[Gamers' Day 2007] In The 'Hunt... Again
Rockstar's ultra-mature action game was the only 3rd-party PS2 game at the event. And we got to see it. Wanna know what we thought?
Published: May 17, 2007
Manhunt 2 is a messed up game. No, seriously, it's messed up. After watching Rockstar lovable Bruce Dugan calmly pause and reload a sequence that had him taking a pair of pliers to a guy's junk then ripping out part of his vertebrae not once but thrice after first watching him turn a guy's face to pulp with a monkey wrench, we're not sure how he sleeps at night, not because we have any problem with the game's content, but just that it's easily the most graphic game we've ever seen.
And yet, it's the bits in between, where new leading man and former doctor Daniel Lam skulks from one shadowy area to the next, trying to avoid detection and puzzling through exactly why he's finally freed after six years in an asylum that he essentially put himself into by volunteering to be part of an experiment that went south and had government funding pulled. Not how he was freed (that's due to a power failure that lets the entire complement of the asylum's detainees -- most of which are former experiments too -- out in the open), but why.
It should be mentioned that those shadows we watched Lam sneak between weren't all just naturally occurring; if need be, light sources can be snuffed out even more easily that the demented folks that were patrolling the Honey Pot brothel where the game was being played. Should the need to kill arise, the familiar color-coded system of tiers, offering those that can hold off their attack for longer before striking a bigger, badder, nastier way of offing a dude, is still in place, as are the basic categories of melee, ranged, throwable -- broken down into where on your body you can store them, which is important because you aren't a bottomless pit of storage.
We weren't able to squeeze too much more info about the story out of anyone (which is to be expected; Rockstar isn't about to spill the beans completely), but it does seem like the whole back story of what's happened to Lam both before he give up his life and during his half-decade or so of imprisonment is going to play a part. The mere fact that Lam is starting to lose touch with just how much of his past life's memories are true is intriguing to say the least, and we're curious to see how Rockstar London (not to be confused with Rockstar North, the original game's developers, who are working on some PS3 game about stealing cars or something right now) expand on the universe created with the first game. Updates when we get 'em.
And yet, it's the bits in between, where new leading man and former doctor Daniel Lam skulks from one shadowy area to the next, trying to avoid detection and puzzling through exactly why he's finally freed after six years in an asylum that he essentially put himself into by volunteering to be part of an experiment that went south and had government funding pulled. Not how he was freed (that's due to a power failure that lets the entire complement of the asylum's detainees -- most of which are former experiments too -- out in the open), but why.
It should be mentioned that those shadows we watched Lam sneak between weren't all just naturally occurring; if need be, light sources can be snuffed out even more easily that the demented folks that were patrolling the Honey Pot brothel where the game was being played. Should the need to kill arise, the familiar color-coded system of tiers, offering those that can hold off their attack for longer before striking a bigger, badder, nastier way of offing a dude, is still in place, as are the basic categories of melee, ranged, throwable -- broken down into where on your body you can store them, which is important because you aren't a bottomless pit of storage.
We weren't able to squeeze too much more info about the story out of anyone (which is to be expected; Rockstar isn't about to spill the beans completely), but it does seem like the whole back story of what's happened to Lam both before he give up his life and during his half-decade or so of imprisonment is going to play a part. The mere fact that Lam is starting to lose touch with just how much of his past life's memories are true is intriguing to say the least, and we're curious to see how Rockstar London (not to be confused with Rockstar North, the original game's developers, who are working on some PS3 game about stealing cars or something right now) expand on the universe created with the first game. Updates when we get 'em.