Gone are the days when you saw Spidey dangling from one of his webs over New York City, because Bionic Commando would beat that scrawny guy to a pulp without even breaking a sweat. Originally released for the arcades in 1987 and later ported for the NES and others systems, Bionic Commando is a game that focuses on a bionically enhanced soldier. Those were 2D action platform games, and this review is about Capcom’s new Bionic Commando in 3D for the Xbox 360, PS3 and Windows PC.
It’s a little tricky to get used to that robotic arm at first. And before you’ve barely gotten the hang of it, before you can fully come to terms with the awesome power of the multi-purpose grappling hook, you are thrust full-bloodedly into the action, enemies and all. In the midst of all that carnage and post-nuclear apocalyptic radioactivity, you must adapt yourself to, what can only be described as the thing that has been missing from the base of your shoulder all this time. We wouldn’t shun the idea of being trapped in this game playing it over and over just waiting for them to release a sequel. That being said let’s get to the game.
It starts off with our bionic commando, minus his one very bionic arm, being saved from a wrongful execution, right at the very death. You see, he is the only man…err…bionic soldier still alive, who has any chance of stopping a coalition that has detonated a nuclear device, destroying everything in Ascension City. One man and his trusty mechanical arm, in separate drop pods, are fired towards one end of the city, from jets grinning wider than the Cheshire Cat. A mid-game tutorial begins just as our ex-soldier finds the pod carrying his bionic arm, and incidentally is as exciting as the start of the game. It takes a while to figure out what exactly it is you have to do in the tutorial, and a little more time and effort to actually do it. But when you finally do what is expected of you, it’s just so thrilling. Frankly it captivates you and makes you feel like doing the moves over and over just to watch the game physics do its thing.
At the start of the game, you have only a limited amount of moves that you can perform with the arm. But as you go along, more fascinating, dumb-founding moves are granted, which ultimately lets you sling at opponents, anything from rocks to trash cans, from barrels and wooden boxes to police cars. You can even stun enemies by throwing and smashing their dead comrades into them, or live ones. Smashing one soldier, preferable alive, into others, is just so satisfying. And when running and jumping gets boring, you can always zip around using the many functionalities of the arm. Heck, that’s what it’s there for!
The environments in the game are huge and seem near endless, stretching as far as the eye can see. But you are limited to moving about within areas bounded by radioactivity, which is depicted as a hazy zone of brilliant blue. This tends to get really frustrating. Stray into a radioactive area for even so much as a few seconds, and that will be the end of little old bionic you. But in the areas where you can tread, the game lets you run and swing through, and change (to some extent) vast open forest environments, rocky underground locations, all beautifully built. And the graphics on the surface are just so rich with the greens and browns popping out from the bluish radiation background.
As for the gameplay, it is interesting in the beginning when you are still learning the ropes of the oversized mechanical arm. But after a while, it does get old. And Spencer’s ultra cheesy one-liners like “Nailed Yeah!” and “That must have hurt!” don’t make it any less monotonous. Although his “So long son!” was just too funny. The one thing that never gets old is the ability to kite huge objects such as Biomechs and cars, into the air and smash them into virtually anything, and Nathan’s ‘Death From Above’ move is as captivating as it is deadly; for enemies that is! Also, it was just jaw-dropping to watch the guy free dive. And when he does it in the sunshine, it’s even more fulfilling. There are also a number of mini challenges, such as swinging for 30 meters without touching anything, which give upgrades to weapons and armor.
Playing on the hard difficulty setting the game’s AI didn’t seem fooled by the same trick twice. And while the grunt soldiers were not challenging enough, the Biomechs, especially the aerial Biomechs with energy blast powers, do give something to think about, strategy-wise. You might even have an uncontrollable urge to scream out some of Spencer’s lines when you ultimately kill those damn things. The music is a little like Spencer’s lines in the game. And although the music score is really great, the overly dramatic suspense music that comes in every now and then is less than convincing. Most of the time you are just running and swinging to no music at all. Probably a good time to complete some of those mini challenges.
Strangely everyone in Ascension City has succumbed to the nuclear explosion, not one survivor, not even a single body is left. But you do see a few silhouettes of birds fluttering away from you a few times. Oh, and there are a bunch of collectible items, looking like microchips, scattered over the place, which apparently unlock game art. But to find all, you have really got to search the highs and lows of the environments.
Towards the end, the game’s story gets stronger and gives more reason to keep playing. Plus the boss fights were quite exhilarating. More than enough to get the adrenaline levels up. What would have really been hilarious though was if the Bionic Commando would strike up a few martial arts poses every now and then.
There’s no hiding the fact that this ‘third person grappler’ did deliver an awesome experience like no other. From 2D to 3D, beautifully, brilliantly, bionically! Definitely one to pick up this summer.
The Final Word: Graphically, Bionic Commando delivers an awesome experience. And although the plot is a little slow leading up to the end, the action is unmatched. All things considered, it is a really a great game to play.
Graphics: 9/10.
Gameplay: 7/10.
Game AI: 9/10.
Game Music: 7/10.
Overall (Not an average): 8.5/10.