What do you get when you cross a little Monty Python, a little Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, a little Serious Sam, and a half-dozen fine English sheep? If you answered “an unholy stew of mutton and paper products”, half points. If, however, your first impulse was to say “the most flat-out hilarious game in years”, bingo, you take home the mystery prize.
Anyone who has played Giants: Citizen Kabuto will be intimately familiar with the ale-swilling British humour of the Meccaryns. That humour is back tenfold, and it’s the major selling point of the game. Crossing the off-kilter sci-fi of the Guide with the absurd Python-esque one-liners, and then topping it off with the fast-paced, guns-blazing action of Serious Sam, Armed and Dangerous was a surprise sleeper in 2003.
In the game, you control Roman, a masked bandit who is the leader of a ragtag band of rebels known as the Lionhearts. By “band”, I mean Roman’s two best friends: a refined, tea-guzzling robot warrior named Q, and Jonesy, an explosives-loving mole-man who hurls sardonic comments in a thick Scottish burr. For story-related reasons, the Lionhearts team up with a blind old man named Rexus, who was once the keeper of the fabled book of Lore.
The story is standard “destined hero” fare, with an evil king, a band of plucky heroes, and a mystical book with the power to save the world. It’s in the execution of this story that the game shines. Between each action-packed (albeit somewhat repetitive) level, there are cut-scenes packed with ingenious sight gags, one-liners, and witty repartee that had me laughing out loud. I think that’s the first time in years a videogame has actually made me laugh, which is a feat in itself. Most of the humour is implied – a kind of Shrek humour in which the jokes contain many layers, each bawdier than the last. Plus, watching Q save Rexus’ life by inserting the old man into the rectum of a rhinoceros, and then watching the panic-stricken rhino bolt, dragging poor Rexy after him, is something no gamer should miss.
So it’s a funny game. The humour carries on into the weapons for players to use. In addition to the standard sniper rifles, machine guns, and (butt-burning vindaloo) rocket launchers, there are a few choice items. For instance, the shark gun fires a baby land shark that, through the wonders of science, is shot into maturity, where it seeks out the nearest available enemy and pounces (prompting cries of “Aargh, he’s got my balls!”). Or the topsy-turvy gun, which turns the entire world topsy-turvy, dropping enemies “upwards”, only to right the planet and causing enemies to drop to their hilarious deaths.
There are essentially four types of objectives in the levels: You’re either rescuing peasants and bringing them home, destroying certain houses (conveniently emblazoned with a bulls eye), or getting to a certain place. Between these levels, there are stages in which you must use a turret to stop an army of grunts from infiltrating a town; they come in waves of increasing size, which leads to a very satisfying body count.
As far as the run-and-gun levels go, they tend to get a little repetitive as the game wears on, but I hardly noticed. This game offers plenty of challenge, and the environments are pretty enough to keep you in a permanent state of “wow”. Each stage is fairly massive, some with an almost Tim Burton feel as you rocket jump your way through villages bisected with large canyons. There is a bit of fog in places, but that’s to be expected in such expansive environments.
Some levels pair you with your buddies Q and Jonesy, and you can give your comrades orders (a la Freedom Fighters) to the extent of defending a certain area, or returning to your side. Their AI is fairly self-sufficient, but I’ve had a couple of instances where they’ll simply fail to notice that they’re being cut down by a nearby enemy.
The character models are fairly detailed, with impressive physics as they tumble through the air thanks to a well-placed mortar round. I was also impressed that the game maintained a consistent framerate, especially considering the number of arrows, bullets, sharks, rockets, and bad guys flying through the air.
The voice acting in the game is awesome, from the banter of the main characters to the anguished cries of vanquished foes, to the jokes told by the bartender in the armoury… er… pub. (“So she looked up at me, her eyes like limpid pools in the moonlight, and said… ‘baaaaaaaa’”). The rest of the weapon noises are pretty standard explosions, *ptang* sounds, and shark… noises.
Even at 21 missions, I felt that the game was over far too quickly. For me, I felt it worth a second play-through, and each mission has a hidden “token” used to unlock higher difficulty levels, and cheat codes, so if you’re feeling really hardcore, you can collect those. And believe me, this game is worth a little extra attention.
Literate, funny storytelling is at a premium in gaming these days, so it’s really good to see developers making a real effort to make their audience laugh – even if they have to rely on semi-frequent potty humour to get the yuks. Planet Moon did a fine job in that respect, and managed to put forth a very playable game to boot, boasting a creative arsenal, some frenetic, fun gameplay, and some memorable characters. Here’s hoping more developers find a vendetta against mutton.
