Coming from IO Interactive,
I wasn't expecting a hit in Kane & Lynch.
Their last game; Hitman Blood Money in 2006
gave no hints that the studio is capable of
a classic. It's hard to expect anything great
from a shooter in 2007 that only lasts around
five hours.
Blood Money I couldn't even
finish. Half way through the combat was rubbish
and the levels were boring and small. Kane &
Lynch gets off to a bad start with the first
level looking like it came out of 2005's F.E.A.R.
but with brightness cranked up. The warehouse,
bank, city streets, awful looking nightclub,
freeway, construction site, prison, skyscraper
and tokyo streets levels all follow, and none
of them are particularly impressive. Apart from
perhaps the start of the skyscraper where you
rappel down the side with an entire city on
display far, far below. That was a great scene,
but only lasts ten seconds. These levels all
feel very washy, lacking any kind of exquisite
detail or impressiveness. They look 2005/2006,
not late 2007.
But things pick up a fair bit
once the game moves to Cuba in the middle of
a civil war. Then you trek through the Venezuela
jungle to find the antagonist's base. These
aren't fresh settings, they've all been done
to death. And the outdoors areas are almost
laughable compared to games like Crysis. But
at least it's more visually interesting than
the plain concrete grey that makes up the earlier
levels.
The levels are also all fairly
small and linear. Not a huge departure from
Blood Money really. The graphics and design
are adequate, but there's tonnes of 2007 titles
that look better than Kane & Lynch.
The combat takes place from
third person but to one side of the player model.
This was a bad decision because many times you'll
have your sights directly on an enemy while
slightly behind cover, but your gun just hits
your cover instead of where you're actually
aiming. There's no obstacles between the camera
and your sights, but because the gun is held
off to one side it hits things it shouldn't
and you've got to move completely out of cover
to hit them properly. It doesn't happen often,
but the times it does is enough. It should have
been fixed.
There's also a Gears Of War
cover system where you can lean up against objects
and aim you're sights around at the enemies..
It works okay, but getting into cover is sometimes
unreliable while other times you'll go into
cover when you didn't want to. It's a feature
that wasn't really needed.
The weapons are all fine. They're
not pin-point accurate and you'll often have
bullets spraying around the enemy. Ammo is sometimes
unlimited, while other times you have to go
back to your team-mates to restock until they
run out. Also when die you can be revived by
a team-mate, but it usually only works once.
It was a ice little feature though, meaning
I often didn't have to replay from a checkpoint
when I or my team-mates died.
Kane & Lynch, being console
focused, only has checkpoints. But it's a terrible
system where you can't manually load one of
your checkpoints. So if you quit the game you
have to start the entire level again. That's
just damn lazy from IO Interactive. At the end
of the game you have two choices; one ends the
game prematurely while the other gives you a
final level to play. I chose the former, but
then had to play the entire level again just
to choose the other option. I've no idea why
they gave this option anyway; the game is already
too short and the 'Choice' level is easy and
over in several minutes. It's hardly a final
battle. The level that follows is perhaps the
best in the game and should be mandatory, although
again not that hard. No bosses here.
Where Kane & Lynch shines
is the story; an area where most action games
fall flat. It's the usual cliche B-grade action
flick about a gang member (Kane), whom you play,
that stole from his gang and now they want whatever
it was (which is never even fucking revealed!)
back, and have kidnapped your ex-wife and daughter
to make sure you get it. Lynch, an older guy
who reminds me of an older, balder version of
Michael Douglas in Falling Down; is also part
of the gang and comes along for the ride to
help you get it back while reporting your actions
back. Lynch is where the game excels; he's a
hilarious character, even with some backstory,
that has major schizophrenic issues and fucks
everything up. If there's a hostage, he'll panic
and kill them. If civilians are running around
trying to get away, he panics and kills them.
Kane and Lynch are constantly at ends with one
another mostly because of Lynch's profanity-filled
constant complaining about everything.
Kane & Lynch is even being
turned into a movie with the most absurd casting;
Bruce Willis playing the YOUNG Kane, and Jamie
Foxx playing the older crazy Lynch. That's right,
a 56 year old has-been is playing the younger
Kane, with a black man the schizophrenic Lynch;
Billy Bob Thornton or John Malkovich would be
a more appropriate choice for Lynch.
Movie aside, the problem is
while Lynch is amusing, both characters are
complete assholes. In fact, I don't even want
to play as Kane because I don't like him or
sympathise with him at all.
Kane & Lynch is an average
game at best. The combat is fun enough, but
it'll only keep you busy for a day and isn't
really worth playing it if you missed it in
2007.
