Bully

"Probably would have been received with high praise if it was called something other than bully"

When I was first told what Bully was about, I couldn't believe that people would make a game like that; essentially setting GTA into a school environment, with all the school shootings, a like this is just what the world needs. However, I recently heard from a friend that it's a pretty good game, so I decided to give it a go, and I have to say, it's nothing like what the media were saying it is. This is no more influential to a child's imagination than most cartoons, and while some of the things are a little adult orientated, what could you expect, it is supposed to be an adult game after all.

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Storyline (9/10)
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The main story line is that you play a delinquent, and his adventures. However, even when the game starts, the opening cut scene at least allows you to see why Jimmy is the way he is, and is probably one of the best cut scenes I've ever seen in terms of setting up a storyline. As the game continues, some things seem entirely irrelevant to the grand scheme of things, but are still interesting enough to keep your attention. Even when these things to seem unimportant, it always soon gets back on track and never strays too far away from the main plot, which means you're involved for pretty much the entire game.

The missions in the game are well thought out and progress the game at a good rate. Many of the sidequests are dull as they don't have much relevance to the game and for the most part are just racing games. However the bulk of the game never really slows down, and the fact you can leave some missions alone altogether is actually quite useful, as if you get busted by an adult or whoever, you have to redo it, which you may not want to.

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Gameplay (8/10)
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The basic controls of the game are pretty well designed, making the game easy to enjoy and get into, the menus are easy to navigate through and contain mostly useless but sometimes interesting information. The weapons can take a while to cycle through, but gets easier when you learn the pattern that they cycle through, although aiming them can be a problem sometimes as I've had a lot of difficulty with the locking on system. The "authority" characters are challenging and will generally give you a second before they give chase, but sometimes you can keep running into one after another meaning you're constantly having to run away, which can be infuriating if you're simply trying to complete a mission.

The style of the missions will be familiar to anyone who's played GTA, however, to me they felt shorter than the average GTA mission, which in some ways is not a bad thing, and for the longer ones, if you get "busted" they'll allow you to continue the mission from a "checkpoint". For the most part, the missions aren't that hard, except sometimes you're not really given enough information about what's expected of you, so in those situations it boils down to trial and error, which can lead to a frustrating experience. The rewards for the missions are generally in the form of money, however, this is my biggest gripe with the game; the money is useless for the most part. It allows you to buy more clothes, and drinks from the machines, and go play at the fun fair, but essentially, it's useless as you can get any weapons you need from the chemistry set, or will simply find them lying on the floor.

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Graphics (7/10)
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In some ways they're very similar to the GTA graphics, except they're bigger; as in the camera isn't zoomed out so far. The level of detail on the characters is pretty good, there's a decent variety rather than just generic NPC 1-4 on loop as in most games. However, many of the environments are rather bland; the insides of the school aren't too impressive and the boys dorm is rather sparse on detail. The town itself is largish and designed well enough, but once again it's the insides where there's little detail, as the insides of the shop aren't very pretty.

The different seasons are done well though, and I loved the graphics for the Halloween event, and the Christmas one was good. The different outfits you can unlock are for the most part rather bad, and not something you'd want to wear anyway. However, the decent ones are done really well, and it shows that that's were their efforts went simply due to the differing amounts of detail.

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Sound (7/10)
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The music doesn't really stand out for me; this is both good and bad. It shows it didn't really get in the way for the most part, but it also shows it wasn't really anything memorable, and if it was, then probably for the wrong reason. The generic walking music and fighting musics were alright, and a nice touch that you get different music depending on which rep group you're fighting. However, I used the bike a lot to get around and the music for that was really annoying, also I would have used the scooter, but the buzz of the motor was way too loud, and while realistic, also very annoying.

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Summary (8/10)
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Not the game I was expecting and this was a good thing. I really enjoyed playing it for the most part, as there were some pretty annoying missions. However, the game itself was pretty fun, the lessons were good, even the cutscenes were a treat due to the comedy elements. All in all, this is probably one of the best games released last year, and it got so much negative press, just because of the name (although it's probably what Rockstar wanted).

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 02/22/07