Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines

"Somewhere in office, Arnold is crying"

Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines

The Terminator has returned. With Atari’s recent use of the Terminator license, they have created two games from it: Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, and Terminator 3: Redemption. I’m sure with this, Atari thought they struck software gold. I mean a First-Person shooter where you control the Arnold “The Terminator” Schwarzenegger through the present and the future sound great, right? Well the developer chosen to make Rise of the Machines is none other then Black Ops Entertainment, the same company behind the dreadful Fugitive Hunter. Will this game be better then Black Ops’ previous games? Will this make a good game for Black Ops? Find out in my review of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines.

Story
Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines’ story begins with a recap of the beginning of the movie. It talks about how thanks to Sarah Conner, John Conner, and Terminator, it seemed that Judgement Day was eliminated. Conner, now in his 20's, lives “off the grind” - no home, no credit cards, no cell phone and no job. No way he can be traced by Skynet, the highly developed network of machines that once tried to eradicate John Conner. However, after this, the game takes us into the future were we see the war between the humans and Skynet. The world is a complete mess thanks to the war. We are brought to a secret base of the resistance, as Arnold is reprogrammed by John Conner’s wife, Kate Brewster. It gets interrupted by some of Skynet’s cybernetic soldiers. After laying waste to the cyborgs and the flying disc-machines, F/K Kites, you take control of Arnold and his mission to protect John’s wife. The first half of the game takes place in the future, showing the events that happened in the future, before the Terminator and T-X went back in time.

Gameplay
For the most part, Terminator 3 is a First-Person Shooter. You control the “Govenator” through levels, destroy the Terminator’s and resistance met by Skynet. There are three different types of Terminator droids encountered within these sections. The types include:

• T-900 Green - The green T-900s travel in packs and are the most common in Skynet’s army. They are the easiest to terminate.

• T-900 Yellow - The yellow T-900s carry two guns. They are tougher then their green-colored counterparts.

• T-900 Red - The red T-900s carry Skynet Assault Cannons. They are by far the toughest to terminate.

You also encounter some of Skynet’s lesser droids, flying units, and ground units. The F/K classes, the flying droids, can be quite a problem to take down. Another type of resistance you face, are the ground units, which include F/K Rover Bombs, Tanks, and even the first terminator series made, the T1. The T1 isn’t humanoid like the newer models, but rather they resemble that of armored battle tanks.

The controls for the shooting missions feel a little jerky and clunky. Many times you’ll find yourself having a hard time getting the cross-hairs on the target. Because of this, you’ll find blasting swarms of enemies (especially flying ones) becoming a chore, rather then fun. Thankfully, Black Ops included a lock-on button which makes it easier. Also, sometimes your bullets...err, lasers go right through them! Another problem with this game is the enemy A.I.. They are dumb. I know cyborgs aren’t supposed to act like a human would, but are they really this stupid? I’ve seen them miss soldiers that are standing still, only 5 feet away from them, and walk into walls. However, there are times when the A.I. also seems to never miss. Not only that, but they go down after only a few shots from your weaponry. I’m surprised the human’s are losing the war if this is how the machines act. Along with all this, the game has some unclear objectives at times (like find the exit in 15 seconds or you die,) so you’ll find yourself repeating levels again and again.

Once you reach the present, you find yourself in levels that were in the movie. However, just like in the movie, you aren’t allowed to kill any innocents or police, just because you’re such a swell guy. Also, in the present you face off with the T-X, who has a nasty plasma gun, and she’s in the mood to kick ass. As the Terminator puts it “She is a far more effective killing machine.”

There are a wide variety of weapons to chose from. In the future, you find weapons ranging from plasma rifles, to lightning guns, to SMGs, to plasma machine-guns, and even rocket launchers. Once you reach the present, the weapons get more modern of course. You find weapons like 9mm pistols, shotguns, MP5s, mini-guns, machine guns, and grenade launchers. Don’t worry. Ammo is plentiful.

Now first-person shooting isn’t the only thing this game has. If you’ve played Black Ops’ other game, Fugitive Hunter, then you’ll remember that to catch the terrorists, you needed to fight them in a ‘poor man’s version of Street Fighter’ fight. Well Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines has brought it back. Usually the bosses, such as other main Terminator’s and the T-X, the game goes into 3rd person where you fight them. This time however, the combat system was designed by members of Shiny, the same company behind the mediocre Enter the Matrix. You attack you enemies by pressing the A and Y buttons to punch and kick, and the B button to throw. You can block by using the X button. Let’s just say the fighting portions of the game aren’t something the developer should brag about. Also, the character models during the fights look very stiff. I guess the stiffness is ok in this case, since you only fight other Terminator’s during these battles, and cyborgs are stiff.

Graphics
Since the first half of the game takes place in the future, you’ll play that part in destroyed cities. Not a lot of variety in the future. Once you reach the present, it gets more colorful, as you play through the areas found in the movies. The graphical effects look outdated. Fire looks flat, the water looks flat and like goo, and explosions seem to consist of flashing balls of light, and sometimes balls of fire for explosions. Also, there are a few animation bugs to be found. During cut-scenes, the screen goes to a wide screen mode to give it a movie effect. Only one problem: the black bars don’t cover the entire top and bottom. You’ll see gaps in the wide screen cut scenes on mainly on the top of the screen, so it kind of ruins the effect. The textures look muddled, and the character models are undetailed. Sometimes when the machines fall to the ground, they instantly get back up, and completely skip their ‘getting up’ animation. More problems include characters going through walls, and enemies responding out of thin air (one moment you see air, the next you see a machine.) Also, on some of the characters, you’ll see little holes in their model (often around the eyes) so you can see inside their hollow character model. Also, it seems all the soldiers look the same (with different eyes), and all of them feature an emotionless stare, which makes them look like robots. It’s little bugs like that which bring down the graphics score. Over all, this game is a graphical mess.

For the cut-scenes, they use either clips from the movie or they use CG. If the scene your in is from the movie, then they tend to use the clips from the movie. However, since there were no real clips of the future in the T3 movie, the cut-scenes in the future are done with Computer Graphics. Even in the present they use the Computer Graphic cut-scenes for moments that weren’t in the movie. Black Ops did a great job with the cut scenes, as for the most part, they look great.

Music and Sound
The soundtrack found in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines was one of the only good things I found in this game. Most of the music throughout the levels sound like the music from the movies (and some of the music sounds like it’s from the Matrix.) However, even with good themes in it, you often find background music absent during the levels. Atari did do something right with this, and obtained the cast from the movie to do the voices. Thanks to this, the voice acting is top notch.

Extras
Atari even included a few easter eggs in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. Through out the many missions, you can find old arcade machines of classic Atari games, like Mission Command and Centipede. It’s always nice when developers add this.

Final Thoughts
Overall, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines is a mediocre game that doesn’t do the series justice. The game may have had wonderful CGI cutscenes and top notch voice acting, but good voices and pretty graphics don’t make a game. For that, I can only afford Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines a mediocre score. If you love the Terminator series, then you may enjoy this game. However, for everyone else, you’ll want to avoid this game at all costs. Hopefully Terminator 3: Redemption will turn out better.

Final Score: 4/10

Reviewer's Score: 4/10, Originally Posted: 05/02/04