"The Hulk: Now, with Gamma Goodness!"

Intro:
What can be said about the Indomitable, the Unstoppable, the Incredible Hulk that has not been said already? He's big, he's green, he's big, he's strong, he's big, and he's angry. His anger often gets the best of him, leading to many moments of pure rage, untainted by mere thought.

With that in mind, this is NOT a game for those that enjoy puzzle games. Aside from the occasional ''stealth'' mission, this game requires little thought beyond ''Bad man shoot Hulk. Hulk squash, kick, or run?''

Gameplay:
For those that enjoy games like Final Fight, Double Dragon, and other ''Beat the crap out of people as you go'' games, The Hulk is right up your angry, green, gamma-irradiated alley. There is a cornucopia of pain-inducing techniques at the Hulk's disposal, such as the overhead smash, the gamma stomp, the aerial shoulder crush, and the good old ''pick the little dude up and throw him, knocking over several other little dudes.'' The game would have received a 9/10 were it not for the following paragraph.

There are some ppoints in the game when, through some magical twist of fate, Dr. Bruce Banner cannot transform into the Hulk. As such, he must rely on his wits and stealth to sneak into heavily guarded areas undetected and unscathed. While this could, in theory, have been a great concept, it is pulled off rather shoddily. Banner has two ''stealth'' abilities: crouch and walk slowly, ergo silently. If he can sneak up behind a guard, a simple press of a button will see banner knocking him out. If he is detected, have no fear. Banner can punch. Not with as much force as his chartreuse-shaded Mr. Hyde persona, however. Nor does he have as much stamina as the Hulk. Since all the guards have guns, if you are detected, you have three options:
1. Run like hell.
2. Fight like hell.
3. Start the level over... like hell.

The controls are easy enough to master. The defaults are the basic WASD movement, numpad 4 to punch, numpad 6 to grab, numpad 8 to use gamma or to use an item nearby as Banner, space to jump, and shift to walk. I don't recommend rebinding them, but it's your decision.

Gameplay: 8/10

Story:
The game takes place shortly after the end of the movie, and follows the comic book to some extent. Bruce Banner sneaks into a laboratory so a ''friend'' can remove the Hulk from his persona. Instead, his ''friend'' takes a portion of what makes Banner the Hulk, uses a bit on himself, and takes the rest to the mysterious ''Leader''. The rest of the game consists of Banner and the Hulk trying to keep the Leader from creating an army of Hulkified mutants. Typical ''save the world'' storyline, but pulled off quite well.

Story: 9/10

Graphics:
The cutscenes are beautifully cel-shaded. I much prefer this style of computer animation to polygonal figures. It just seems to flow so much better. The games it self is polygonal, but in many cases the polygon count is extremely high, so the figures don't look blocky.

Graphics: 9/10

Sound:
No real ups or downs here. The characters that were ported over from the movie are voiced by the actors that played them. Eric Bana as Banner, etc. Boxes breaking sound like boxes breaking, punches sound like you're punching something. The music was pretty generic. It didn't really add or detract from the gameplay.

Sound: 7/10

Play Time:
It took me about 3 hours on Easy mode. Might take a bit more on Medium or Hard. If you have the invincibility code, it will take considerably less, as you can simply run through. But where's the fun in that?

Replayability:
You might want to try playing this game on all the difficulty with different combinations of codes. A certain code placed at a certain point will allow you to play the Hulk in his original gray skin tone. This also adds Duke Nukem/Serious Sam-esque one-liners just about everytime the Hulk does something other than walk. I enjoy this mode.

Replayability: 8/10

Overall:
The Hulk is a great game for those that just like breaking stuff now and again. If you get tired of doing the same stealth level over and over and failing, there's always an Unlock All Levels code.

Overall: 8/10

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 08/11/03