The Getaway

"Just where did all that time and money go? Not into this game that's for sure."

Introduction

Usually when a game has been in production for a while it turns out to be something special. These games are almost forgotten about whilst in development and the excitement over their release only comes to light when the odd announcement is made concerning that game. The Getaway is one of these games. Set in modern day London it’s the typical GTA style gameplay only somewhat worse. Believe it or not, this game was in production for 5 years (it actually started it’s life as a PSone title but switched to the PS2 when things started taking longer than expected) and had over £5 million spent on it’s development. Well, I am sure I’m not the only sucker who bought this game to wonder where on earth all that time and money went.

Story

Here’s the deal. You start off as one Mark Hammond, former member of the notorious London gang call the Bethnal Green. Mark has recently come out of prison and is just getting ready to start his new life, when, surprise surprise, his son is kidnapped and his wife is murdered in the struggle. Hearing this from his flat Mark races out to see the people who killed his wife, and took his boy, speeding away and his wife dying on the pavement. After picking up and then dropping the murder weapon (which now rules out any chance of the police helping you find your boy - as far as they’re concerned you’re a murderer) Mark jumps in his car and gives chase.

To start with the story seems quite okay (turns out your boy was kidnapped by a Charlie Jolson, and he wants you to complete certain tasks before he lets you have him back) although the linear nature of it soon sets in as you realize you are launched straight into mission after mission and if you don’t do as you’re told it’ll be game over before you can shout “these cars handle terribly”.

Gameplay

In a game entitled: The Getaway, you can expect driving, and driving there is a lot of. It is no exaggeration to say that most of the game you’ll be driving from point A to point B and once you get there the usual drill applies, shoot the hell out of the club/warehouse/museum, whatever and then drive back to point A again.

You would not be far off in thinking that this sort of thing going on for 24 missions is unbelievably boring, so lets start with the cars and driving aspect.

The game features over 50 fully licenced cars, all available to steal at the touch of a button, all nice looking and all horribly hard to control. We’ve all heard the story about this game being realistic. Well in some games realism is a good thing, for instance it can help to fully immerse you in the experience. Well in this game realism is a terrible thing. Because the cars are so realistic, they are somewhat difficult to handle, especially when you’re tearing down Westminster Bridge at 70mph, and if you crash you can expect damage. The funny thing about damage though is you can’t see it. That’s because there are no side or front views, you’re just constantly left with looking at the back of your car. I mean blimey, even in real life cars have a rear view mirror. No such luck in The Getaway, these developers were going for ultra realism, which is why that after one crash (and you’re bound to have at least one every couple of minutes) your car is severely damaged and begins to become hard to drive. If you continue with that car it will eventually burn the engine out entirely making the car go at a snails pace and forcing you to change cars, which may not seem like a big deal, but for two reasons.

1) Changing cars wastes precious time on missions where you normally have to reach a destination within an annoyingly unforgiving time limit.
2) Changing cars is a risky business. I’ll tell you why, it is for the very simple reason that roads are dangerous places and when you’re playing a game devised by realism fanatics, one wrong step (thanks to the rubbish camera control) in front of a car and you’re smacked down on the tarmac, dead.

While I’m on the subject of driving there is the issue of roads, Sony have really pulled out all the stops to make London streets as realistic as possible, so realistic in fact that they are exactly like the real thing. The funny thing is that for some reason, the people that designed the roads of London hundreds of years ago, did not foresee that people would be speeding around them at dangerously high speeds. How thoughtless of them. Well anyway, because the real London streets were not designed for high speed car chases, nor were the ones in the game. Such is the realism they’ve gone for. This makes for some very frustrating episodes of driving whilst wondering where the hell you’re going, because (and this is the truly fantastic part) there is no in game map. All Sony could produce is a crummy paper map in the box. Now, unless you know you’re way around London really well (and not many people do) you would find it incredibly difficult to locate yourself on that map, and even more difficult to plan your route. That’s not to say though that Sony didn’t try to include a navigation system. That’s right, they’ve really revolutionized the way in which people can get lost in videogames by putting in the diabolical indicator system which gets to what seems like a mile away from your destination every time. This sort of absurd navigation again, would be fine, if all of London was made up of square blocks of buildings. In reality London contains curved roads, roundabouts and dead ends. Finally, the complete absence of any shortcuts or allyways make navigation absolute hell. So, driving isn’t up to much in The Getaway, what about on foot?

Surprisingly going around of foot is actually quite fun. You wander seamlessly from the outside to the inside. You can hold twin pistols and shoot while walking. You can take hostages and shoot other bad guys whilst using them as human shields. You can flatten yourself up against walls or crouch behind boxes and shoot around corners or over objects without exposing your body. This is good because Mark cannot take many shots, and heals through the slow process of finding a nice wall to lean against while he catches his breath and his wounds miraculously disappear. The enemy AI does it’s job, although most of the time the guys you’re fighting seem more concerned about getting to within 2 feet of your torso before blasting you. With regards to combat you can break enemies necks if you’re unarmed or handle a total of 4 different weapons. That’s right, 4. Those include pistols, a shotgun, an MP5 and an AK. Not exactly an impressive arsenal, especially as you see other characters use such things as grenade launchers and sawn off shotguns. Shooting enemies is great fun, they recoil from the shots with the expected cries of pain and when they’re finally put to sleep they make a satisfying groan before crumpling to the floor. This is one of the few points in the game where realism pays off. These deaths are gruesome matters. One of the few glaring issues on foot combat though is the camera and controls. Both are relatively crucial things are you can imagine, especially when you tiptoeing around a private mansion and the slightest indiscretion with the controls will lead you to cross a dreaded laser beam.

The gameplay is essentially a poor job, with only a small number of redeeming qualities.

Graphics

This is probably the games strongest point. The cars are shiny, they have some real time reflections and the realism when you skid round a corner and leave thick black tire marks on the road is quite nice. The pedestrians look very good too, and are complete with superb blood effects, which also splatter the walls. Where the game falls down in this department is the outdoors sections. Apart from the same monotonous weather conditions (it’s apparently grey skies 24/7 in London) the buildings are blurry and only bare slight resemblances to their real life counterparts. Big Ben’s clock face for instance, is not blurry to look at when you’re standing right in front of it, although this game would suggest otherwise.

Sound

Another strong point in the game, although I personally prefer American voice actors in games, the cockney clichés that exist in this game are perfectly acceptable. As are the engine sounds and the screeching of tires.

Replayability

Seriously, if you stick with this game until the end (and that will maybe take you 10 hours tops) you will have had enough. There is no real reason to go back and play it again, unless you like the idea of the Free Roam mode which is unlocked after completing the game. This allows you to drive aimlessly around the streets of London in the vain search of finding a number of hidden cars. Your patience will undoubtably run out before you find a single one though.

Final Recommendation

I believe that a review should not be based on initial impressions, but how you come to view the game in the months and years to come. Well, having owned this game for almost 5 months I can still honestly say it’s the worst game I have bought for my PS2 yet. The gameplay is horrible, the story isn’t really much cop. The only thing really saving this game from a trip to the dump is the fact that I spent £40 on it and I don’t like to waste money.

Don’t buy it. Rent it if you have money to waste.

Reviewer's Score: 3/10, Originally Posted: 05/21/03, Updated 05/21/03