MANHUNT 2 (M)
Rating: **1/2
Rockstar
Wii, PlayStation 2
It’s been four years since the original Manhunt hit the PS2 (likely from behind, with a crowbar), and the controversial stealth franchise is still as gritty, well designed and morally reprehensible as ever. Only this time, instead of being a sadistic lowlife forced to compete in another sadistic lowlife’s twisted game, you’re an escaped mental patient searching for his past, removing the entrails of anyone he stumbles upon along the way.
The problem I still have with this series (and it’s entirely personal) is that it gives anti-video game groups the ammo they’ve been looking for. There are many extremely violent games out there that allow you to do horrible things, but they invariably offer you rewards for doing what’s right and consequences for doing what’s wrong. But Manhunt 2 encourages you to be as arbitrarily brutal as possible, tasking you to stalk people, holding the kill button as long as you can, in order to perform the most sadistic execution possible. Mortal Kombat’s “Fatalities” offered you a chance to be extra mean to an already-defeated opponent, but these amusing, over-the-top moves were performed on someone who had had a chance to fight back and probably put your thumbs to the test. In Manhunt 2, you’re just killing an unaware pedestrian, like a cowardly scumbag.
THE SIMPSONS GAME (T)
Rating: ****
Electronic Arts
Wii, Xbox 360
The Simpsons Game is filled with ridiculous power-ups, overly familiar level designs and tedious fetch quests, and it’s all part of the joke. Not content to be a mere tie-in to the TV show and recent movie, this game is actually a self-aware satire of the video game industry and its clichés. The story has
VIVA PINATA: PARTY ANIMALS (E)
Rating: **1/2
Microsoft Game Studios
Xbox 360
Viva Pinata only has one game to its credit so far, and yet the series has already gone the way of the kart racer and mini-game collection. What a copout. The original puzzle game/wildlife simulation probably proved too complex for younger players, drawn to Viva Pinata’s bright colored aesthetic. But even the youngest players will probably find this Mario Kart and Mario Party rip-off tiresome.
TIMESHIFT (M)
Rating: ***
Vivendi Universal
Xbox 360
The gimmick in TimeShift has such incredible potential for greatness that is sadly underutilized. The suit you wear in this first-person shooter allows you to pause, slow down and even reverse time, which means you can pause time long enough to return an incoming grenade, or if you’re too late, you can rewind to a point before you died. Now if only you could rewind to the beginning of TimeShift’s insanely long development cycle and throw in some unique puzzles that make clever use of this idea.
When Las Vegas Weekly contributor Matthew Scott Hunter realized his career as a lab technician was seriously interfering with his gaming, he pink-slipped himself into a successful career as a freelance writer. Bug the hell out of him at [email protected]