El Matador

"A Max Payne clone that can't decide if it wants to be run and gun or tactical"

El Matador is a Max Payne clone from European developers Plastic Reality and Cenega Publishing. It follows the exploits of Victor Corbet, a trigger-happy, no-nonsense DEA Agent as he is on loan to Colombian police to fight the La Valedora drug mafia. The game's premise is nothing new, and the the plot is neck-deep in action movie cliches. Corbet is a gruff, muscular action hero who is constantly in trouble with his superiors - at one point in the game, he abruptly ends a phone call with his police chief by saying he's "gotta shoot scum". The other main characters pretty much come from the same mold. The story sends you to various generic settings, such as lavish drug lord mansions, nightclubs, jungles, etc, and serves as nothing more than an excuse to shoot many, many drug dealers in the face. If you're playing this game, you aren't gonna be playing for the story.

El Matador, at first glance, is pretty much a Max Payne expansion pack. The game features slow motion, allowing you kill multiple enemies before they can damage you too quickly. Corbet can also perform a slow motion dive and fill enemies full of lead. He can also do combat rolls to dodge shots, and also has the ability to enter over-the-shoulder aim for more precise shots. While playing this game, you'll definitely want to do that because El Matador is a much, much tougher game than Max Payne ever was. Enemies don't take a lot of shots to die, but neither do you, and the odds are usually stacked at least 10 to 1. Cover is essential to survival, and the over-the-shoulder aiming mode allows you to shoot from cover, sometimes clipping through the wall to do so. For much of the game, enemies are set up to get the drop on you, so the game becomes sort of a tactical shooter. It's not to say that you couldn't survive playing it run and gun style, but you'll usually be getting out of firefights by the skin of your teeth.

You won't be entirely alone while you fight La Valedora, though. For about half of the game you'll be accompanied by AI controlled team mates. They have fairly good aim, and are smart enough to hide behind cover, but they'll die fairly quickly and are much more useful as a meat shield than as real team mates. Occasionally, you'll be able to fight alongside some main characters, identifiable by their face because they don't wear any armored helmets like regular team mates do. These guys never die and are quite helpful when you get to fight with them.

There aren't any puzzles in the game, and the game eventually becomes a linear shooting gallery, as both you and the AI pop in and out of cover shooting at each other. Except for a few times where it's not entirely obvious where to go, levels are easy to navigate. If you're not sure if you're going in the right direction, you'll know you're entering a new area when you're suddenly ambushed by more enemies. To break up the monotony of shooting faceless goons, every few levels you're thrown into a boss fight. Each boss is basically an enemy with a ton of health and 100% accuracy. The bosses aren't particularly smart, and sometimes will just stand still behind cover as you slowly chip their health away by shooting their foot.

To facilitate the act of shooting everything that moves, El Matador features a very wide variety of weapons. There are a bunch of handguns and machine pistols, which are surprisingly effective weapons. Shotguns are typically slow to fire but incredibly powerful, and the heavy machine-guns are devastating but incredibly inaccurate. You'll spend most of the game using an assault rifle of some sort, as they are both accurate and rapid firing. There's also an assault rifle that comes equipped with a scope, which will be one of your most widely used weapons, as ammunition for sniper rifles is incredibly rare. The game also has a rocket launcher (very fun to use in combination with slow motion), a useless grenade launcher that exhibits very strange physics, as well as a variety of hand grenades. Explosive grenades are great for clearing rooms, but the flash bangs provided in the game have absolutely no effect on the AI.

For a game made by an independent developer, El Matador has superb graphics. The engine has great lighting and sharp textures. Character models have a great amount of detail and animate in a realistic fashion, and the game looks and runs great on older machines. Explosives are especially gratifying to use, as enemies flop around with exaggerated ragdoll physics. As generic as the levels are, they're beautifully constructed. The audio isn't as good, though. The voice work is incredibly hammy and the cheesy lines are delivered flatly. The music is a terrible, ear-grating synthetic rock that is incredibly distracting and should be turned off.

In spite of the extreme damage model and the crack shot enemies, you won't spend that much time on the game. El Matador is, at best, around 6 hours long. The entire game is split into 6 chapters, and one prologue chapter, but each chapter is composed of several levels. There is no multiplayer mode to speak of, but the action is good enough to warrant another play through. You can access each chapter directly from the main menu as soon as you unlock it in the story mode, but other than replaying the story mode there's no replay value to this game. If you can find this game for a fairly low price, you can't go wrong with purchasing El Matador.

Summary:
Pros:
+ Great shooting action
+ Slow motion gameplay a la Max Payne
+ Great graphics
Cons:
- High difficulty
- Short story mode with no replay value

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 11/20/08

Game Release: El Matador (US, 09/29/06)