Red Steel (Nintendo Wii)

Later on there’s a freeze-time mode where you can lock onto several enemies and pin-point locations with your gun, this gimmick adds a touch of ‘cool’ to the game and allows you to perform some pretty slick shots.

The weapons look and feel pretty good, the sword fights are nice but they’re often reduced to a simple exchange of blocks and swings without any true sword-ballet motion behind the battles themselves.

Graphics

On the whole Red Steel is a pleasing game to look at, the level of graphical detail and lighting effects are decent enough and there’s a good consistent/quality feel to the game in this respect. I could go into detail about the various graphical tricks and so on, but I can already sense some of you would end up comatose from that, so I won’t bore you.

Level Design

A fairly decent job at level design, nothing really stands out as amazing though. It’s a good quality of architecture but it seems a little lack lustre and standard in some of the places. There are a few nice set pieces that go above the call of duty and shine however, so it’s not all streets and alleyways.

Models/Animation

They did a good job on this aspect of the game, there’s a fair level of detail on the various bad-guys and the bosses for the sword fights are certainly quite interesting. The animations are decent enough and nothing looks overly stilted. There are a few choppy sword-fight animations that could have been smoother and slicker.

AI/Physics

The AI varies between fairly intelligent (use of cover and tactics) through to downright moronic (charging into the fray without care) at times, it provides a relentless challenge since the game sends in quite a few bad guys for you to blow away.

The physics are decent with some nice explosions and some nice knock-on physics effects, shooting certain objects can cause a satisfying cascade of destruction.

Sound, Music, Voice

It’s got a decent level of sound and the weapons all have a satisfying audio feel to them. The clash of steel is nice and the rattle of gunfire is very decently done. The music compliments the game nicely and has the right mix of oriental and modern themes. The major let down is the voice work which is stilted, flat and decidedly un-inspiring.

It isn’t helped by the lack-lustre drawn cut-scenes either. Each of these factors wouldn’t be too much of a problem on their own, they could be overlooked but when you look at how other developers use the console you realise how short-changed you’ve been in this respect. Hopefully we’ll see better in the future.

Multiplayer

It’s a fun diversion with up to four players battling it out in a traditional deathmatch style gameplay, there’s nothing really special about the multi and it feels a little tacked on. It would have been fun for instance (perhaps hard to implement) to see a cooperative mode where you could progress through the game’s story with a friend.

Overall

It’s a game that hits and misses the mark. It should be applauded for trying something new/innovative on a brand new platform and I don’t think it deserves some of the lower scores it’s been getting. If I were to cite one particular review I’d say the Gametrailer’s review got it spot on for me.

It is a fun game but the initial frustration and problematic controls will put quite a few people off, especially those that want an instant fix and can’t be bothered to play further into the game to find out what happens next.

It might be a bit of a clichéd story and the graphic novel/photo kind of storytelling worked in Max Payne, but here it falls a bit flat and leaves you wondering if the game is going to get better. It does, but you’ll need to play a fair way into it before the story opens up beyond the initial focus.

The multiplayer is enough to keep you amused for a while but nothing beyond that, which is a shame, but those are the breaks as they say.

A good effort but hopefully if there’s a sequel we’ll see something truly special.