Posted: 10/31/07

Carving its way onto the Xbox 360 and PS3, Conan’s latest title comes with all the violence and sexuality you’d expect from Hyboria’s famous barbarian. Hacking off limbs, conquering ancient monsters, and rescuing topless females, Conan’s latest exploits follow closely in the footsteps of his flicks and action games like God of War. Is it all too familiar or does this warrior stand on his own?

Searching for hidden treasure, Conan unwittingly awakens a captive wizard, who casts him upon the open sea and uses his armor to create monsters that spread a dark curse across the land. He soon meets the warrior queen Akana who becomes a valuable ally (and bedmate), and they quickly set out to slay the wizard’s savage beasts, recover Conan’s armor, and run the villain through once and for all.

Conan’s tale is told through brief scenes before and after each chapter, giving insight into the wizard’s history and showing that Conan’s relationship with Akana doesn’t keep him from enjoying the local attractions. The story provides a fair context for Conan’s quest, but it isn’t particularly compelling.

The level design in Conan is pretty straightforward. There’s always a clear path leading to the next group of scoundrels, and the game keeps you from backtracking very far. However, there are small side rooms that hide health and magic upgrades, as well as treasure chests and captive women, which both net you extra experience. Since you can’t revisit earlier stages, you’ll need to search every corner if you want to find them all and max out Conan’s abilities.

While the game focuses mostly on combat, Conan frequently mixes in moments when you’ll need to put your brawn and brains to other uses. You may need to muscle your way through a door, knock over pillars to reach higher ground, burn away brush, or scale a wall. The variety is well-rounded and levels are evenly paced so you’re never doing the same thing for too long.

As you hack your way through the waves of ruffians, you can pick up the weapons they leave behind to take advantage of several different fighting styles. Conan can add a shield to his basic set of attacks, he can dual-wield two light weapons, or he can use powerful two-handed weapons. He also has a small repertoire of grapple moves like body slams and pile drivers that can be used to quickly dispatch smaller enemies.

Each of these different fighting styles expands greatly as you earn experience and learn new techniques. One move allows you to yank an opponent’s shield out of his hand, while another lets you stun soldiers by kicking them in the groin, giving you an opening to attack without resistance. You can also parry an attack by tapping the guard button at just the right time, giving you a chance for a vicious instant kill.

Perhaps the most controversial part of Conan isn’t the disemboweling violence or the topless babes, but the game’s magic system. Conan is known to hate magic, but the game grants you a new spell with each piece of armor that you recover, much to the chagrin of fans. While they may not fit Conan’s character, the spells do come in handy, allowing you to turn creatures to stone, call down fire from heaven, or summon a flock of ravens to massacre large groups of enemies.

The game consistently introduces new scoundrels for you to butcher. You’ll face off against foes in heavy armor, soldiers with spiked shields that harm you when you attack, and you’ll encounter beasts like lions and giant gorillas. And since these opponents aren’t afraid to gang up on you, you’ll need to stay on your toes.

Boss battles pit you against massive creatures like a sand dragon, a giant squid, and (our favorite) a zombie elephant. Like other recent action games, many of these encounters end with quick time cinematic sequences that test your reaction time in order to get the final kill.

In all, Conan’s combat system is deep and rewarding. You may survive by repeating the same combo for a while, but it won’t be long before you encounter an enemy that forces you to rethink your approach.

Conan’s visuals are easily the weakest part of the game. Crude and rough overall, characters often look out of place, and at times, you can even see colored outlines around Conan and his enemies. Animations don’t always connect well either, and you can often see instances of clipping and other unsightly issues.

The audio holds up a little better. The voice work for Conan and Akana is well-delivered, and Conan’s quips are always good for a chuckle. And as if there weren’t enough reasons to compare it to God of War, THQ hired the same composer to score Conan’s soundtrack, which mixes together epic ancient themes with raw tribal sounds.




Release Date:
PS3, Xbox 360

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