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Red Steel (Wii)

By Matthew Steele Winters on Sunday, November 19, 2006 at 8:20 PM EST  

Red Steel
The city…Tokyo. An average guy, Joe Everyman, with a not so average girlfriend. An instant recipe for trouble. With sword in hand and gun in holster I start my journey to save the woman I love. Everywhere I go I’m plagued by gun-toting Japanese Yakuza looking like they just came back from a buy one get ten sale at the Men’s Warehouse. Arriving at a high class spa, I storm in, guns blazing. Pressing the tip of my blade against the pale neck of the owner, I demand that she tells me what I want to know. Suddenly, I’m ambushed from behind. As I stare down the barrel of a gun, I hear my enemy utter the last words I may ever hear…“Sayonara sucker!” That one phrase snaps me back to reality. I realize I’m not Japanese, the authentic ramen that I’m eating is only Cup-O-Noodles and I’m not engaged to the daughter of a powerful yet strangely compassionate Yakuza Boss. This and other cheesy dialog will pretty much ruin any atmosphere the game tries to create. But if you can get past lines like “Serious Eurasian hottie”, then you might find something worthwhile in Red Steel.

Before I even bought a Wii, I read a few reviews of Red Steel on the so-called “major” gaming websites, and I was shocked to see numbers so low even EA wouldn’t buy the rights. I’m talking Barbie Adventures bad. Nevertheless, I refused to believe that the game I had been waiting for since the second it was announced could be THAT bad, so I picked up my copy on launch day. Almost two weeks later, I’m glad I did.

Graphically, Red Steel looks like a revamped Goldeneye. The lighting is one of the game’s best visual features and character models look good. Overall though, there is nothing that really stands out. Where you really start to wonder how Ubisoft defines “Next Gen” is during one of the so-called “cutscenes”, a term I use very loosely. The story is told using static comic book screens, complete with classic sounds such as “wham”, “blam”, and everyone’s favorite, “kablam”. I don’t know if they actually thought this was a better way to tell the story or if they just got lazy. Either way, it doesn’t even hold a candle to Max Payne, the game that set the standard for graphic novel story telling, which came out 5 years ago. I hesitate to make any final judgments, since I have yet to receive my Component cables (thanks Nintendo), and therefore I’m forced to experience the game in 480i.

But who cares what the game looks like. If you wanted a game with great graphics, you would have mugged someone for a PS3 like everyone else. Gameplay is why we bought a Wii and lucky for us, it’s not half bad. I say it’s not half bad because unfortunately the other half is bad. When using a gun to mow through Yakuza, dock workers, and various civilians who are packing heat for some unknown reason, you will be pleased to hear that the controls actually work. You use the remote to aim, the nunchuck to move, and when you want to look around, you point the remote at the edge of the screen and your view changes. Holding the A button steadies your view for more precision and highlights enemies. When I first played, I felt like the controls were unresponsive, but after playing for a while, I realized that it was not the game, it was me. The game has a learning curve, albeit not an obvious one. Once you start to get the hang of it though, you can easily pick off bad guys from a distance or navigate the map without walking into random objects. The only issue I’ve had with the controls is when attempting to turn completely around. As soon as you point the remote off-screen, if you’re not careful, you may get trapped in a loop, which not only disorients you but leaves you vulnerable to enemy fire. With practice, this becomes nothing more than a minor annoyance.

Ironically, sword fighting is one of the worst aspects of Red Steel. I wouldn’t even call it sword fighting, since you’re often fighting random thugs wielding bats and crowbars. Basically, you swing your sword by swinging the remote, and the nunchuck can be used to block attacks. While this seems like a great idea in theory, in practice it’s ineffective. It’s almost impossible to pull off any move dependent on timing, since your motions are often ignored or delayed. Bottom line…it’s boring. Also, in my day if you were defeated in a sword battle you did the honorable thing and took your own life. You did NOT offer your opponent respect points. Like many features in Red Steel, the option to spare or take your opponent’s life comes off as gimmicky at best, and annoying at worst.

Fortunately, when you get tired of bad dialog and pointless sword battles, there’s always multiplayer, which is really fun. There are three modes, of which I’ve only been able to try one, since the other two modes require 3-4 players. And no, it’s not because I don’t have 3-4 friends, it’s because I don’t have 3-4 controllers. I had to sell a kidney just to afford one extra controller, let alone three. In deathmatch, you choose a character, a bonus, and other standard options. My biggest problem with the multiplayer is the levels. They’re way too big for 2 players and totally confusing. You spend about 80% of your time looking for the other player and only 20% of your time actually trying to kill him. One question that has plagued mankind for centuries is how many grenades could a nunchuck chuck if a nunchuck could chuck grenades? Well apparently 5 according to Ubisoft. While not a very effective way to kill your opponent, making a throwing motion with the nunchuck to hurl a grenade is tons of fun. You can make an overhand or underhand motion depending on how you want to toss it. Just be sure you wait until your character releases the grenade before you look down at your feet.

What created all the buzz surrounding Red Steel was the gameplay. Not only is it the first shooter to take advantage of the Wii’s unique controller, it allows you to fight with a sword, which ranks number 3 on the list of things nerds wish they could do, flying and sleeping with a woman being numbers 1 and 2, respectively. In my opinion, the reason the game got such low scores is that reviewers had unrealistic expectations. If you thought that Red Steel was going to revolutionize first person shooters, you will obviously be disappointed. Although the new control scheme is interesting and somewhat accurate, you won’t be picking off bad guys like Dirty Harry. The low scores are a result of a growing trend in the industry. Reviewers seem to have forgotten not only the most important aspect of a game, but also the very reason why we play video games. For FUN! Does Red Steel have problems? Yes, plenty of them. The game could have been much better. But even with all of its flaws, the game is still fun, and isn’t that why we bought a Wii in the first place? Now if you’ll excuse me, I have an underworld to infiltrate, an English as a second language class to teach, and a serious Eurasian hottie to save.

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