Altered Beast: Guardian of the Realms

"Better than the first?"

I played the original Alterd beast and enjoyed it, when I saw this game I thought it would be just a remake of th original, I was wrong.

Story: 5/10
Basically the same as the first Alterd Beast, you are a warrior that is brought back from the dead by the gods to save the world, nothing great, but it works.

Audio: 5/10
Every creature you encounter has the same growl and all of their other sounds are recycled throughout the game. The music is pretty catchy, which is the only thing saving this section of the game.

Gameplay: 5/10
The game play is the same as the last Alterd Beast. You are a man, you go through a level ( its a side-scroller) and pick up power ups, first you become more muscular, then you become like the Incredible Hulk, then you turn into that level's animal form which grants you lots of new attacks, wait, no, just two attacks. Thats right, each animal form has two attacks, and they are not that great. Oh, but you can get upgrades to your animal forms that increase their strength says the instruction manual, but the upgrades just change the animal's color, nobody has found any evidence that these upgrades increase strength. Another problem, difficulty. This game is so hard to beat because you die in three hits, only have one life, no checkpoints, and health is very rare.

Multiplayer:6/10
You can link up with someone else and play co-op in this game. It helps with those insanely difficult levels, but usually you and your friend will just end up fighting over who becomes the animal and who stays as the puny little guy, they couldn't have added in enough power ups for both players? Another problem is that you probably won't be able to find someone who has this game, it is really rare.

overall: 5
Unless you are a diehard fan of the original , stay away from this game. Then again, even if you want it you probably won't be able to find it.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 08/09/06