Haven: Call of the King

"Just call me Captain Collectinstuff"

Haven: Call of the King revolves around a boy named Haven, who is a slave along with the rest of the population of his planet. As the story goes, the king of this world left on a crusade some time ago and while he was gone an evil being named Vetch took over and enslaved the planet. Not content with simple slavery, he also infected everyone with a virus that will kill them if not regularly vaccinated. However, the king left a safeguard in the form of a giant bell, which should be rang by his people if his return was necessary. In the natural behavior of a villain, Vetch had this bell moved to a far off location and all knowledge of it suppressed. When Haven starts to dream of this bell, he foolishly tells people about it and his big mouth soon gets him in trouble as Vetch catches wind of it and starts to hunt him down. Strangely, most of what I've just described is not in the actual game, but rather written in the game manual. In fact, the story doesn't play much of a role in the game and it is rare for anything story-related to come up.

In effect the story is only there to provide the barest reason for running through a variety of environments, jumping around and collecting stuff (much like an old school platformer). Speaking of which, Haven manages to be one of the worst offending games on the PS2 when it comes to forcing players to collect mundane garbage. Nearly every second of the game is permeated by the requirement to drudge around environments looking for something in order to progress further. In an early segment, I had to search through a village looking for feathers just so I could call for my mechanical bird who would bring a jetpack, thus allowing me to put out a fire. As if this wasn't bad enough, it's even necessary to collect stuff just to survive. Due to the story contrivance of everyone being infected with a virus, Haven has to keep his stash of antidote up (although it's just lying around everywhere. Apparently Vetch isn't too worried about a slave uprising) so he doesn't die. If the ever depleting supply runs out, his health begins to drain eventually leading to death. Can you say “tedious and moronic design”?

When the game can transcend its collectathon roots, the game is surprisingly good. The platforming is typically spot on, with all the necessary mechanics being easy to work with. There's also a lot of variety to be had. There are rail based shooter sequences, vehicular segments and plenty of other cool stuff. Surprisingly, all this stuff manages to work out with no real problems.

Combat does pose problems though. Haven's default weapon (some sort of energized yo-yo) has a short reach and it is unusually hard to line up an attack with an oncoming enemy. On the occasions when he gets a real weapon (of the ballistic type), there's no targeting reticule so it basically comes down to holding the fire button and hope you hit what you're aiming for.

Unfortunately, the camera is a constant hindrance, even though it is player controlled. Often it simply won't obey the input it is given, moving a certain distance to one side then abruptly stopping even when in a completely open space. To make things worse, the game uses an inverted control scheme and there's no option to change it.

Visually, there's no way to describe Haven but ugly. Then again, perhaps being released near the beginning of the PS2 lifecycle has something to do with that. Either way, the game hasn't weathered the test of time well, as character models are hideous and devoid of detail. Environments are excruciatingly bland and texturing is very simple. On at least one occasion, I looked over an environment and actually saw an area that had no detail or texturing whatsoever. It was just a flat green plane that was supposed to represent the ground.

The sound work is just as bad, with voice acting being mind-numbingly bad (we're talking the worse than the worst Saturday morning cartoon on television). Even so, a few characters manage to be funny in spite of, or perhaps because of, their terrible acting. Music is simplistic and boring, and the sound effects for items such as weapons and pickups are painfully annoying.

THE VERDICT
There might have been a time when this was a good game. If so, that time has been long gone and what remains is a manual on how to not make a game. Endless, mindless collection, pitiful graphics and terrible sound design make this a game worth avoiding like the plague.

HIGHS
- Lots of variety

LOWS
- Too much collection
- Terrible camera
- Horrific voice acting
- Ugly graphics

Reviewer's Score: 4/10, Originally Posted: 02/05/09

Game Release: Haven: Call of the King (US, 11/17/02)