kill.switch

"A very average shooter with a gimmick"

When I started this review I sat for about ten minutes staring at the screen trying to think what I wanted to say about it, it's easy to praise a great game or rip apart a bad one. However how should one begin when describing a very generic and average game? I don't believe kill.switch deserves a pat on the back but then again it hasn't done anything to deserve a tongue lashing either. I can say that I was disappointed and expected more from the concept but in fact I probably shouldn't have expected what I did. The game does throw some fairly new gameplay elements at you but it also stays snuggled up in all the old clichés of the third person shooter genre at the same time. Anyway I'll do my best but the English language has much more words useful for describing greatness or crappyness than it does for describing mediocrity.

Graphics 6/10

It's basically the typical gamut of third world streets and industrial looking areas you'd see in any military themed third person shooter of today. You can tell the designers didn't want it to look like crap but at the same time you can tell that they only really bothered to make it look up to standard. No destructible objects, no advanced physics systems. Just generic areas for you to kill things in. The enemies and Bishop move fairly fluidly but also a bit oddly, death animations seem to be scripted rather than dynamic.

Control 9/10

The only thing about this game I found impressing, control is fluid and intuitive. Picking out a weapon is the only thing about it that can be a little awkward. Otherwise it's perfect.

Sound 5/10

The sound follows the example of the graphics, good enough but only so. I would have given it a six but the music can be completely awful, the second area has this odd techno thing that makes strange sounds as it plays. Mostly the music is as generic as everything else but whenever it does break the pattern of mediocrity set by the rest of the game it's only for the worse. Guns make underwhelming noises and grenades aren't exactly that spectacular either. On a positive note guards will often have amusing conversations with each other and the acting isn't that bad.

Gameplay 6/10

Ah gameplay, this is what should be the deciding factor when judging any game. Essentially you just run around killing things much like any other shooter. This game's particular gimmick is the way it forces you to take cover. The levels are full of things to hide behind and the health system is designed to reward you for taking cover. Whenever you get shot you lose a sliver of health and are threatened with losing more if you continue to get hit. If you get shot about fifteen times in a single volley you're worm food, however you can survive those same fifteen or so shots if you only get shot once at a time and let your health regenerate between each shot. You'll still take the default damage for getting shot but you wont take the penalties for getting shot a whole lot at once. It works kind of like the health in certain fighting games. Health is regained by picking up those magic boxes with red crosses on them that every gamer is familiar with. In each level you are given objectives but basically all that means is that you must move from point A to the blue glowing circle at point B, sometimes afterwards you might have to continue on to point C or back to point A but it almost always boils down to moving through a fairly linear sequence of fighting. Enemies like to fight in much the same manner that you do taking cover behind various objects. Many people who have written reviews for this game claim these enemies are very intelligent, personally they just seem kind of cowardly to me. Their only real tactics are to fire from protected positions and to bum rush you, they don't do the latter very often. They can be flushed out of their positions with grenades but not for long since they'll just seek new cover as fast as possible. Occasionally they'll try to flank you but only really if they can do so without crossing open ground, the game doesn't have many areas that would allow this. Even when they do try a flanking maneuver it isn't very well organized. For the most part a methodical gamer can hand them their asses while a rash impatient gamer will get thoroughly ventilated. Most of the times I died it was because of some enemy ambushing me from the side, there is a certain trail and error thing in effect. The game is very short, the first night I had it after renting it I came home to realize I had left my memory card at a friends house. I called him and told him to swing by and drop it off since he had to go somewhere in about twenty minutes anyway. I then began playing it assuming I could just start saving as soon as he dropped by. Two or three hours later I realized he wasn't going to drop by and that I was getting tired of playing the game, I shut it off feeling resentful of my friend. The next day while walking my dogs I dropped by his house and got the memory card back, and the day after that I started playing again this time saving. I beat the game in two sittings and it turned out that I had finished about 5/6s of the game that first night before quitting. That is short, that is REALLY short. At the same time though I realize that had it gone on much longer I would have gotten sick of it anyway due to it's repetitive nature. I came away from the gameplay experience feeling lukewarm about the whole thing.

Story 3/10

Some unsavory characters ruin a guy named Bishop's life before killing him and turning him into a killer zombie soldier for the purpose of starting WW3. Kind of like Robocop but not near as cool. Over time Bishop will struggle to regain his mind and body and the game will conclude with a showdown between him and his equally uninteresting nemesis. Bishop himself is a generic amalgamation of the kind of military hero types you see in videogames. In Bishop they tried to combine the badassness of Solid Snake, the cold calculated attitude of Sam Fischer and the devil may care cockiness of Gabe Logan. He fails to capture any of the things that make those guys so likeable and he himself serves as a representation of this game's generic nature.

Multiplayer 0/10

There is no multiplayer, why is there no multiplayer? Third person shooters are supposed to have an obligatory multiplayer mode, this is clearly unacceptable.

Replay Value 2/10

It's so short and so repetitive. I can't see any reason to ever want to play it again after beating it once. There is a hard mode, essentially the same thing only you can take less damage, not very enticing. No extras, no unlockibles and no bonus endings make Bishop a dull boy.

Buy or rent?

Rent it, beat it return it if you want to play it. Why not rent an exceptional game instead though?

In conclusion this game reminds me of something my series Gunny told me in boot camp when my PT scores were right at the minimum of acceptability. He said to me “A Marine should always strive to be the best, you are meeting the minimums but doing so shouldn't be your goal. You must strive to become exceptional, not average.” The guys who made this game need similar advice.

Overall 5/10

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 05/23/04