Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Chaos Bleeds

"Into Every Generation…"

…A Game is created. It alone must stand against the Mediocrity, the Rubbish and the forces of Mainstream. It is the…wait, what the hell am I doing?!

Every once in a while, a game is released that revolutionizes the gaming industry. Pong, Super Mario Bros, Legend of Zelda, Tetris, Metroid, Sonic, Street Fighter II, Virtua Fighter, Doom, Super Mario 64, Final Fantasy VII and Devil May Cry are some of the more famous and important examples of such games. These are the games that changes the way we players look at games. These are the games that revolutionize. Is Buffy The Vampire Slayer: Chaos Bleeds one of those games? Not even close. Is it a good game? It most certainly is.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer: Chaos Bleeds is a 3D action/adventure game based on the TV-show with the same name. It's constructed as a ''lost episode'' near the end of Season 5, even though the story of the show and that of the game have very little in common.

The adventure part of the game consist of ''puzzles'' of the type 'find locked door 1, find object A, use object A on object B, open locked door 1, find locked door 2 repeat'. While this sort of puzzle doesn't require much brain, it does force you to venture through all of the level, thus disabling your ability to rush through all the puzzles (at least your first play-through). While some people might be put off by all the backtracking that is required, I felt that it suited the game just fine. Even though I do wish you could run faster with the characters, making backtracking faster and smoother.

As for the action part of the game, you could say that it's divided into five categories, seeing how you play as five different types of characters on the different levels, each with their own strengths and weaknesses.

- Buffy/Faith: They are the Chosen Two, the Slayers. They easily beat the crap out of the monsters and they let out puns while doing it. With a ton of combos, incredible strength and the ability to use stakes, spikes, shovels, holy-water guns etc, these two characters is easily the most fun to play as, and luckily the ones you'll play as the most. They are quite alike, the only differences being their looks and the fact that Faith has a much ''cooler'' attitude (for example, compare Buffy's quip ''Those dead guys, they're so fragile'' to Faith's ''Ashes to ashes, honey'').

- Spike: A vampire with a chip in his head that makes him unable to harm humans, Spike is still quite deadly for undead creatures. While his array of moves isn't as big as the Slayers', he can dish out some serious damage thanks to those vamp-powers. Still, he manages to feel rather dull, like a down-toned version of either Slayer.

- Xander: He's the normal guy of the party, no superpowers here. Even so, he kicks vampire butt with little difficulty (something which, if you've seen the show, will make you raise a questioning eyebrow). His move list is even smaller than Spike's and is extremely boring to play as. He's supposed to concentrate more on firearms than close combat, but alas, said firearms aren't nearly as effective as you'd wish.

- Sid: A former demon-hunter's spirit now living in a ventriloquist doll, Sid uses his small size and his speed to make up for his seriously lacking move list consisting of four attacks, not counting the staking. Sid has potential to be a truly fun character to play as, but that potential has sadly not been taken care of. Luckily, you'll play as him the least of all the characters.

- Willow: And last but not least, we have Willow; a witch. Not big on the whole physical violence aspect, Willow uses magic to make up for her lack of muscle. With her magic, Willow becomes the most deadly character in the game, and later in when she's gotten all of her spells, she's incredibly fun to play as. There's just something about using a bat as little Willow to first beat the fangs off a vamp and then finish him off with a fireball.

While it's nice to have a big number of characters, the only ones that are necessary are Buffy and Willow, and possibly Sid. The other three serve no real purpose, but are merely there to satisfy the needs of the fans.

Controlling the characters is both a joy and a royal pain in the ass. While it feels extremely good to pummel the enemies black and blue and then ending the combo by impaling them with whatever weapon you're using at the moment, at times the controls just go AWOL on you. If you, for example, start a combo, but the enemy moves out of you range, your character will continue kicking and punching in a straight line, without adjusting to the enemy's new position. Annoying. Or when you get knocked down to the ground, you'd think that a Slayer, a superhero for god's sake, could quickly get on her feet again, so that she doesn't get hit again and again while lying stupidly on the ground. Frustrating. And you'd think that the characters, all of which is above twenty years old, would know who to properly use a ladder. Laughable.

Add to that the camera, while not horrible, isn't anywhere close to as good as you'd want it to be, and you have some very aggravating moments where you just want to scream at the TV ''Whyyyy?! You stupid *****!''.

While the game's graphics are no where near fantastic, and doesn't show us anything we haven't seen before, it still looks good. Even though the characters are stiffer than Al Gore, they are fairly detailed, and the environments are quite beautiful, though nothing spectacular. The graphics are simply good enough.

While you're running around solving ''puzzles'' and beating the crap out of the many enemies in your path, you are accompanied by music that could be directly ripped from an episode of the show. If you've seen the show, you'll know that this is a good. Rather than exploding out of your speakers and making you jump with surprise, the music lies in the background, subtly changing with the events of the game. When it picks up into a more menacing tone, you'll know without really thinking about it that there are enemies near by. When you walk around in a deserted corridor the eerie music faraway in the background really helps set the mood.
Something that also sets the mood, albeit in an entirely different manner, is the voice acting. The characters throw around one liners when you try to open a locked door, kill an enemy or find a secret etc. These are cute and funny the first time your hear them, but after the 100th time, you just want to turn off the sound. The dialogue in the cut scenes is very pushed, it seems like the characters aren't really talking to the other characters, but rather into a speaker in a recording studio somewhere *cough*. Never the less, the dialogue has the same humor as the show's, just not with the right timing.

So how about replay value? Is there a reason to pick up the game again after having finished it? Well, there are a ton of interviews and voiceovers of the cast to unlock, as well as twenty-something characters for the rather bland multiplayer modes (give us co-op story mode next time!!). But honestly, I unlocked most of that the first time through. The thing that keeps me playing this game over and over again isn't the unlockables. It's the simple fact that kicking vampire butt while running through the levels as fast as possible is extremely fun. It was fun in Devil May Cry, and it's if possible even more fun in Chaos Bleeds (and easier too). Every time you finish a level, you'll get a set of scores (time, number of kills, secrets found, ranking), and it's strangely addicting to push that time down as low as possible. For example, when I first played through the second level, I had a time of 72 minutes. Now I play through the same level under 13 minutes. It's fast explosive action with stylish ass kicking to boot.

I'm not gonna lie to you and say that I'm not the least biased towards this game. I am. As a Buffy-fan, walking into the library at Sunnydale High gives me goose bumps. While a non-Buffy-fan player runs in, whacks the enemies quickly, picks up the items and then leaves without looking around, I take my time. I look in awe as the rays of the moon streaming down through the sky light where Buffy's first nemesis plunged to his death. I look at the cage where Oz spent three nights a month with a little smile on my lips and a feeling of nostalgia. And I get strangely excited as I finally can go into Giles' office and take a look around. All the while I'm absently fighting off the enemies that are hacking away at me. But I don't care. For just a few minutes, I'm in the show. I'm actually walking around inside the library where so much has happened, and I'm loving every second of it. So, when my life bar hits zero and it's game over, I reload, play the level again, and as I reach the library for a second time, I steel myself, run inside and take care of the enemies quickly. Then I spend a couple of minutes just walking around, enjoying the sight, before continuing through the game, not caring that the story sucks, or that the voice acting could be better, or that the controls give up on you sometimes. I don't care, cuz I'm in the Buffyverse.

Gameplay: 7.5 - Killing monsters is seldom this much fun, or stylish.
Control: 7 - Overall it's good, but has one too many kinks to be satisfying
Graphics: 7 - Nothing new, but good enough.
Sound: 7.5 - The music is wonderful, and while the voices are good, they get old quickly
Overall: 7 - A fun action game that despite it's many flaws manages to make me come back again and again, if only to take a stroll down the main street of Sunnydale. If you love Buffy, you'll love this as well.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 12/05/03