There
are few times when words can fail to express the wonder, and adrenaline rush
associated with a video game title. Peter Jackson’s King Kong, an Xbox 360
release from Ubisoft presented one of those moments.
The
title only had two levels available to play at a recent Xbox 360 Event in San
Francisco, one was entitled Chased and centered on a trio of the film’s
explorers trying to avoid being chewed on by a tyrannosaurus rex while searching
for other members of their party. Armed with a machine gun, and facing minor
puzzles, the scene played out in adrenaline-pumping fervor. The T-Rex was
merciless in its pursuit. Your traveling mates are yelling out for you to
“distract” it while they get a gate open. Distract it? With a machine gun that
tears holes in it but rather than damage it, only seems to make it angrier?
Yeah, right! How about you take the gun and distract it and Jack (the character
players participate as in the scenario) opens the gate.
It is
played from the first-person perspective, and at times all you can see is teeth
– really BIG teeth. Running helps, but the T-Rex is in hot pursuit and your
comrades seem to delight in telling you that. If you take too much damage, there
are teeth, and a throat and a lot of red stuff, which presumably is you being
ingested.
The
second playable level centered on Kong defending the small human
love-of-his-life from not one, but three T-Rexes. It begins with a T-Rex
threatening Kong, who is holding the girl, so he sets her down and begins a
brutal combat match with the foe – pounding away, grabbling and trying to pry
the jaws far enough apart (with some startling accompanying graphics) to end the
monster’s life. Kong can power up by pounding on his chest and he will certainly
need it. After defeating the one dinosaur, he hears the woman calling for help.
She has wandered off (silly human!) and is being menaced by two T-Rexes. Kong
must solve some simple puzzles to open up a pathway to the arena where she is
and then take out the monsters before they do more than merely menace the human.
Fortunately the monsters can be separated and attacked separately, but Kong has
to balance beating on them to keep attention away from the woman without taking
too much on himself.
The
game is a bit of a button masher, but is an exceptional graphical display. The
environments have destructible elements, there is water that splashes around and
creates some great effects. This scenario is played out in the third-person
perspective. Equally as amazing is the game’s sound.
Two
levels, but guaranteed heart-thumpers. If the rest of this title lives up to the
two levels displayed at the Microsoft event, then Ubisoft is about to unleash a
“monster” of an Xbox 360 title.
