Intro:
You know those times where you see a game and it looks
pretty cool, yet your lack of interest for it keeps you
from trying it out to test the “coolness” factor? Well I
have those times a lot, and the most recent game to be
given this treatment was the Smuggler’s Run
series by Rockstar on the PS2. I was in the exact same
position, both Smuggler’s Run and Smuggler’s
Run: Hostile Territory looked really cool, however I
had little to know interest in them to try them out. So
of course I went on checking out other games, and
totally skipping over these two “diamonds in the
rough”. Until one day I was browsing the racks
of Blockbuster and ran across a couple of new games on
the Gamecube rack, which has REALLY been lacking lately,
named NFL Blitz 20-03 and Smuggler’s Run:
Warzones. What?! Yet again, the constant barrage of
PS2 ports on the GC has surprised me and so I took the
opportunity and grabbed me a copy to see how good it was
for myself. I mean it’s under Rockstar’s golden name,
Grand Theft Auto III’s developer also, so it can’t
be that bad can it?
Gameplay:
Does anybody here like to play cops and robbers? Whoa
wait...let me rephrase that sentence, is there anyone
who DIDN’T play cop sand robbers when they were
little(or still do)? I know I did, in my not so distant
childhood I played cops and robbers with my cousin all
the time, “Bang! Bang!” sound effects and all. I don’t
know about you, but I loved being the bad guy. Nowadays
in video games, there aren’t too many games anymore
where you play as the bad/evil guy. I’m not saying there
aren’t any because I can name a few( Grand Theft Auto
III, Blood Omen series), but there aren’t
that many.
In Counter-strike I use to play as the
terrorists, however it wasn’t until 9/11/01 when I
stopped playing “the bad guys.” However it’s just a
game, so therefore Smuggler’s Run: Warzones is a
really fun “bad guy” game. What you’re ordered to do is
smuggle goods into Russia, and eventually you’ll be in
Vietnam and then another location later on in the game.
There are like 5 or 6 different game modes, however all
but one are for multi-player, and the first game mode on
the list is for the single player. I’ve never played any
of the games, so I don’t know whether the missions on
here are combined from the first two games or what, but
I do know that there are 36 missions and three tutorials
with some fun and some not so fun missions. After
choosing the mission, you’ll come to a vehicle select
screen that will only have one vehicle when you first
start the game. But when you start beating more
missions, other vehicles will be unlocked, each with
their own attributes like handling, weight, speed, etc.
You’ve got a buggy, truck, jeep, ATV, grenadier, and a
couple other vehicles, and each mission has a vehicle
that is best suited to complete the mission. For
example, the ATV is small and fast, but it’s handling
and overturn rates are a lot higher than say...the
grenadier which is nice and fast, but also has excellent
handling and a heavier weight that’ll keep it on the
ground more than an ATV will be. When you get a “Great”
ranking on each mission, you’ll eventually unlock a
hover sled, however it’s not that much better than any
of the other vehicles in my opinion, the sports car is
my favorite as it’s got the best speed out of all of
them.
Now I begin the only big problem I had with this game,
and that’s the terrain. I know that the hills and rugged
areas are ideal for what this game’s setting should be
that pertains to the story, but you’re doing way too
much more flying in the air than you do drive( maybe
they should have changed the name to Smuggler’s
Flight: Flyzones). The landscapes are bumpy and
there are rarely any flat spots more than an inch apart,
and even if you go over a tiny little “bump”, the
lighter the vehicle, the more air they’re going to get,
even off a small little hill or area. Anyhow, most of
the missions have one common point, and that’s that
you’ll collect packages and deliver them to a different
area, and the remaining missions are ones where you get
to chase and blow people up. Most of the missions you’ll
be working on your own, collecting packaged that are
located by yellow smoke, and then dropping it off at a
drop zone that’s located by red smoke, all while dodging
the local authorities(or the army). Knowing where to go
next isn’t really a big deal, as you’ve got a fairly
detailed map in the bottom right corner of the screen,
and you’ve also got an arrow at the top of the screen
that will point in the direction you need to go.
Speaking of the authorities, they are the most annoying
AI enemies in any game I’ve EVER played, as if you screw
up JUST once, they’ll swarm you and since the
acceleration sucks on ALL the vehicles, no matter what
their stats say, you can’t get out. There is a damage
meter around the map that calculates how much damage you
take as you drive, and trust me, EVERY little bump gives
you a little bit of damage, and if you’re not damaged
TOO bad, when the meter runs out, you can keep pressing
the “A” button to restart the engine and get goin’ from
the position you’re at now with half your damage filled.
But then again, that ties in with the swarming AI that
will pounce on you like a lion on a gazelle and if your
engine isn’t running you’ll be arrested and have to
start the mission over again.
Some of the missions have to parts to them, and when you
get arrested near the end of the second part of that
mission, you still have to start at the VERY
beginning...and although none of the missions are very
long in the first place, this can get VERY tedious.
Like, there’s a couple missions where you have to
pick-up a bomb and deliver it to a drop point...without
blowing up. The last mission that you do this, I re-did
about 60, maybe 70 times until I finally reached the
drop zone and completed the mission. I do believe that
the AI vehicles in Smuggler’s Run: Warzones are
the best vehicle AI I’ve seen in any game, even
Twisted Metal Black, although it’s not that the AI
are smart....they just seem that way because they’re so
annoying. So anyway, those are the missions where you’re
on you’re own, now for those team missions. The team
missions have you collecting packages(like in the solo),
and taking them back to a specific drop off point, and
you have to reach a certain amount of packages first in
order to win. But you and your comrades aren’t the only
ones on this mission now, oh no...now you’ve got another
team that’s trying to do the same thing you are, AND the
stupid police are on your tail also. In order to win,
you need to watch your radar very carefully, because
there’s usually at LEAST one of the other team members
that wait behind your drop point and will zoom out and
steal your package by hitting you right before you reach
the drop point. So therefore, you’ve got to turn around
and try to steal it back by hitting them. For all the
missions, you’ve got a certain amount of time in order
to complete the mission, so you won’t be able to screw
around much in this game, or else you’ll have to start
over from the beginning.
Although very loose and slippery, this game is just so
addicting because as I drive over the hills, bumps,
mountains, etc., or any surface at all in the game, it
feels like I’m controlling a vehicle on ice, and it’s
just fun to slide around and stuff like that. My
favorite part of the game would have to be the sort of
hand brake that’s used by pressing the “R” button, which
is actually used to keep you right side up and lower to
the ground when you hold it after or before going off a
mountain or hill, however I used it for pulling off some
wicked 360*’s. It’s really fun, and I’ve probably wasted
two or more hours of my life just driving around and
doing doughnuts everywhere.
Eventually after you complete missions under certain
times, or if you get a high ranking on different
missions, you’ll unlock one of the vehicles
“countermeasures”...or in my language means weapons.
There are two counter-measures for each vehicle,
although I think the second counter-measure is opened
after getting certain rankings on certain missions or
completing one within a certain amount of time. The
counter-measures are pretty useful, however there are no
projectile weapons to use, and they’re all used out the
back end of your vehicle, such as oil, fog, bombs, etc.
My favorite vehicles to use were the ones with the
bombs, and the ones with the fog...because as I said the
AI SWARM behind you in a big pack of lions who are
bloodthirsty, so one well timed bomb rolling out from
behind your vehicle into the pack of savages, and you’ve
got a big explosion with the police vehicles flying
everywhere. It’s not necessarily a beautiful thing to
watch, but it makes you feel good inside, or at least it
did me, just knowing that the idiots behind me ran right
into the bomb and are now lookin’ down on me and
scowling. As for the fog, that’s perfect for big groups,
because they’ll get totally lost, and that’ll give you a
few more seconds ahead of the police, and it also comes
in handy when you get surrounded and they keep running
into you so you can’t get out anywhere, so you just blow
some fog and watch as a path is opened right up for your
exit. Apart from those handy features, this game would
have been a lot more fun if there were actual weapons
like missiles, machine guns, and other power-ups that
can sort of be a reminiscence of Twisted Metal: Black.
Graphics:
Although nothing extraordinary, the graphics aren’t
really that bad, considering it’s a year and two year
old game that’s been updated for this Gamecube version.
I’m not sure what the Smuggler’s Runs on the PS2
ran like, but Warzones doesn’t have much of a
frame rate drop, unless the police swarm you and/or
there are a whole bunch of explosions. The environments
aren’t really that big, and are basically using the same
models over and over again to create one big map, and
everything looks the same because it looks like they
made one grid of the environment, used copy and paste to
make a pretty big environment, and added little details
like roads, buildings, towns, etc.
The vehicle models aren’t ANYTHING to write home about,
as they’re just plain and bland, and the only part about
the vehicles that stand out are the fact that you can
distinguish each vehicle from each other. The game also
isn’t that colorful, it just has a lot of uses with
reds, blacks, browns, dark greens, that give you the
desert like feel of Vietnam and the other locations
you’ll visit. Also the FMVs of real-like footage was
real grainy, and I wasn’t sure if this was because of
the Gamecube’s compression techniques in order to fit
the game in, or if it’s like that just because they
couldn’t really get good quality into it, but either way
the picture was real bad and fuzzy. You know what, I
just had an idea, that maybe the developers MEANT to do
this, hmm...
Sound:
I was really disappointed in this area, although since
there wasn’t anything very extraordinary when it came to
the graphics, I didn’t expect for the sound to be any
better. However it was worse than I thought, as there
were a few sound effects here and there, and the
occasional rock beat that could get your foot tapping or
something, but otherwise the sound effects are pretty
much the only thing left, although they sucked also. The
vehicle sound effects are what I’m talking about, and
they are just awful as they don’t sound like vehicles,
but like the little Malibu Barbie cars that has an
engine from a go-kart or something. The voice acting
that was done actually fit in pretty well with the
setting that this game takes place in and the whole
story, however it still wasn’t anything you’d want to
praise.
Rock’s Thoughts:
Aside from the disappointing sound and graphics, the
gameplay is just too addicting to not recommend, and
although not worth a full 50 dollar purchase, this is a
definite rental as it’ll keep you busy maybe the whole
rental period, and with the last hidden vehicle only
unlocked by receiving a “great” rating on all the
missions, it’ll take you even longer with the game. But
I must admit there are lots of frustrating parts to the
game, such as the missions where you have to deliver the
bombs, and just all of the enemy AI in general as they
swarm you like you’ve just messed with a hornet’s nest.
7.9
