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Dom Robinson reviews
Eidos
- Price: £39.99
- Players: 1-4
Fast, fun and frenetic.That’s the three Fs that make up Timesplitters, one of the first gamesto be released for the PS2 and bordering on one of the most visually impressiveto begin with.
It’s a first-person shooter like Quake, with an Arcade mode that playsas a multiplayer game and a Story mode which makes things last a littlelonger for the pre-Quake III fans like myself who think that amultiplayer-only engagement is rather a cop-out.
The Story mode has you simply trying to get from A to B, or to fulfila mission of sorts, in three different time zones.
Firstly, it’s 1935 in Egypt and you must explore an ancient Tomb, find theCultist’s ankh and return it to the shine. Then, in 1970’s China, don yoursideburns and seize a gang’s files as evidence before getting back to thealley, toting your Uzi along the way. Finally, the first port of call inCyberden in year 2005 is to get the cyborg’s plans and return to the ventilationducts.
I preferred these missions to the straight-forward Arcade deathmatchmodes which have you tagging the bag, capturing the flag… hell, you probablyhave to spin the bottle too. Such adventures are of little interest to mebecause there’s no direction to them.
Just like Time Crisis, the graphics move with great fluidity. If youwant to run, you can run, the game never lets up the pace for a second.The colour is well used to aid the atmosphere, gunfire lights up the darkcorridors and shooting glass looks fantastic.
An epic-a-like soundtrack thunders along with bullets ricocheting in surroundsound. Brilliant, if a well-worn idea.
The vibration can be set to kick in when you’re either hit or are shootingsomeone else or, for the ultimate in thrill-seeking, during both times.
The control method takes a fair bit of getting used to with the analoguejoysticks either strafing left/right and moving backwards and forwards, whilethe other helps you look around and aim. Why I can’t use the D-pad to do someof this is in the hands of the game’s creators, but such is life.
Overall, great graphics and sound, but the control aspect and almost completelack of originality let the game down on the whole, not to mention the easeof dying before you complete a level, so it’s back to the start you go (!)
SOUND EFFECTS AND MUSIC
PLAYABILITY
ORIGINALITY
ENJOYMENT
OVERALL
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.