Headhunter

"MGS meets VIP"

This game is hard to explain. It's the Dreamcast's answer to Metal Gear Solid, but it feels dirty and more realistic if you can believe that.

Where MGS and MGS2 were burried in detail and little nuances, Headhunter has a ''less is more'' feeling to it. There's crates all over the place, and everything looks dirty and used and almost like the stuff that MGS had used and then threw out. This gives the game a weird-but-real-world sense, as everything is more real-world identifiable like a car than, say, a giant mech.

Jack Wade is a character that tries to be cool but flops and becomes a B-Movie action hero. He's a step or two cooler than Dolph Lundgren, but they're in the same class. He has amnesia, he has to find out who he was and what to do... frankly, sounds a lot like ShadowRun without magic.

Jack goes through a series of adventures, trying to unravel his life. This amusingly plays out like an episode of VIP, enviroments and all. The gun play is realistic in it's simplicity: duck behind something, pop up, shoot, duck, repeat. You can also roll out of the way of bullets. There's also some motorcycling that is very cool at times, but has bad collision mapping, so once in a while, you'll nick a car and come to a dead stop.

The sound in the game is unusually good. As you walk around a warehouse, you have to be careful not to kick cans or debris which warns guards that someone is around. There's also lots of ambeince and little sounds that are great during game play. I found that some of the cutscenes had problems with dialouge, as sometimes it would play and sometimes not. It seems to be an issue as to how the game is read on the PS2.

The voice-acting is not too bad. It's cheesy, sure, and it's not as well acted as MGS or it's sequel, but it's above-par and quirky, which I liked.

The music score is something to scream about. Richard Jacques outdoes himself with a spelndid, completely orchestral score performed by the London Philharmonic.
It really helps push the game along.

The camera suffers from the same problems that all the PS Spider-Man games do. You'll find yourself hitting the ''Auto-target'' button a lot to center the camera. This is the game's big interaction flaw. Also, ''Auto-Targeting'' has a lovely habit of targeting the wrong guy when you have more than one target, which means you have to stay exposed and cycle through those targets before firing. This leads to many four-lettered words and loss of life bar goodness.

The other flaw is the length of the game. It's too short. Too damned short. Despite rather a rather blah story, it is manic fun.

I'd really, really like to see a sequel to this game, as it is too short and could use a fresh idea or two.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 06/04/02, Updated 06/04/02