds, you also take control of Clank in special sections of the game designed just for him. Here he is assisted by the Zoni, a mysterious alien race that seems to know a little too much about Clank. These sections focus on the game’s platforming elements and also involve solving puzzles. While I do prefer the regular gameplay, these alternative sections were not completely horrible like they are in many 3D platformers that feel the need to “mix it up”.

The main storyline has you play a few rounds in the Arena, but there are many optional challenges in that section of the game. Completion of the main game also unlocks a special challenge mode. This is a “new game plus” situation where you get to keep all your upgrades and play through again against harder foes. On the second play-through, there is an added combo system so you can earn more bolts (the games currency) and finish maxing out your weapons.

Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction is an easy recommendation for any PS3 owner. It is fast paced, funny, and all ages can enjoy the goofy characters and stunning animation.

We all have those games that we miss the first time around. With the busy release schedule of modern gaming, no one has time to play everything. That is why we at WingDamage present to you “Fashionably Late Reviews“. This is our series on games from the current generation of consoles that we may have missed on their initial release, but have gone back to experience now.

Back in August, I wrote a piece on Piles of Shame, and had our readers vote on which game I should play through to completion and review. “Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune” won with 48% of the votes. There is much love for this game and, while it isn’t perfect, it is easy to see why.

Everything about Drake’s Fortune is designed to give the feeling of a big summer blockbuster movie. The plot revolves around ancient lost treasure, the odds are stacked overwhelmingly against you, it is full of exotic locations, and there are lots of explosions. Oh, and don’t forget the sassy female sidekick.

The game is broken up into two very distinct sections. By that I mean there are the exploration sections and the gunplay sections. While the exploration and gunplay flow seamlessly into one another, they do feel like two very distinct chunks that the game flips back and forth between.

The exploration sections were my personal favorite. While a little more linear than I would have liked, they give you a chance to stop and appreciate how gorgeous this game is. If you need a graphical showcase for the PS3, look no further.

Drake is guided by where the next safe hand-hold is, which is fairly obvious most of the time. Occasionally, these sections would have camera problems when they were in tight quarters, but the ones that took place outdoors made good use of dramatic angles to further the summer blockbuster look and feel.

This is the part of the game that adds the “Tomb Raider” part of the equation when people describe this game as “Tomb Raider” meets “Gears of War”. It does feel very reminiscent of Lara Croft’s adventures, but with tighter controls and way less tigers and dinosaurs.

Gunplay is something that many third-person action games fail at. It can be the aiming, a broken cover system, or a host of other problems that can ruin the game. Uncharted’s firefights were a mixed bag for me. While the cover system was fun and forced your to use the terrain to your advantage, I would occasionally have trouble getting Drake to hide where I wanted him to.

My biggest gripe with Drake’s Fortune is that enemies take too many shots to kill. Maybe it just expected a level of precision not easily achieved on a PS3 controller, but sometimes enemies would take three head-shots to take out. I also should not have to unload half a clip from an automatic rifle into a regular human’s torso to kill him. It’s a small complaint, but it did make a few sections drag on more than I would have liked.

"FAL-CONE PUNCH!"

There is also some basic melee combat. If you run up behind a guy, you can take him out in one very well animated move. You can also just run up and start punching guys in the face. There is a combo system, but it didn’t seem very responsive. I generally ended up just button mashing my way through these confrontations.

One of the design goals with Uncharted was to make Drake feel like a regular guy. While most regular guys I know could not scale walls, heal in a few seconds, or shoot a gun nearly as well as Drake, they did do a good job of making him feel vulnerable and mostly ordinary. You can’t jump ten feet into the air like Mario or run at super-sonic speeds like a certain blue hedgehog. When Drake pulls himself up to a higher ledge, you hear him straining. When you barely make a jump, he reacts. When you fall from too far, he clearly sounds like he is hurting (or dies instantly).

By all accounts, “Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune” is a great game. This is why the flaws that are there stand out as much as they do. There were a few parts I found very frustrating, but they weren’t enough to kill my overall enjoyment. While the last few sections lost some of the magic set up by the first 3/4 of the game, I still recommend this to anyone looking for a great action title for the Playstation 3.

“Wet” is the story of Rubi Malone a dual pistol and sword carrying, leather clad sexy bad ass gun-for-hire, who is trying to retrieve a wealthy man’s son. In typical action movie cliche style, she gets caught up in a double cross and is out for revenge.

Bethesda would love it if Rubi could join the ranks of Dante, Kratos, and Lara Croft as an action game icon. Read on to see if her game has what it takes to raise her up to the level of these gaming icons.

From the first moment of firing up Wet it is obvious that the developers are going for a cool retro 70′s style. The game looks like it was inspired by Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino’s recent Grindhouse double feature. There are little old time commercials that break up the action.The game even has little scratches, cigarette burns, and a filter to make it look like an old grindhouse action movie.  I found the filter annoying, it made the screen flicker so much that it gave me a headache. I was very grateful there is an option to turn the effect off.

The best part of the game was the 70′s style music. I am not a music expert by any means but to me it feels like a blend of funk, surf, Spanish guitar, and retro rock. Very cool. It fits every scene perfectly and instantly gets you pumped up and ready for some acrobatic face shooting. Brian Lebarton composed the music and he has done such a phenomenal job I want him to compose the soundtrack to my life. Even mundane activities like getting the mail and grocery shopping would become a spectacle.

As for the gameplay it seems like a mash up of Total Overdose (which no one played so don’t worry if you don’t remember it), Max Payne, Tony Hawk, and Robert Rodriguez’s Desperado which is then shoved into John Woo’s blender. You are constantly diving, sliding, or running on a wall, all while trying to shoot people in slow motion. You score style points for each kill and if you manage to string enough kills together you can get up to a 5x multiplier. These style points are then used to upgrade your moves, health, and abilities.

Some of the moves you unlock are pretty sweet. One of my favorites has you using the enemy as a springboard for a slow motion dive. You basically treat the guy like a launchpad and then shoot him in the face, which is probably not the most dignified way to die. This reliance on slo-mo action might wear thin for some over time, but you there were just enough new moves that I stayed interested.

I can just imagine the development team queuing up every Hong Kong action flick and 70′s action movie on Netflix then sitting down for a 40 hour Red Bull fueled movie marathon. It is clear they are trying for ludicrously over the top action. This is probably best exemplified by the car chase level where Rubi leaps from car to car as explosions car crashes surround her. It is like Bad Boys 2 on overdrive, so far over the top and ridiculous you can’t help but smile as she leaps in slo-mo from car to car barely dodging rolling semi trucks.

To break up the action further, at occasional points in the game Rubi will shoot a guy and end up covered in blood. This causes her to go into an over the top Rage Mode, which makes everything literally go red. Rubi then proceeds to kick even more ass than usual.

My main issue with all this over the top action comes down to the fact the bullets don’t have nearly enough impact. I emptied entire clips into people and they just staggered a bit and then tried to whack me in the head. I constantly felt like my bullets were not doing any damage. Whenever I play a shooter I like to shoot things like televisions or computer monitors to see if they explode.

The televisions in the game don’t explode, shatter, or crack. It is a small thing but speaks to a larger issue with the game, namely that you aren’t really able to effect the environment. For all the bullets that fly, they don’t seem to do much. With the thousands of bullets that are flying around their should be smoke and debris flying all over the place. It is not the end of the world but it does remove you, that little bit, from being fully immersed in the game.

For all the emphasis on gun-play I actually found the samurai sword to be surprisingly useful. You quickly unlock a slide to a uppercut slice that just decimates guys. The sword attacks are simplistic but very, very satisfying. I would often put my guns away and rely on the slide-to-slash move.

In the end the game feels like the kid who is trying a little too hard to fit in and hang with the popular kids. You know the kid who listened to all the popular bands, liked all the popular shows, and shopped at the popular stores but was never really anywhere close to being as cool as he thought he was.

Wet is just not as cool as it thinks it is. The combat, for all the crazy acrobatics, is just not as satisfying as it should be. I hope that the game sells well enough for a sequel, where they can give your bullets a little more heft and impact. I also hope they expand on the very satisfying sword combat. The combination is there for an amazing series but there needs to be a couple of relatively simple tweaks before I can give it my full recommendation. As it is, the best I can recommend is to tell you to give it a rental, to at least check out the amazing soundtrack.

This review is based on the Playstation 3 version of Wet provided to us by Bethesda.