One minute
you’re just one of many thugs in a long line of other thugs working for one of
the major crime syndicates in the corrupt city of Las Sombras and the next you
find yourself betrayed by the same group you once considered family. The anger
you feel boils your blood and all you can think about is beating the men behind
this betrayal and beating them without mercy. Ah, you think, I’ll form my own
crime family that will rival those backstabbing fools and finally lay my
vengeance upon them. This is exactly what happens in Beatdown: Fists of
Vengeance for the Xbox, a fighting game with some interesting ideas.
In the beginning
of the game you are asked to pick from five characters (Gina, Raven, Jason G.,
Aaron and Lola), each with his or her own distinct fighting specialty and weapon
of preference. If you pick Jason G., for example, your weapon of choice would be
a bottle while his fighting specialty would be Double Hammer Punch (a
high-impact punch that does double the damage). Gina, on the other hand, prefers
a knife and specializes in the Gattling Kick move (a series of quick kicks). The
story is different for each character but the underlying theme is the same. You
are a seasoned enforcer in the Zanetti crime family but for reasons I won’t go
into you and the other four main characters are betrayed by the family and thus
framed for murder. Chased down by the Las Sombras police as well as other
underworld figures, you vow to get revenge.
Yet the road to
vengeance is not an easy one to walk. First you’re being pursued by the city
police both honest and crooked, and secondly the city is filled with gangsters
out on the streets that can recognize you right away. You’re left to walk
through a small map that is the city of Las Sombras but you’re free to explore
side streets, subway stations and even enter buildings such as clothing stores,
bars and even a hospital. While there’s a city complete with a police station,
shopping district and a basketball court among other things, the city itself
feels small and cramped.
The shops you
can enter just don’t offer clothing options for when you’re bored with your
character’s appearance, changing clothes serve to conceal your identity from the
police and rival gangster. There are plenty clothing options (shirts, pants,
hats, sunglasses, etc.) and, in the Shopping District you can even change your
hair color or style your hair in a different way. Yet sometimes these things
aren’t enough and you’ll even resort to more drastic measures such as getting
plastic surgery (where you can pick from different noses and other facial
features). Of course, these things cost money and the only way you’ll earn it is
by beating up rival gangs, rob the random pedestrian and accepting sub-missions
like clearing the subway of a group of punks.
You’ll get into
many fights in this game and the more fights you win the more experience points
you earn to level up your fighter’s stamina, attack and technique skills. The
best part about leveling up is that your fighter can now become strong enough to
make more damage in fights you would have easily been knocked around had you
skipped straight to the heart of the matter. Leveling up on your technique makes
it far easier for you to negotiate with other brawlers you’ll encounter.
Negotiations are simple and one of the game’s highlights. Come across a bruiser
and you can either talk him into joining your gang and follow you around to help
during fights or you can shake them down for money, information or just perform
a bloody beat down that just results in your opponent getting beaten to death so
you can be free to search his or her corpse for money or items.
Unfortunately
even these things are ruined by the game’s forced attempt to be a dark and cool.
Interrogations should be a great way of finding out useful information like
finding out where the leader of a rival gang is hanging out. Instead, though,
you get such gems like “Err, um, a new skirt is available at the Rag Shack” or
“Um, taxis help you get to certain areas a lot quicker.” Not every fighter you
meet will eagerly join your ranks but once you’ve gained a reputation you’ll be
able to have two of them walk around with you and you can always get phone
numbers so you can call them up when you need an extra fist. There are even
thugs that require you to pay them to join up. With up to a hundred characters,
there are enough fighters to make up your army.
The sad part is
that even with these good ideas the fighting itself becomes the most
disappointing of hurdles you must deal with. You’ll be able to unleash some
basic moves well enough such as punches, kicks and grapple moves but the more
complex moves lack polish and feel awkward. Often times you’ll miss a lot,
punching in the direction an opponent was standing seconds ago. Weapons can also
be used but they are often not effective in your hands as they are in your
opponent’s hands. Top it off with opponents that can be easy to beat and others
will knock you out (if that happens you’ll take control of one of your recruited
gang members until all three of you are wiped out). Just about the only time the
fights feel good is one you’re drunk or taken a dose of bad healing pills. When
this happens things slow down enough for you to get in some solid punches and
kicks.
On the graphics
front, Fists of Vengeance is not a very good-looking Xbox game. Occasionally
we’re treated to some decent animated cutscenes but overall the game lacks
detail, better textures and less PS2-quality jaggies. The character models
aren’t bad, though, and it’s good to see facial bruising on your character. The
city, though, is unimpressive and too small so you’ll see everything you need to
in the first half of the game.
As I mentioned
above, the game is trying too hard to be dark and cool and thus fails to be
both. The dialogue sound roughly translated from Japanese and it comes off as
awkward during cutscenes or when you’re talking to other character in game.
Adding profanity to the awkward sentence structure just doesn’t help. Worse yet
the voice acting is amateurish and the soundtrack is recycled often within the
game. Even the sound effects just don’t make an impact.
As a fan of
fighting games, I was one of many gamers looking forward to a game that promised
to introduce many interesting new elements in almost the same vein as Shenmue II
did a long while back. Beatdown: Fists of Vengeance does possess many
interesting elements but they are overshadowed by the game’s hard to ignore
blemishes. If you’re a fighting fan you will be disappointed so do yourself a
favor and look elsewhere to get your fighting game fix.
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Gameplay: 5.0
Not quite the
best controls suited for the fighting genre, Beatdown’s biggest letdown is its
poor handling of the specialty and beat-down moves. The erratic controls make
for awkward brawls across small and uninteresting streets. The ability to
recruit your own gang is a nice touch but it’s the little things like changing
outfits and facial features via plastic surgery that really stands out.
Graphics: 5.2
Graphically
speaking, the Xbox has seen better looking Capcom games before but in the case
of this game it has done a sloppy job of displaying great textures, good
lighting and detailed character models that really stand out. Even the
environments don’t look as good nor are there great visual effects. On the
bright side there’s neat bruising.
Sound: 4.5
There’s very
little to like in the sound department as well with its atrociously written
dialogue that’s voiced in the most unintentionally funny way and repetitive
soundtrack. You can even forget environmental background noise because you won’t
hear much except for a passing car or two. The only thing good about the sound
effects are the sounds of characters receiving quite a beating.
Difficulty:
Medium
When your
opponent is a drunkard with a piece of lumber as a weapon you can expect to
thrash him or her without breaking a sweat. Then you go up against a
lightning-quick opponent with a samurai sword that makes short work of you
within seconds. The difficulty level rises and falls constantly throughout the
game so expect many easy fights mixed in with ridiculously difficult ones.
Concept: 5.5
There’s much
to like about Fists of Vengeance such as the constant changing of your
character’s appearance and his or her ability to recruit street thugs willing to
join your gang. There are many choices to make in this game and some have
interesting results while others – like interrogations or beat downs – fall
rather flat. There are five different endings available depending on what
character you play.
Multiplayer:
4.0
The
multiplayer in the game isn’t even worth mentioning seeing as it’s just two
players fighting against each another using familiar Las Sombras landmarks and
brawlers you meet or recruited in the single player game and the five main
characters.
Overall: 5.0
Alas Beatdown:
Fists of Vengeance just isn’t able to rise above its glaring flaws to bring us
the unique fighting game it should have been since the game was announced a long
while ago. It’s sparse moments of truly enjoyable fisticuffs just come too late
in a game that tries too hard to be cool. Fighting fans, this is one you should
simply rent or skip altogether.
