Gungrave

"You'll either love it or hare it."

Read this first:

The following review is not my opinion on the game itself. Gungrave is the kind of game you’ll either love or hate, so this review is an informant for those considering a purchase of it. I rated it a score of 5/10 not because I don’t like it, but because it’s the only real balance I could give.

Gungrave is a Japanese third-person shooter developed by Red Entertainmant and published by Sega. The game follows the story of an undead hitman named DEATH: BEYOND THE GRAVE, a former employee of a huge corporation who was murdered by his good friend Harry MacDowell. Since that day, the corporation was overthrown and now owned by MacDowell and his gangsters. Grave's only goal now is to seek revenge on the company that betrayed him and to kill Herry MacDowell.

The presentation is a real treat for anime-fans; the cutscenes, though cel-shaded, look like a beautiful hand-drawn cartoon. The characters, stages, and just about everything in the game has a distinct anime feel to it. Maybe that's because the original concept and story comes from the mind of Yashiro(?) Nightow, the creator of the popular anime series Trigun. This, however, may turn off some American gamers for feeling a bit TOO like an anime. Those people that are used to Hollywood action movies may enjoy the incredible fight scenes in the game(more on that later), but the weird characters and the fact that the game's entire spoken dialogue is Japanese with English subtitles may turn some people. If you're not into anime at all, you'll have to look past the game's cutscenes and, well, just about everything that has to do with the look of this game.

Gungrave is just like an old-school arcade shooter. No puzzles, no finding keys, no logical thinking required. All you do is shoot. And shoot. And shoot. Then walk through a door, wait for the game to stop loading the next area, then shoot some more. That's basically the whole premise of the game.

The game is put in a third-person perspective, the camera panning behind you character's(Grave) back. Before you start the stages, you are always showed a intro cutscene just to give you a premise of where you are or what you're up against or both. After that intro cutscene, the game starts, right after the words ''Kick Their Ass!'' leave the screen. The game immediately starts, usually with a few enemies firing wildly at you. You are armed with your twin pistols Cerberos and your coffin on your back to kill your enemies and stay alive. You have the ability to lock-on to enemies, to perform diving shots in any direction, even the ability to use your coffin to whack your opponents or to use it as a devastating rocket launcher or machine gun(called the Demolition Shot). Demolition shots can be earned by having a high Beat Count, and we’ll look at the Beat Count later

You have two types of vitality, your health and your shield. When you take damage, your shield bar drops. If you stay unharmed for a few seconds, it quickly recharges. But if you're being hit too hard and lose your shield temporarily, you will start losing health. The only way to replenish health is to use an option from the ''Demolition Shot'' option on the Pause Menu, but it will hurt your Health Rate score at the end of the stage(more on that below). From this point on, you have to shoot your targets and proceed to the end of the stage, where you'll end up finding a boss. By reaching the end of the stage and defeating the boss, you will have finished the stage and taken to a small ranking screen.

While playing through the stage, you will be rated on five separate factors. Your Beat Count is a combo system based on how many enemies/objects you can shoot continuously without stopping at all. If you do, you'll lose the Beat Count, and have to start it over. The higher the Beat Count, the better your score. Your Kill Rate is based on the number of enemies killed during the stage. To get the highest score, you'll have to kill ALL the enemies in the stage. Your Time Count is based on how long it took for you to beat the current stage. Time Counts vary, but the best scores belong to the people who beat the stage the fastest. Your Health Rate is based how much health you have at the end of the stage. Full health equals a full score, but the ''Recover Life Now'' feature HURTS your score badly. Finally, your Artistic Rate is based on how cool you were killing your enemies. This means that you'll have to fight in style. Diving towards enemies and shooting them up-close, whacking their dead bodies with you coffin before they vanish, even posing in special stances using the Select button will help raise your Artistic Rate. That, and basically anything else that makes you look cool.

You are rated on each factor with Skulls. Five is the maximum amount of skulls earned, hence the highest score. The more skulls earned throughout the course of the game(25 total skulls per level) will determine your final rank at the end of the game, judging on your performance. What do these ranks do? Not only do they give you a good feeling for earning a high rank, but they also unlock little extras for the game after you beat the game. Skulls also unlock more Demolition shots. You start off with your standard rocket launcher, but with more skulls you can turn your coffin into a minigun, a tri-rocket launcher, and a tool to restore health during a stage.

The fighting is incredibly stylish and fun. Grave's shooting animation when you stand still is amazing, as Grave will start to jump, dance and move while hitting any nearby targets. Performing dive shots doubles your firing rate; doing it when diving backwards from a flight of stairs or off of a high platform is not only great to watch, but helps your Artistic Rate improve. Using your coffin to smack people will send them flying like ragdolls. The stages are great, too. With the exception of the last level(The Sky Temple-place, what a beautiful place), every level in this game kicks ass. If you've ever seen the Antonio Banderas action movie Desperado, the first stage will remind you of it in a way: the first stage is a bar. Not Cheech Marin's dirty old bar, but a nightclub nonetheless. The first part will make you feel great while blasting enemies and the recliners behind them, shooting the shotgun-toting bartender while hitting beer bottles. The next levels come as a bigger treat, since they take place in your common warehouse, subway station and other cool locations. This game will make you feel like you’re in some kind of big-budget action movie.

However, there are serious problems in this area that can be overlooked by some people, but not by all. This game is VERY short and easy. This game has only six medium-sized stages, all of which end with a great looking boss. However, looks aren't everything since these bosses are either dull and easy, or just annoying. I guess their only purpose was for the sake of a boss character, but they could have made the bosses a decent challenge, not just some overgrown stupid characters that can be beaten in about five minutes each. There are a few exceptions like the first boss of the last stage, but none of them are very hard or fun to fight against. I guess looks aren’t everything. Slowdown occurs frequently, since you'll always be fighting an excessive amount of enemies. However, as one of the reviewers on this site said about the slowdown, when there's bullets flying, explosions everywhere and bodies being knocked all over the place, sometimes its a benefit since we get to notice all the activity going on.

If puzzles and strategies are your kind of thing, I don’t think you’ll enjoy Gungrave very much. As I said before, Gungrave lacks puzzles due to the linear gameplay. Well, that doesn’t seem to be a problem, as long as there’s plenty of variety in the gameplay, right? Yeah, but sadly there isn’t. Even though the whole purpose of the game is to shoot and run, your abilities are limited. While your enemies have uzis, swords, dual M-60’s, flamethrowers and everything but the kitchen sink, all you have are your two pistols and your coffin. That’s it. No weapon varieties, unless you count the different Demolition shots you earn. Also, this game is extremely repetitive. Repetition may be good for a shooting game and some people won’t mind, but this goes over the limit. Chances are that most people will get bored halfway through the game firing at the same basic enemies for the thousandth time. The artificial intelligence(AI) is a huge problem, too. One of the reasons this game feels like an action game is because just like an action movie, the enemies are either stupid or can't seem to hit you with their bullets or both. This applies to the AI. Some of the enemies may roll out of the way or use the environment as a shield, but most of them will stand out in the open shooting everything around you, waiting for you to kill them. There are only a few trouble spots in the game where you may lose lots of health, but that shield of yours will replenish itself so often that you probably won't ever lose health if you're smart and know how to play. This can make the game fun for some people since they have the feel of invincibility, but people looking for a challenge will want to look elsewhere.

Gungrave's audio is a mixed bag. While some of the tracks are pretty cool, the music is usually uninspiring and dull. Only a few stages had music that made me want to kill people, while the majority of them will make you want to turn the music down and put your own tracks on. As for the sound effects, they're pretty basic. The grunts, screams, and explosions are pretty much common and you won't be missing out on much if it's turned down. They aren't anywhere near perfect, but that doesn't mean that it isn't annoying. Of course, sound is a necessity in a game, but don't expect any stellar music or sounds in the game.

The controls are responsive, but I do wish it was on-the-spot controls with a few of the buttons. For instance, right when I recover from a dive, I'll have to wait about 0.5 seconds for my guy to turn around after pressing that button at least three times. 0.5 seconds may not be much when you read this, but when 10 guys with uzis are surrounding you this does get irritating. Also, the lock-on feature doesn't work as well as I wanted it to. Other than that, the controls are good. And for those people upset with a default control structure, good news: the controls are FULLY customizable, so you can set it to however you want.

The replay value all depends on who's playing it. Fighting waves of gangsters while diving and posing with style over and over again won't get old for people who enjoy these kind of games. Also, getting high scores to unlock extra features may motivate players to play through the game a few more times. But then again, the extras are limited, including a slow-motion option(nothing like Max Payne's), stage select, all demolition shots and a few more. I think the best extra that is unlockable is the ''Characters'' feature; it you get a good rank, you can unlock enemy character models for each stage. The models are even in toy cases that allow you to view them all up close. Even though you can see that the character models are lacking in graphics, I think they're absolutely stunning. This is a cel-shaded game, and these characters look great for it. But it that's not your thing, you may not want to go through this ridiculously easy game again.

Overall, Gungrave is a mixed bag. For people that love arcade style gaming, killing people and blowing people up in style, fighting waves and waves of gangsters and are fond of anime, this game is for you. If you're someone that loves hard, puzzle-filled games, tons of variety in your games and one long journey to the end, look elsewhere. If you're somewhere down the middle, you may want to rent this one. Actually, if you ever want to try this game out, RENT IT FIRST. Don't go paying your 90$(or 50$ American) for a game you MAY hate.

PROS:
-Feels very much like an anime
-Feels like a big-budget action movie
-Beautiful cutscenes and environments
-Straight-forward and simplistic gameplay; you can play
right off the bat
-Great levels and character designs
-Cool theme song

CONS:
-It may turn off some people that hate anime, since this game was based on the ideas of a well-renowned anime creator.
-The dialogue is spoken in Japanese with English subtitles, so you better know how to read if you want to follow the story.
-Music/SFX is average
-AI is horrible
-Almost no replay value or depth for some people
-Very short
-Slowdown may bother some people
-Gameplay is a bit TOO simplistic
-Very easy for a veteran gamer

My Score: 8/10
Reason:
I think this game is stunning. To tell you the truth, I don't watch a lot of anime, but this game impressed me more than any other game I've played in a long time. The bosses, characters, storyline, cutscenes, every single aspect of the presentation is so beautiful that it makes me want to watch anime right now. Even though the bosses are a joke, the enemies in this game are very diverse; instead of fighting the same enemy in all six stages, you fight at least 8 unique enemy models per levels. That Action Movie feel is something I haven't felt in a long time, and Gungrave brought it back to me. I think this game is one of the best action games released lately and I recommend it to anyone who misses those mindless straight-forward arcade shooter. Rent it first, then make your decision. Anyways, that's my thoughts on the game. Until my next review...

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 10/06/02, Updated 10/06/02