Review by biscoemarwickc

"Do not buy this game"

I was sucked in by the hype over this game and its offer of sword weilding Yakuza chasing goodness. But instead of this supposed goodness I got utter dissapointment.

For the first ten minutes or so this game tricked me into beleiving it was good,(although the cut scenes that looked like those old crappy Marvel cartoons where they just slid still images across the scene made me a little wary). This was mostly because of the controls, the pushing your arm forward to zoom in and the use of the wii-mote to direct where you look and aim and the shoving open of doors with the nunchuck, all of which is fun, but not enough to hide the substandard game underneath it all for more than say, well, ten minutes.

The level designs are linear and boring, you can pretty much only go one way,(unless your going back over old ground), and the AI is more like AS,(artificial stupidity), as the enemies you have to defend yourself from will mostly just stand there and let you shoot them while saying stupid stuff like "where did he go, he's gone!" Plus the difficulty level is zero, you're like some unkillable Rambo guy, which makes the game about as exciting as staring at a piece of burnt toast while listening to the tap drip.

The most dissapointing part was the sword fighting sequences, in the promotional images the guy playing the game is holding his wii-mote and nunchuck in position and the swords on screen match this position. In the actual game you just give your controls a bit of a swish in the air and you may as well have just pressed a button. Because of seeing the way the Mii's in wii-sports baseball move their bats exactly like you move your remote this just doesn't seem up to standard. That said, the sword fights were still alot of fun, but not enough to save the game from its poor overall quality.

I really wanted this game to be good, and I played it a fair bit to make sure I really was right about its utter badness. Unfortunately, I was. Red Steel takes a great idea and cuts its legs and arms off with incredibly poor execution. Instead of being like a piece of cult Asian cinema with tension and style to boot, it turns out to be like the old ham sandwich I left in my lunchbox over the school holidays one time when I was a kid,(with two dead AA batteries that leaked allover the place. Ugh! What a mess, I had to throw the lunchbox away even). So I'd advise that you don't buy this game. If you're looking for some FPS goodness then go for Call Of Duty 3, or if your like me, and don't particularly like the idea of re-enacting WW2 in your living room then wait for good old reliable Metroid, or pray that Lucas arts makes a kick arse Lightsaber game or something.

I could winge a bit more, but I think you get the idea. I bought this game, regretted it and took it back to trade it in for something better. I think it shows in some small ways that first person shooters on the Wii will probably be packed with unbeatable goodness because of the fantastic control system, but only if game developers take the time to make great games and don't rely on control as their only selling point.

I'm hoping that when Metroid makes it to the Wii I'll be as satisfied as I expected to be by RedSteel,(or maybe that lightsabery lucas arts game I'm dreaming of will come into being and be fantastic).

Reviewer's Score: 4/10 | Originally Posted: 12/21/06


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