Gone Gonzo Posts: 1077 Joined: 26 Apr 2008 | A few notes before the meat and potatoes of this review. Since everyone else is reviewing Spore, Mercenaries 2 or whatever else came out this week, I decided to do something different review a game that came out seven years ago and furthermore, one that nobody else has ever heard of, most likely attributed to me owning the only copy in Australia. I also did this because I'm broke. This is the second review that I've contributed to The Escapist, and I'd appreciate any comments or advice you may have.
Airblade, developed by Criterion games for the PS2, is boring. It's a title that's taken a good idea and ended up making an incredibly mediocre game that you'll get more use out of as a prop for a wobbly table.
The game begins with your apartment being raided by security guards from GCP, a multinational corporation that just teems with evil, looking for the Airblade, a sweet looking hoverboard that your roommate took the other day when he resigned from the GCP Science Division. Supposedly the anti-gravity technology powering the Airblade could make fossil fuels obsolete overnight and GCP will stop at nothing to get their hands back on it. Long story short, your friend Oscar gets kidnapped and it's up to you, Ethan Palmer, to save him by committing vandalism en masse and spinning around on poles. The story lugs around a half hearted environmentalist message, GCP clearly being a caricature of real world companies like Shell and Caltex and the Airblade's anti-gravity technology being akin to solar, wind, hydro-electric or any other low emissions power source, but if the main purpose of the game is to promote sustainable energy it isn't doing it very well.
The main mechanic of the story mode has you floating around an area on the Airblade, completing goals by utilising its destructive nature. Typically you'll be tasked with destroying some billboards, then some cameras, then some trucks, then knock some guys out before a more puzzle oriented final goal, like figuring how to grab onto a helicopter using strategically placed powerlines. Gameplay feels arcadey, with an emphasis on using combos and your boost meter to your advantage. You can get through most of the game with a simple jump-trick combo, however there is some limited depth in that you'll get a bit further by stringing together tricks with grinds, spins and boost jumps.
You'll not be drawn in by the game, for a few reasons. For one, the story mode is really short. Once you've got the basics down, a person of reasonable skill could finish it in an hour or two. After that there's a challenge mode but that'll only take an extra hour or so, as it's just story mode with the game telling you what trick to do. For two, the story is boring. Corporations are bad. Now go save your friend who only had half a line in the opening cutscene. That's it. It's odd that it should be so shallow, considering how there's a fairly rich back-story in the game manual, and with extra time it could have been fleshed out a lot. And for three, the characters are two dimensional and annoying. Ethan is typical skater dude all over, complete with spitting out one-liners like "You wanna piece of me?" or "Woohoo!" every time he manages to do a kickflip without splitting his head down the middle. And what motivation do I have to keep going when I haven't even got a proper look at the face of the guy I'm meant to be saving?
Graphics could be best described as "meh". Textures are drab most of the time and the lighting is dull. Level design seems unfinished, as the levels are reasonably big, but there's only need to use about a third of them. If you get bored (and you will) you could search around in hopes of finding something fun. The physics engine ensures that what few props there are knock around realistically, but it is by no means Half-Life 2.
The only part of the game I really like, wasn't the game at all, but the special features. On the disc is a "Making of" feature, where Emily Newton Dunn goes around the Criterion office talking to artists, designers, programmers and producers. It's nice that they threw extra bits onto the disc as standard, because usually you have to buy a special edition for that sort of thing, but I'd say it's the only outstanding feature of the game. There's also some concept art and a music player on the disc, which might peak your interest a little. The game has a nice mix of original, catchy electronic and jazz tunes, making soundtrack the strongest point of the game, but even that doesn't forgive it.
So there you go. Airblade. A bland, slow, empty game, far too flawed to be worth spending money on. Leave it. |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 3644 Joined: 3 Apr 2008 | lol.. I have a demo for this somewhere (gravity sucks disk)
And it was a shit version of Tony Hawk with hoverboards and breaking stuff |
Pulitzer Laureate Posts: 862 Joined: 22 Jun 2008 | Great review for an awful game. |
A few notes before the meat and potatoes of this review. Since everyone else is reviewing Spore, Mercenaries 2 or whatever else came out this week, I decided to do something different review a game that came out seven years ago and furthermore, one that nobody else has ever heard of, most likely attributed to me owning the only copy in Australia. I also did this because I'm broke. This is the second review that I've contributed to The Escapist, and I'd appreciate any comments or advice you may have.
Airblade, developed by Criterion games for the PS2, is boring. It's a title that's taken a good idea and ended up making an incredibly mediocre game that you'll get more use out of as a prop for a wobbly table.
The game begins with your apartment being raided by security guards from GCP, a multinational corporation that just teems with evil, looking for the Airblade, a sweet looking hoverboard that your roommate took the other day when he resigned from the GCP Science Division. Supposedly the anti-gravity technology powering the Airblade could make fossil fuels obsolete overnight and GCP will stop at nothing to get their hands back on it. Long story short, your friend Oscar gets kidnapped and it's up to you, Ethan Palmer, to save him by committing vandalism en masse and spinning around on poles. The story lugs around a half hearted environmentalist message, GCP clearly being a caricature of real world companies like Shell and Caltex and the Airblade's anti-gravity technology being akin to solar, wind, hydro-electric or any other low emissions power source, but if the main purpose of the game is to promote sustainable energy it isn't doing it very well.
The main mechanic of the story mode has you floating around an area on the Airblade, completing goals by utilising its destructive nature. Typically you'll be tasked with destroying some billboards, then some cameras, then some trucks, then knock some guys out before a more puzzle oriented final goal, like figuring how to grab onto a helicopter using strategically placed powerlines. Gameplay feels arcadey, with an emphasis on using combos and your boost meter to your advantage. You can get through most of the game with a simple jump-trick combo, however there is some limited depth in that you'll get a bit further by stringing together tricks with grinds, spins and boost jumps.
Screenshot
You'll not be drawn in by the game, for a few reasons. For one, the story mode is really short. Once you've got the basics down, a person of reasonable skill could finish it in an hour or two. After that there's a challenge mode but that'll only take an extra hour or so, as it's just story mode with the game telling you what trick to do. For two, the story is boring. Corporations are bad. Now go save your friend who only had half a line in the opening cutscene. That's it. It's odd that it should be so shallow, considering how there's a fairly rich back-story in the game manual, and with extra time it could have been fleshed out a lot. And for three, the characters are two dimensional and annoying. Ethan is typical skater dude all over, complete with spitting out one-liners like "You wanna piece of me?" or "Woohoo!" every time he manages to do a kickflip without splitting his head down the middle. And what motivation do I have to keep going when I haven't even got a proper look at the face of the guy I'm meant to be saving?
Graphics could be best described as "meh". Textures are drab most of the time and the lighting is dull. Level design seems unfinished, as the levels are reasonably big, but there's only need to use about a third of them. If you get bored (and you will) you could search around in hopes of finding something fun. The physics engine ensures that what few props there are knock around realistically, but it is by no means Half-Life 2.
The only part of the game I really like, wasn't the game at all, but the special features. On the disc is a "Making of" feature, where Emily Newton Dunn goes around the Criterion office talking to artists, designers, programmers and producers. It's nice that they threw extra bits onto the disc as standard, because usually you have to buy a special edition for that sort of thing, but I'd say it's the only outstanding feature of the game. There's also some concept art and a music player on the disc, which might peak your interest a little. The game has a nice mix of original, catchy electronic and jazz tunes, making soundtrack the strongest point of the game, but even that doesn't forgive it.
Back To The Future
So there you go. Airblade. A bland, slow, empty game, far too flawed to be worth spending money on. Leave it.