Disaster Report

"Short, sweet, and surprisingly....decent."

Disaster Report
Meet Keith, a young man heading towards the artificial island of Capital City for his first day on the job as a reporter. But...oh my! The bridge to the island has collapsed! What ever will he do? Disaster Report puts you in the middle of a series of earthquakes plaguing the manmade Stiver Island, aka Capital City. But not only do you have to take care of yourself, but you also have a maximum of three other earthquake survivors which you must look out for as well. While Disaster Report is a good game overall, it does have some serious problems. Let\'s look at the good first.

Gameplay
Disaster Report is basically your average survival/horror game at heart, but instead of a life or terror gauge you have a water gauge, and instead of zombies or serial killers you must survive earthquakes. As you traverse Stiver Island, your water gauge will quickly go down, causing Keith to go slower and slower. Along the way you\'ll find many conveniently located water fountains which you can use to either refill your water gauge, save your game, or fill up one of the many water bottles that you find throughout the game. Like most survival/horror games, you have an inventory screen where all the useful items you find are stored. Unlike most games, where you never know where the main character keeps all those items you find, Keith carries a back pack the whole time, which is where he puts everything. Back pack space is limited, so of course you\'re going to have to get more room by upgrading to a better back pack, which you can find in different places througout the game. Earthquakes can hit at any time, and deaths in this game occur very suddenly. You\'ll be reloading your game a lot, so save as often as possible. The game also involves a lot of running to escape falling beams and other objects. Not only do you have to watch out for yourself, but much of the time you\'ll also have to watch out for other earthquake survivors who haven\'t evacuated the city yet, and are in need of help. Luckily they\'re smart, and they never really die, so you won\'t have to pay all that much attention to them. Just know where the are. Controls for this game are pretty easy, but the game is lacking a much needed jump command. You can call out \'\'hey\'\' and see if anyone responds, but that\'s only needed in a few places in the game. You can also run, walk, climb, and brace yourself for an earthquake, and the game is completely jump-less as Keith will jump automatically when needed, but it would be nice to be able to simply jump when wanted.

Sound/Music/Voice Acting
Sound effects are actually very annoying in Disaster Report. It doesn\'t really seem that the makers really put too much effort into them, as they are sound effects that could easily be mistaken for Resident Evil leftovers. They really didn\'t slack on the voice acting, though, it\'s some of the best I\'ve heard. The voice actors for Karen, Greg, Kelly, and the rest are great. I\'m not so sure I like Keith\'s voice, he never really sounds like he cares about anything. The music in Disaster Report isn\'t very frequent, and it\'s nothing new or memorable, but it\'s good enough and it sounds good.

Graphics
The graphics in Disaster Report aren\'t bad, although they may be considered low by today\'s standards. I think they look good though, the characters look fine and they fit in well with the environments in the game. One thing I didn\'t like was that the characters mouths don\'t move when they talk, and it\'s especially annoying when there\'s a close up on a character\'s face.

Story
Personally, I think Disaster Report\'s story is the weakest part of the game. It starts out fine, Keith is heading to Stiver Island for his first day as a reporter, when suddenly an earthquake hits the bridge he\'s on, thus starting his adventure. The thing that I didn\'t like was the twist in the story which they bring in about 3/4 of the game. I won\'t say it here, but I think it ruins the fun of the game, in that this island is being attacked by something natural and common, it\'s a fight for survival. As it turns out there are more sinister deeds involved with the earthquakes and nothing is really natural at all. I didn\'t like it, but maybe others will.

Replay Value
Disaster Report has a solid eight endings (I think that\'s correct) and every choice you make throughout the game affects which ending you receive. The game takes about four hours to beat, so it could easily take about 40 hours to get all the endings. It\'s all good, but seeing endings may not be enough to make you want to play through the whole game again, and chances are you\'ll end up with the same ending more than once. You also get a nice photo album the first time you beat the game, but I haven\'t seen anything new after that.

Overall
Disaster Report does have it\'s own problems and all, but so does every other game. While you\'d think it would be wildy unique and special, it\'s really nothing you haven\'t seen before or will never see again. It does manage to hold your interest long enough for you to beat it a few times, the voice acting is great, and the various endings is a huge plus. Buy or rent? That\'s your call. I say rent it and see how you like it. Who knows, maybe it\'ll become your new favorite game.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 08/06/03