Hulk

"Hulk SMASH!"

The Incredible Hulk... This game nearly slipped under my radar. It seems like every single person involved in the development of this movie and/or game decided to wait to the very last minute, or at least maybe a month before the releases to even reveal anything besides the titles. No screenshots for the game, or anything other than teaser trailers were released until recently either (maybe 1 or 2 months ago... this is kinda a late review). However, it seems like they still managed to get the huge endorsement and marketing blitz out in time. Anyway, on to the review...

Story: 10/10

The 10/10 score doesn't represent an incredible (like said hero, Hulk) story. It represents the perfect story for a video game adaptation of a comic, that is not necessarily based on the recently released movie (i.e. Spider-Man: The Movie). Anyway, this game takes place 1 year after the events in the Hulk movie, which currently isn't out for a few more days. Even though the story pretty much makes no sense and has you doing random things and going to random places that you haven't really been given good reasons for going to, besides tracking one of the good Dr. Banner's experiments. Basically, some Professor friend of Bruce Banner finishes one of Brucey's experiments that supposedly transforms him into a normal human. To make a long story short, it turns Professor Crawford (Banner's ''friend'') into Ravage, an evil Hulk with a spiky beard. You travel through some military compounds, beat up minor boss characters based on Super villains from the Hulk comics that I never read (Spider-Man and X-Men dominated my childhood), such as Flux, Madman, Half-Life, and finally Ravage. About halfway through the game The Leader (the one Hulk baddie everyone should know) is suddenly building a huge Gamma army. The game basically tells you he is building an army, and like everything else along the way, ''Hulk Smash!'' is implied. However, the story is made up of beautiful pseudo-cel-shaded cut scenes. Some parts are also told in text on the loading screen.

Graphics: 9/10

The graphics get a great score because all of the character models (especially the Hulk) look great, in the funky pseudo-cel-shaded way (don't you hate it when someone uses a peculiar word like pseudo-cel-shaded more than once? It defeats the purpose, and diminishes the impression that their vocabulary is bigger than your...anyway). However, the environments (at least inside) are pretty bland (walls and stuff). Luckily, they are crammed with tons of pipes, and generic looking machines which keep you from noticing. Everything animates superbly. Hulk's charged up attacks glow green and the power blast-esque sonic booms from Hulk's hand claps look nice. Another nice touch is the cracks that form whenever Hulk does anything other than think or breath, maybe including breathing. Hulk's simply jumping even leaves cracks in the floor.

Gameplay: 6/10

Hulk is damn fun, don't get me wrong. Who doesn't like running around smashing everything in sight. Well if someone doesn't, then they shouldn't rent the Hulk and maybe they might get smashed themselves if I saw them (don't get angry at my ''disagreement of subject/pronoun''... it is now acceptable in some cases, especially casual writing and/or talk, to use ''themselves'' referring to neuter gender). However, every fourth or so level, you are required to dodge enemies and solve simple puzzles (consisting of finding the green arrow and activating the aforementioned generic machine that is labeled). He also has to solve number puzzles which have you rotating numbers to form a displayed sequence. I think I had to redo one once (there is a time limit), and plus you get to retry without consequence. Luckily, there is no consequence, because Banner can't fight. He supposedly has a one-hit stealth KO (game says so itself), but every time I try, I end up pushing down a guard, instead of one-hit KOing him. He promptly gets up and shoots me dead, or hands my ass to me in hand-to-hand combat (Banner can punch, but you'll never string together a combo, unless you surprise an enemy). You don't need to fight as Banner however, you can just crouch, and practically sneak right in front of an alert guard. Actually, I think you can. Anyway, combat as the Hulk consists of punching, hand clapping, throwing stuff, using the same stuff for Smashing, and charging up the previously mentioned attacks. If you do one of the simple combos, you can stop anywhere and charge up the upcoming combo attack. There are some neat ones. You can also charge up Hulk's aerial attacks (he somehow hovers in midair for 5 seconds), and unleash your fury in that fashion. Hulk can pick up enemies and either throw them or play WWF... excuse me WWE with them also. The boss battles in The Hulk always consist of 2 stages. They are basically exactly alike, except the final showdown with the Leader. Every boss (including Leader) has 2 stages, so if you have less than 1/2 of your health by the time you drain a boss's first meter, you're screwed. Anyway, there is usually some small catch to fighting all the bosses. While fighting Half-Life, you must either throw debris at him, or club him with a pipe, as he can damage you by touch. Against Madman, you must quickly destroy some generic machines before he kills Betty Ross. Against Flux, you can quickly drain his life if you throw him into a generator, etc., etc. The enemies in the game flow so freely in each level that they get old fast. There isn't a shortage of enemy models, but there isn't an abundance either, and seeing as you only face 2 or 3 per major game area, they get old fast. The gameplay also gets old fast in story mode because there is almost nothing in the way of objectives aside from smashing everything or navigating some tunnels. You never get disoriented though. The area that is demolished is from whence you came, and that nice shiny, locked titanium reinforced is your exit.

Sound: 8.73/10

The sound effects are good. The music is I don't remember.

Replay: Not too great/10

There are 3 difficulties, which basically sum up to ''Hulk is weaker and has less life the higher you go''. There are some cheats, including playing as the ''smart (ass)'' Grey Hulk, who makes wiseguy comments, whereas the original Hulk grunts and roars. The problem is, you must enter them on a level where you play as Bruce Banner after finding a special cheat computer terminal. Very annoying... especially since you must save each level individually on your memory card because there is no level select for completed levels, and during my rental, I overwrote all of my previously saved games.

Rent/Buy: This is a great must-rent, but the score is really more for buyers. I wanted to give it a 6.5, but I really enjoyed this during my 5-day rental, and 6.5 rounds up to 7.

Overall Score: 7/10

I won't bother to say that this isn't an average because anyone with sense can add up the previous scores and do a little division. Also, if you can manage to successfully average those letters into a number score, I think the ancient laws of mathematics will have to change, and we'll have to dig up some dead Greek guys and stuff...

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 06/18/03, Updated 06/18/03