[360/PS3] Iron Man 2 Review

[DoctorFinger]

Iron Man 2 Review

Title - Iron Man 2
Platforms - Xbox 360*, Playstation 3, Wii, DS and PSP.
Developers - Sega San Francisco (360, PS3 & DS versions); High Voltage Studios (Wii & PSP versions)
Publisher - Sega
ESRB Rating - T (Teen)
MSRP - $59.99
Editor - Michael "DoctorFinger" Chauvet

What's Hot: Rather than follow the plot of the movie, Sega created a more appropriate yet still iconic Iron Man story.

What's Not: Antiquated graphics. Frustrating armor customization and upgrade system. Escort missions. Wonky camera. Absolutely no replay value.

Publisher Sega took an interesting route with Iron Man 2. Rather than do the predictable movie adaptation which slavishly follows the story of the film, Sega decided to divorce the game from the movie almost completely. The characters, wit and visual design present in both Iron Man flicks remains, but the story itself does it's own thing, free of continuity established by films, comics or animated series. But does that freedom equal a good game? Unfortunately, no.

The last Iron Man game was rightly derided for it's fabulously convoluted controls and mediocre everything else, blamed mostly on it's short (roughly 14 month) development cycle. Sega tried to fix that, giving Iron Man 2 close to 2 full years of development. Sadly, the results are no better than the original.

Crimson Dynamo is just one of the generic armored opponents you fight in the game

The story is basic but solid. Tony Stark's company is attacked, and technology related to the Iron Man system are stolen. Stark and his crew - including Jim Rhodes as War Machine, Pepper Potts as the secretary and Nick Fury as head of SHIELD - spend the rest of the game recovering the stolen tech and destroying the various baddies who have appropriated it. Rather than confine themselves to the characters seen in the film, the developers delve into nearly 50 years of Iron Man history to fill out the roster of enemies. So say hello to the Crimson Dynamo, Advanced Idea Mechanics, and the Titanium Man. All of which are completely vanilla and blend together rather quickly. Don Cheadle and Samuel L Jackson reprise their roles of Jim Rhodes and Nick Fury, respectively, while all other recognizable characters are voiced by others, some well, some not. Even known quantities like Cheadle and Jackson turn in thoroughly flat performances.

But how's the gameplay? Well I'll be generous and say "not good." Style wise, it's a third-person shooter with very linear gameplay. You fly around, destroying enemies with weapons or pummeling them to death. After the missions end you're rewarded with new armors - all based on classic Iron Man looks from the comics - and credits to research upgrades for the armor.

I know it's tough to design a control scheme which works well both on land and in air, and to their credit Sega does a decent job. When you're actually fighting it can be fun. The suit moves relatively smoothly, and you have a decent arsenal at your disposal. You have a few weapons to choose from when you outfit your armor, and each has their place in the game. You'll spend most of your time hovering a bit off the ground, using the sticks to navigate and 2 of the face buttons to control elevation. The triggers operate the weapons - with the D-pad switching between armaments - while the left bumper lets you dash and fly. This works okay, but you constantly find yourself taking your thumbs off the sticks to perform other functions, which makes control imprecise but not too awkward. However pretty much everything other than basic fighting comes off as below average at best.

A chopper attacking the Helicarrier

Take, for instance, missions selection. 3 of the first 4 missions in the game are escort missions. An escort mission, properly done, can be an enjoyably tense experience. But I don't want to have to play one as the tutorial, and I sure as hell don't want to spend the first quarter of the game - and nearly half of the missions overall - staring at the life bar of some building or another. Missions which don't involve keeping other things alive are a little better, but it soon becomes apparent why the developers included so many escort missions. When you boil it down there are only three kinds of enemies in the game. Pest-like drones which can be killed in one shot with Iron Man's "hack" attack (which forces them to fight on your side for a short while before exploding), man-sized drones which require a few hits before you can hack them (and then the hack requires you to pound the 'B' button) and bosses. Cosmetic differences aside, there's no real difference between the enemies you fight on the first level and the last. They all fall into one of those two categories, and all employ the same tactics. Bosses provide a little variety, but some of the bosses are fought 3 or more times during the course of the game, each time under the same circumstances. After a short while you'll find that no number of normal enemies can even pose a threat to you, hence the artificial-feeling escort missions. Bosses can be a bit more difficult, particularly at the end of the game, but I failed missions much more for letting my charges die than by actually succumbing to damage myself.

Another nagging point is the armor upgrade system. A system which seems purposefully designed to be as frustrating and obstructive as possible. Lets say you end a mission and want to buy some upgrades. You go to one poorly navigable menu to buy the upgrade, a second to install it in a weapon, and a third to install said weapon on your armor. And if you get a good upgrade - like for instance the damage upgrade - you have to go to every iteration of every weapon to upgrade it. Which means you not only have to slog through a poorly designed menu, you have to do so repeatedly, after almost every mission. And you can multiply that by each separate suit of armor you want to use. Which makes that fact that none of the upgrades seem to have an appreciable difference on the battlefield even more annoying. If I spend as much time as the average missions installing the newest upgrades on my armor, I want the difference to be noticeable. But whether you're fighting an armature with base armor, or all the badass upgrades it feels exactly the same.

One of the classic Iron Man suits you unlock during the game

Graphically, Iron Man 2 is a mess. Character models, even up close, look horribly low res and muddy. The Iron Man suit should not look like a mylar balloon with a face drawn on with a Sharpie. War Machine should not resemble a worn piece of charcoal. Animations are reused so frequently that by the 3rd mission I was looking for a way to shut them off completely. And don't get me started on the facial animations. Half-Life 2 is nearly 6 years old now, and it ran rings around the faces here. I'm not asking for or expecting the best animations in the business, but these don't even qualify as competent. There's a lot of lens flare and big explosions, but they can't hide the fact that the environments are grossly repetitive. You fight in the lightly forested canyon in the US, then you fight in a lightly forested Russian valley which looks identical. The headquarters of Stark Enterprises are also strangely similar to an abandoned Soviet-era military base in Russia. I understand that reusing art assets is a must in game development, but there's a line between efficient use of resources and not giving a damn.

The soundtrack to the game includes some hardcore metal like Lamb of God and Mastodon. It would however be nice to hear more than 3 seconds of any of those songs. Instead you get generic action game music #7 over 95% of the action. You'll hear just enough of some of these tracks, at seemingly random times, to recognize them before they fade out. Audio effects are similarly generic and uninspired. The game makes no use of surround sound to augment the experience, and as mentioned before the voice acting ranges from bored to bad.

No, it's not ED-209. Unfortunately

In short Iron Man 2 does almost nothing well. Decent controls are overwhelmed by poor design choices, a taxing upgrade system and lackluster presentation. With no multiplayer and no incentives to go through the story again, the replay value is nonexistent.

Score: (2 out of 5 Cogs)


Michael says, "Iron Man 2 aspires to rise above the mediocrity of the normal movie tie-in game, but doesn't even accomplish this. Even with added development time, it's a lackluster, paint-by-numbers game which does nothing new or interesting."

* This review is based on the Xbox 360 version of the game.

[Xerxes]

Let Raven make the next Iron Man game. He was a blast to play with in MUA.

[Shieldmaiden]

Iron Man strikes me as one of those superheroes that could do with a game that completely breaks from the stereotypical action mould. Tony Stark isn't just a guy in power armour who fights bad guys; he's a guy in power armour who runs a hugely successful company, designs and builds all his kit himself, lives a playboy lifestyle, struggles with a drinking problem and fights bad guys, all at the same time.

If I was making an Iron Man game, it'd basically be X-Com with flying, shooty action bits instead of the tactical squad bits.

[MosBen]

Big Jonno, throw in some Sims bits where you run your company, get wasted, and plow models and I'm there.

[The Continental]

Originally Posted by MosBen

Big Jonno, throw in some Sims bits where you run your company, get wasted, and plow models and I'm there.

It's like a one sentence love letter to our hobby.

[Shieldmaiden]

Originally Posted by MosBen

Big Jonno, throw in some Sims bits where you run your company, get wasted, and plow models and I'm there.

We should totally pitch this.

[Hawkzombie]

I love you guys

[menage]

I can't imagine anyone buying this who has even gone close to the original. What a waste.

[Shieldmaiden]

I have a whole list of ideas for superhero comic book games that actually reflect the interesting parts of superhero comic books. When a comic is just filled with action and nothing else, it gets shit on, and rightly so. However, 99% of superhero games are constant combat.

X-Men: The mansion has been destroyed and the mutants scattered. As Cerebro, it's your job to rebuild the base and the team. Can you build a better mansion while dealing with all the drama between the team members as they gradually return? Or do you make Cyclops and Wolverine share a bunk with Jean in the room next door and just wait for the shit to hit the fan?

Superman: How do you deal with a character who is more or less invincible without using some kind of cheesy cop-out? Simple, make his well-being a non-issue. Supes has to foil villainous plots in an open-world Metropolis, operating most of the time as mild-mannered reporter Clark Kent. The quicker you figure out what's going on, the more time you have in the inevitable climactic race to save Lois/Jimmy/Metropolis/Earth. When you eventually do come across a bad guy that can hurt you, instead of just slowing you down a little, you're really going to be fighting for your life.

Spider-Man: Ever played Bully/Canis Canim Edit? Same thing, but with Spidey. Attend class, woo Mary Jane, try and earn enough money to eat AND do the superhero thing. Can you handle the great responsibility that comes with great power, or is Parker going to end up a nervous wreck? What do you do when you wake up in a mysterious black costume that enhances your abilities but makes you more aggressive and violent? (This could be done really well, with the game making bystanders or surrendering enemies seem life-threatening and hostile. Once you've downed them, you see what they really were.)

Batman: Arkham Asylum is definitely the closest a game has got to realising that superhero comics aren't all about punching things. My twist on a Batman game wouldn't involve you playing as Bats at all. Instead, you'd play Robin. You start the game by creating your own teenage Gotham City resident. Through a series of horrific events, you lose your family and end up being recruited by Batman to be his new sidekick. You have to work through your training, both in the Batcave and an Assassin's Creed-esque open world Gotham. Will you be able to follow the teachings of your mentor, or will you be consumed by your lust for revenge?

[Hawkzombie]

"Or do you make Cyclops and Wolverine share a bunk with Jean in the room next door and just wait for the shit to hit the fan?"

it's like you're in our heads

And that idea for a Robin game would be AWESOME. Just make it Tim Drake and you're fucking set.

[Shieldmaiden]

Originally Posted by Hawkzombie

"Or do you make Cyclops and Wolverine share a bunk with Jean in the room next door and just wait for the shit to hit the fan?"

it's like you're in our heads

And that idea for a Robin game would be AWESOME. Just make it Tim Drake and you're fucking set.

The way I see it, you could just make your own Robin. What he/she actually looks like is pretty irrelevant and allowing the player to create their own character is an easy way to increase their emotional attachment.

[Widgetcraft]

My idea for fixing the Iron Man games: Give the license to someone, anyone, other than SEGA. They're probably one of the worst publishers in the industry these days; their games are consistently messy and terrible, with very few exceptions (I've heard the kart racer they released recently was solid).

[The Continental]

Originally Posted by BigJonno

The way I see it, you could just make your own Robin. What he/she actually looks like is pretty irrelevant and allowing the player to create their own character is an easy way to increase their emotional attachment.

I would exchange US currency for one or more of this product.

[Hawkzombie]

Originally Posted by The Continental

I would exchange US currency for one or more of this product.

Same here. Whoever we make has got to be better than Damian.

[ElektroDragon]

You are too kind with that 2.

[J Arcane]

Superman: How do you deal with a character who is more or less invincible without using some kind of cheesy cop-out? Simple, make his well-being a non-issue. Supes has to foil villainous plots in an open-world Metropolis, operating most of the time as mild-mannered reporter Clark Kent. The quicker you figure out what's going on, the more time you have in the inevitable climactic race to save Lois/Jimmy/Metropolis/Earth. When you eventually do come across a bad guy that can hurt you, instead of just slowing you down a little, you're really going to be fighting for your life.

Yes. I actually posted a pitch like this I think a while back.

The thing with Superman is that it's all about time. Every damn one of the games try to artificially craft an excuse to just dump a health bar on him like every other godforsaken action game out there. It's stupid. He's fucking Superman, he isn't hurt by your stupid attacks.

No, he needs to be more like those Japanese shoot-em-ups where there's no health or lives, just time, constantly ticking down. Someone somewhere is in trouble, or something needs to be stopped, and even Superman can't stop time. Maybe have a few ways in each mission to stave off the time, but otherwise that clock needs to keep ticking.

That's the only thing that can really hurt Superman in the end. Time, and failure. Kryptonite is overplayed.

[Widgetcraft]

Originally Posted by J Arcane

Yes. I actually posted a pitch like this I think a while back.

The thing with Superman is that it's all about time. Every damn one of the games try to artificially craft an excuse to just dump a health bar on him like every other godforsaken action game out there. It's stupid. He's fucking Superman, he isn't hurt by your stupid attacks.

No, he needs to be more like those Japanese shoot-em-ups where there's no health or lives, just time, constantly ticking down. Someone somewhere is in trouble, or something needs to be stopped, and even Superman can't stop time. Maybe have a few ways in each mission to stave off the time, but otherwise that clock needs to keep ticking.

That's the only thing that can really hurt Superman in the end. Time, and failure. Kryptonite is overplayed.

The Superman movie game didn't give Supes a lifebar. It gave Metropolis a lifebar, and if I remember right, playing recklessly (blowing up shit) could cause it to go down.

But that game blew due to extremely repetitive missions.

[Xerxes]

Originally Posted by J Arcane

Yes. I actually posted a pitch like this I think a while back.

The thing with Superman is that it's all about time. Every damn one of the games try to artificially craft an excuse to just dump a health bar on him like every other godforsaken action game out there. It's stupid. He's fucking Superman, he isn't hurt by your stupid attacks.

No, he needs to be more like those Japanese shoot-em-ups where there's no health or lives, just time, constantly ticking down. Someone somewhere is in trouble, or something needs to be stopped, and even Superman can't stop time. Maybe have a few ways in each mission to stave off the time, but otherwise that clock needs to keep ticking.

That's the only thing that can really hurt Superman in the end. Time, and failure. Kryptonite is overplayed.

Unless it's in the chest of a cyborg. Then there is that Kryptonian killing machine with the bones on the outside and what not. Can't Darkseid also do some major damage. I'm not knocking the theory of it's about the people and the things around him but I wouldn't rely on that alone cause even that's gimmicky.

[J Arcane]

Originally Posted by Xerxes

Unless it's in the chest of a cyborg. Then there is that Kryptonian killing machine with the bones on the outside and what not. Can't Darkseid also do some major damage. I'm not knocking the theory of it's about the people and the things around him but I wouldn't rely on that alone cause even that's gimmicky.

Kryptonite is nothing more than a red flag for lazy writing.

[Ink Asylum]

Unfortunately, timed missions often suck. A game with nothing but timed missions could end up being endlessly frustrating.