Full Auto 2: Battlelines
Pseudo Interactive's second go at car combat is better, but far from perfect.
Published: December 29, 2006
I'm pissed. The anger is flowing from a couple different sources, but right now it's coming from the fact that writing this review has made me realize how damned close developer Pseudo Interactive is to making Full Auto 2 a great game. All the ingredients are here -- though lopsided amounts -- but they never come together in a way that makes for a good time. Instead, borked difficulty (the other major reason for my rage right now), funky controls and weird, half-assed attempts at injecting more chaos into an already punctured soufflé threaten to collapse the whole mess.
Fortunately, that never really happens. At the risk of making yet another retarded culinary pun, most of Battlelines feels half-baked, like things were on track but they got sidelined in order to get the game running better than the 360 prequel (from which a good portion of FA2's content is lifted), but that doesn't mean that it's not tasty in small bites.
Chances are most reviews for the game will make reference to the first game's performance and it's true that the follow-up bests it in nearly every technical detail. Such is the bonus of re-using assets from one game, having more time and but a single platform to develop the quasi-sequel. Running at 1080p, Battlelines does indeed look better than its predecessor, and it's not just resolution; texture detail, framerate, damage -- all were upgraded in the move to the PS3.
If not for the fact that the framerate never really settles into a sweet spot -- not even down at 480i -- this would actually be a game worthy of showing friends and showing off that $500-600 George Foreman Grill. And it's not for lack of trying. Full Auto 2 sports some of the sickest deformation and damage modeling I've ever seen in any game; windows crack, shatter and then bust out, individual sections of the car crumple and warp, doors fly open, the frame compresses, huge chunks of wall or concrete pylon tear off with weapons fire. All these things make for a gorgeously destructive game, but they don't make it good.
Hell, it even sounds solid thanks to a high-energy licensed soundtrack and some fantastic industrial-electronica tunes from Tom Salta (who knows the genre well -- particularly when using his Atlas Plug moniker). Weapons fire lets you hear plinks and crunches and explosions alike with some great Dolby Digital positioning, but just like the visuals, it never really hangs on and settles into a coherent aural style. Certain cars in the game actually have a song associated with them, but they zoom in and out of range so often that the music for them -- which utterly dominates the rest of the soundtrack when they're near -- is constantly fading in and out erratically. It was an interesting idea, but the execution is horrible.
It's also a perfect example of the game's biggest problem: it has no identity. Is it a racer? Is it car combat? Is it a Burnout-style exploration of destruction? No one part takes the fore, but none are content to let the other shine, and the result is a race/shoot/crash/battle game that feels like all and none of those things. Instead of settling into one mode with the others propping it up, all feel like they're vying for the fore, and it hurts the experience more than you'd think.
Fortunately, that never really happens. At the risk of making yet another retarded culinary pun, most of Battlelines feels half-baked, like things were on track but they got sidelined in order to get the game running better than the 360 prequel (from which a good portion of FA2's content is lifted), but that doesn't mean that it's not tasty in small bites.
Chances are most reviews for the game will make reference to the first game's performance and it's true that the follow-up bests it in nearly every technical detail. Such is the bonus of re-using assets from one game, having more time and but a single platform to develop the quasi-sequel. Running at 1080p, Battlelines does indeed look better than its predecessor, and it's not just resolution; texture detail, framerate, damage -- all were upgraded in the move to the PS3.
If not for the fact that the framerate never really settles into a sweet spot -- not even down at 480i -- this would actually be a game worthy of showing friends and showing off that $500-600 George Foreman Grill. And it's not for lack of trying. Full Auto 2 sports some of the sickest deformation and damage modeling I've ever seen in any game; windows crack, shatter and then bust out, individual sections of the car crumple and warp, doors fly open, the frame compresses, huge chunks of wall or concrete pylon tear off with weapons fire. All these things make for a gorgeously destructive game, but they don't make it good.
Hell, it even sounds solid thanks to a high-energy licensed soundtrack and some fantastic industrial-electronica tunes from Tom Salta (who knows the genre well -- particularly when using his Atlas Plug moniker). Weapons fire lets you hear plinks and crunches and explosions alike with some great Dolby Digital positioning, but just like the visuals, it never really hangs on and settles into a coherent aural style. Certain cars in the game actually have a song associated with them, but they zoom in and out of range so often that the music for them -- which utterly dominates the rest of the soundtrack when they're near -- is constantly fading in and out erratically. It was an interesting idea, but the execution is horrible.
It's also a perfect example of the game's biggest problem: it has no identity. Is it a racer? Is it car combat? Is it a Burnout-style exploration of destruction? No one part takes the fore, but none are content to let the other shine, and the result is a race/shoot/crash/battle game that feels like all and none of those things. Instead of settling into one mode with the others propping it up, all feel like they're vying for the fore, and it hurts the experience more than you'd think.
