XIII

"XIII: A Great Game Held Back Only By Its Short Length"

You’re lost and alone, and you’ve forgotten who you are. A woman helps you to your feet, but after you walk several feet you fall back flat on your face in a hallucinogenic trance; smalls bits of a memory come back to you, but you’re not really sure what they mean. The next thing you know, you wake up in cabin, and hear some men screaming outside; the woman gets riddled with bullets and dies in front of your very eyes. You struggle to find a means of escape, and the meaning behind your life—in addition to the reason why these people are trying to end it. Get up and wake up, agent XIII. There are big men with machine guns outside.

Grenades, guns, and sharp objects: the primary foundations of your typical first person shooters these days. Chairs, broomsticks, and glass shards: just some examples of random objects that you can utilize in XIII to dispatch your opponents with. While XIII isn’t really much different than other FPS’ that you may have already played, it’s not a bad game at all and provides some small unique experiences of its own. Crazy (but plausible) tactics such as finding objects around the environments to incapacitate, but not kill, enemies will be utilized plenty throughout the game. Shooting down helicopters, sneaking into an insane asylum, destroying a submarine—you name it, XIII probably has it. You will go from various environments and stages with special objectives, but overall, XIII is a traditional “I can absorb lots of bullets and you can’t” FPS.

As with most other single player FPS’, you have a health bar and can take many, many shots from an enemy before going down; it’s a concept that has been with these types of games since the dawn of time (or, at least, since the development of them). In addition to your own health bar, you will find armor and helmets scattered plentifully throughout some of the levels. Each of these has a maximum capacity of 100; at a given point, you may have 300 points of damage to take! Okay, this isn’t a flaw that’s idiosyncratic of XIII, but the game is made all too easy because of the enormous amounts of damage that you can take.

We, the valued gamers, understand that it would be difficult to get through a single player game with a realistic amount of health, but XIII just goes all out and makes the game way too easy, even on the hardest difficulty. But at least the game isn’t made any less fun this way—just less challenging. And since the game doesn’t boast a lengthy completion time, we are left with a Max Payne 2 reminiscent feeling. After hours of satisfying gaming, the ending comes. Gaping in astonishment, anger, and confusion, we scream, “That’s it?” The game peaks and peaks and peaks—and sadly, stops.

Big government secrets, mysterious backgrounds, and a secret society dressed in robes all are a part of the game. Unlike most other modern-day first person shooters, XIII actually boasts a story that is revealed as your progress through the game—provided that you were actually paying attention in the first place. A conspiracy unfolds before you, and the ending is a classic cliffhanger. The only downside is that the plot is just a tad too cliché, but then again, it’s an FPS—and I must admit that it’s better than most other ones out on store shelves right now. At least it’s understandable, well-thought out, and entertaining. Bravo to the XIII staff for not throwing a whole bunch of crap together and calling it a game.

A big issue in all first person shooters is sound—you need to know where the enemy is, up close, behind, around the corner; you’ve got to keep awake and aware of what’s going on around you. So grab those surround sound speakers, sit back, and enjoy. All of the sound effects and the music place you right in the environment that you’re playing in. The taps from footsteps give you an advantage over your enemy—especially during those arduous stealth missions. The enemy voices repeat, especially on the longer missions with lots of enemies. That’s not to say that the voicing wasn’t done well—just that you might get tired of hearing the same thing over and over. Agent XIII’s voice is done very nicely by none other than Agent Fox Mulder of the television series “The X-Files;” I hadn’t even realized that it was his voice until I saw the credits roll. But credit is due for the sound staff of XIII, because most of it went without a hitch.

The main question that I asked about XIII: Cel-Shading in a first person shooter? Hey, whatever works; XIII worked out the details so that nothing looks out of place. You can pretty much rest assured knowing that graphically, XIII is a beauty. All of the guns and environments were drawn to detail, plus the comic-strip style feeling of the whole game is captured through the use of text bubbles and visible sounds (e.g. someone walks toward you and you hear their steps). Plus, when you shoot somebody in the head, they go “AGHHHH!!!” and the projectile that entered his head will be shown in a three portion comic strip that progresses the projectile upon entrance up until the point of exit. Ouch. And, if you’re a fan of the Comic Sans text, you’ll find that XIII utilizes it throughout the entire game, from the start menu to the credits. XIII is beautifully crafted in every single manner.

Sadly enough, like most other first person shooters, XIII, even on the hardest difficulty, totaled only a few hours—I’m not exactly sure how much, but I played just a little each day over the course of five days. Excellent visuals, game-play and controls make XIII a pleasure to play. The story can keep you guessing until the very end, and despite the shocking cliffhanger ending, (the Matrix: Reloaded, anyone) you will most likely run to pick up the sequel to this game, if it should ever be developed. It’s entertaining, captivating, and original, as a cel-shaded FPS. One word of caution though—don’t dig into your pockets unless you’re definitely sure that you want to spend the whole sticker price on a short game like this one. A rental is highly recommended though, since the game is out for many platforms, and depending on how much you enjoy it, you can always purchase the game to show your support. Look at the game first before you purchase it—because it’s a great game, just relatively short. XIII is a game that’s well worth playing, but downgraded just because of its length. 9/10.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 02/24/04