[Gamers' Day 2007] Big Red Teddy Bear
First impressions of the PS3 build of Hellboy are comin' atcha.
Published: May 17, 2007
It's nice to finally see Krome Studios doing something a little dark for a change. After years of working on their own Ty the Tasmanian Tiger franchise (even going so far as to co-publish the last one), they've decided to hook up with Konami and delve into the world of Mike Mignola's slightly pulpy comics, as well as the film adaptation directed by Guillermo del Toro and starring Ron Perlman (who did a fantastic job, by the way, as we were reminded when we watched the movie on our way out to the event).
The game, then, is something of an amalgamation of the film and page, though it favors the former for the most part in terms of look and feel, which is fine by us. The PS3 version was announced alongside the Xbox 360 one, but until now, we weren't entirely sure how the game's progress was coming along. It's something of a rule these days that most multi-platform games have the PS3 version if not lagging, than at least somewhere underwhelming compared to the 360 one, so we were eager to see how things turned out.
Not surprisingly, the build that was shown off was a little rough, but it didn't really lessen our enjoyment of mixing it up in a graveyard against a bunch of Bambini -- imps that are usually meek when alone, but will swarm their prey when they outnumber it. The game felt much as it did on the 360 months ago; Hellboy can take shots with his pistol, but most of the combat is mixed up between normal fists and the Right Hand of Doom, which allows for some powerful area effect attacks and of course provides a little extra ass kicking power. It's also quite handy for punching through solid things like rock and wood. Y'know, should those things get in the way.
The combo system favors using the Hand as much as possible, for everything from grapples to the start of a juggling combo, and just as they did in the earlier build of the game, the Bambini were rather fond of getting behind the big red guy and climbing onto his back. This actually allows for a fun little grapple where they're snatched off and chucked into things, causing some nice environmental damage. It was probably the sensitivity of the PS3's analog sticks (is it wrong that we miss the dead zone now?), but we did have a little trouble lining things up. This would become a bit of a trend, what with Uncharted being a little unwieldy too.
Still, the game seems like it's trucking along. We were a little bummed that we didn't see anything new (at least not that we can remember), but there's still plenty of time for Konami to pimp the game and kick over new builds, so when that happens, we'll offer up a meatier preview.
The game, then, is something of an amalgamation of the film and page, though it favors the former for the most part in terms of look and feel, which is fine by us. The PS3 version was announced alongside the Xbox 360 one, but until now, we weren't entirely sure how the game's progress was coming along. It's something of a rule these days that most multi-platform games have the PS3 version if not lagging, than at least somewhere underwhelming compared to the 360 one, so we were eager to see how things turned out.
Not surprisingly, the build that was shown off was a little rough, but it didn't really lessen our enjoyment of mixing it up in a graveyard against a bunch of Bambini -- imps that are usually meek when alone, but will swarm their prey when they outnumber it. The game felt much as it did on the 360 months ago; Hellboy can take shots with his pistol, but most of the combat is mixed up between normal fists and the Right Hand of Doom, which allows for some powerful area effect attacks and of course provides a little extra ass kicking power. It's also quite handy for punching through solid things like rock and wood. Y'know, should those things get in the way.
The combo system favors using the Hand as much as possible, for everything from grapples to the start of a juggling combo, and just as they did in the earlier build of the game, the Bambini were rather fond of getting behind the big red guy and climbing onto his back. This actually allows for a fun little grapple where they're snatched off and chucked into things, causing some nice environmental damage. It was probably the sensitivity of the PS3's analog sticks (is it wrong that we miss the dead zone now?), but we did have a little trouble lining things up. This would become a bit of a trend, what with Uncharted being a little unwieldy too.
Still, the game seems like it's trucking along. We were a little bummed that we didn't see anything new (at least not that we can remember), but there's still plenty of time for Konami to pimp the game and kick over new builds, so when that happens, we'll offer up a meatier preview.
