By Christopher Money
These are the words that light up the screen in great blue and pink glowing letters. There are few games that make me say “This is gonna be awesome,” before it’s even started properly. When you start from the main screen, you’re treated to a beautiful, awful cutscene lovingly rendered in 2D, replete with cheesy, over-acted voiceovers and tense, dramatic 80’s backing music. But the game itself is rendered in full next-gen graphics and the combination is brilliant.
These are the words that light up the screen in great blue and pink glowing letters. There are few games that make me say “This is gonna be awesome,” before it’s even started properly. When you start from the main screen, you’re treated to a beautiful, awful cutscene lovingly rendered in 2D, replete with cheesy, over-acted voiceovers and tense, dramatic 80’s backing music. But the game itself is rendered in full next-gen graphics and the combination is brilliant.
This is a game that does not take itself seriously in the slightest, and instead of suffering for it, actually does quite the marvellous job of bringing the player out of what we’ve been acclimatised to: ‘modern’ warfare games in the same old warzones and jungles. Far Cry 3 did a good job of starting the return to clearer levels of fun in the first person shooter genre, and its standalone sequel only serves to prove how much Ubisoft is dedicated to bringing us just that – fun. Mindless, explosive, neon fun. The last time I had this much fun was with Just Cause 2. It hearkens back to the good old days playing Serious Sam, where you could release a silly game and actually sell well.
Don’t go into the game expecting an intellectual pursuit, I suppose, is what I’m trying to get at. You gotta be in the right mindset for Blood Dragon. Go watch Rambo, followed by Predator, Terminator, Eraser, The Running Man & Total Recall all at the same time, and you’ll be in the mood for this game. Bullets fly in all directions at once, explosions go off at random, and there are giant lizards with eye lasers – the titular blood dragons. Shut down the megashield guarding an enemy garrison, then use a cyberheart ripped, still beating, from the body of a fallen enemy, to lure dragons into the base to terrorise the opposition – or maybe you’d rather pick off the enemies one by one with a bow – or maybe, just maybe, you’re going to run in the front door, all guns blazing.
Don’t go into the game expecting an intellectual pursuit, I suppose, is what I’m trying to get at. You gotta be in the right mindset for Blood Dragon. Go watch Rambo, followed by Predator, Terminator, Eraser, The Running Man & Total Recall all at the same time, and you’ll be in the mood for this game. Bullets fly in all directions at once, explosions go off at random, and there are giant lizards with eye lasers – the titular blood dragons. Shut down the megashield guarding an enemy garrison, then use a cyberheart ripped, still beating, from the body of a fallen enemy, to lure dragons into the base to terrorise the opposition – or maybe you’d rather pick off the enemies one by one with a bow – or maybe, just maybe, you’re going to run in the front door, all guns blazing.
I don’t know what else there is to say. You’re a cyber-commando with a bionic arm. Every step you take is accompanied by the whirr and buzz of leg muscle servos. You’re carrying a small arsenal of weapons, each of which has neon Tron lines all over it, and fires either bullets with tracer rounds or actual lasers. Your recurve bow, which seems to be a requirement for current game releases, glows bright blue, as do the arrows, so you can easily find them in the dark (though I’m not sure how the enemies are unable to see your giant glowing bow while you’re stealthed). The enemies are robots voiced by Microsoft SAM and Stephen Hawking’s vocal coach. Hint screens deliver the most inane, useless hints, such as “Hint screens will give you hints.”
There is little else to say that can be explained in text. The player needs to physically play the game to understand the hype. I suggest you get it for one of those days when you just need to blow things up. Even if you have to deal with the arbitrary Uplay platform, you will not regret this purchase.
There is little else to say that can be explained in text. The player needs to physically play the game to understand the hype. I suggest you get it for one of those days when you just need to blow things up. Even if you have to deal with the arbitrary Uplay platform, you will not regret this purchase.
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