James Bond 007: Everything or Nothing

"A diferent approach, not necesarily a better one."

Welcome to the newest installment in the long line of James Bond games. In this adventure you play James Bond(Pierce Brosnan) battling against the student of Max Zoren whom Bond killed in the Bond movie ''A View to a Kill''. Unfortunately like ''A View to a Kill'', it's not the best Bond game yet still has enough charm to entertain most people.
Story 8/10: You are Bond, James Bond. Superagent that remains undercover although you seem to blow up everything around you. You are assigned to rescue a Dr. Katya Nadanova(Heidi Klum) from Nikolai Diavolo(Willem Dafoe), a former KGB gone freelance terrorist. You travel from Moscow to Peru, as well as New Orleans and finally Egypt. The character interaction is pretty good, although classic cliche at times. The plotline is above average for a Bond game although what really saves it is the strong cast.
GRAPHICS 7/10 I have heard it said that these graphics are awesome. Not true. They are average most places, good in others. The dialog sequences are done really well. The close-ups of the character faces are VERY well done with a very high polygon count and great animation. However, the game itself seems a bit sloppy. In Nightfire, the gameplay was very smooth; Here we get better graphics than those of ''Enter the Matrix''(X-Box), but it's not really all that great. Someparts look great like the Peru stages, someparts are just decent like some of the driving scenes. The driving scenes are nice but not as detailed as in Nightfire. The graphics get the job done, there isn't anything too extraordinary here.
SOUND 10/10: No doubt, the sound is great. THX sound system support. Great voices from real actors including Judi Dench as M, John Cleese as Q, Willem Dafoe, and Pierce Brosnan. Does a cast get better than this? No. The music itself is improved over Nightfire's repetition of the James bond Theme. Here we get variety and classic musical momments as well as a really nice intro song. Explosions sound good, gunfire is done well. Speech is clear not only in cutscenes but in the game as well. Which is important in some areas where it can clue you in on what the guards are doing while you're trying to be stealthy. Good job.
GAMEPLAY 7/10: James Bond gets the ''Dead to Rights'' engine in Everything or Nothing. This means that it's a third-person perspective. Where you can rotate the camera with the right stick and move with the left stick. Hold the left trigger to lock-on to an enemy, and right trigger to fire at him. This system was supposed to make you feel more like Bond. It really doesn't. You have to be exposed to lock-on to an enemy. This means that the enemies get to play ''Duck Hunt'' with you going back and forth while Locking on to enemies. You HAVE to get shot! The bad guys are good shots,and there is NO MANUAL AIM! Sometimes the lock system will ignore a target that is ''Out of Range''. Yet he can shoot you no problem. A manual aim is possible only with the sniper rifle, and you will get shot as you aim. This game is harder than past Bond games. But for the wrong reasons. Some enemies spongtaneously appear. CHEAP!
Okay, the good things. The system does work, but takes getting used to. The martial arts are easier to perform and I heard that's one of the things they wanted to improve on. I guess in that, they succeeded.
FUN FACTOR 8/10: Although the gameplay has it's share of problems (LIKE NO MANUAL AIM!), this game is fun to play. The cutscenes are fun to watch and Bond has enough charm and good moments to make you overlook the minor things. The action scenes are fun, as are the driving scenes. There is one particularly fun driving scene where you do a rally race. This was really well done and reffreshing from the Missile loaded vehicles Bond usually gets. The gadgets are usefull and fun to control. And of course, you have a great cast delivering an entertaining performance.
BOND GIRLS 7/10: Shannon Elizabeth and Heidi Klum get an 7 out of ten? Well, yes. Although Shannon and Heidi are perfect tens in real life, the transfer to the game world was not as good as you would think. Their hair is kind of painted on and has no real depth to it. They also don't glow they way they do in real life. Basically, Shannon and Heidi are much better looking than what I'm seeing here. We do get some good transfers though. Agent Mya Starling (Mya) looks good in the game and we get Q's assistant Ms. Nagai (Misaki Ito, a japanese pop idol) whom is well animated and very cute.
OVERALL 7/10: I think first-person is the only way to be Bond. Nightfire was GREAT. Everything or Nothing is a different approach to Bond, but not necessarily a better approach. It has it's moments where you will enjoy it, but it does have it's moments where it same old, same old. The best way to describe this game is: ''Even if a Bond movie is not that great, there are still enough good moments in it that you will not mind watching it.''
RENT/BUY: Rent this game first. It's a good game, but not great. After Nightfire, I really expected more. Instead, I got a little bit less.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 02/21/04