Ghost In The Shell: Stand Alone Complex – PSP – Review

Ok, the reason I wanted to play
this title is because I am a big fan of the Ghost in the Shell anime. It was a
revolutionary leap forward in the way complex and engaging science fiction
could be translated over to the animation medium. So, being that I am such a
big fan I thought I would be able to give this title a fair shake and not get
a bunch of grief no matter how I scored it from all of the other anime fans
out there. So please, all you die-hard fans out there, go easy on me and try
the game before you send in your nasty e-mails.

First off Ghost in the Shell (GitS)
is indeed a first-person shooter on the PSP. The only other FPS on the PSP was
the widely reviled Coded Arms so I was thinking it couldn’t get any worse then
that, and I was right, it didn’t get worse, but it didn’t get much better
either. As is the norm in GitS, there is a heavy amount of conspiracy-based
plot twists and all sorts of different terrorist cells operating in this bleak
and violent future. Problem is, there is so much plot and animation to watch
that I really think it steals from the overall gaming experience. I mean, I’m
all for cool cutscenes and little plot devices to help move things along.  But
in GitS, there is an awful lot of watching going on (and not enough
playing) and the plot is so thick with technical references and double, double
crosses and back stabbing that I found myself not really caring about the
plight of our four heroes (the same one from the cartoon) and their obviously
contrived situation.

The state gaming commission released
2500 of these little fellas for sport!

Now eventually when you do finally
get to play, you can choose from one of the four heroes featured in the game
Motoko, Batou, Saitu and Togusa. Now once you get your character picked you
can arm them with several different weapons that you select from a rather
large collection. And you must equip and arm a Tachikoma, a sort of walking
tank that fights alongside you. The Tachikoma provides the comedic relief as
they are supposed to be a new form of A.I.  You can arm the Tachikoma with
some of the games cooler weapons and in some instances actually get inside of
them and control them. It’s one of the game’s better ideas, as often you must
place a rescued character in the Tachikoma and then lead it out of harm’s way.
Plus with a quick pop-up menu, you can order them to attack viciously anyone
who gets near you, or stand down and let you complete a stealthier part of the
mission.

The missions, by the way,
are fairly short and I breezed through the first few with a little too much
ease, which is actually saying something because the controls on this title
are not it’s strongest suit. Using the control nub you can move your character
around and with the four primary buttons you can look up, down, right and
left. It’s something of a stretch for all of us since we are all used to using
the much more dialed in controllers of the console systems and/or the
tried-and-true mouse and keyboard. Thankfully the game does give you an
auto-aim feature that helps alleviate some of the difficulty of dialing in on
a bad guy. But it is small consideration since the game really isn’t
controlled well. I am not a big-handed guy and the way my hands would clench
up as I used the nub (which is set too low in my opinion) and the right
trigger button to fire while using my right thumb to aim. The whole thing just
does not work.

Hold still, you’ve got something on your
face, I’ll get it for you.

Since it is based on an excellent
anime, I suspected that the graphics would rock, and I was right as far as the
cutscenes were concerned. It appears to be a darn near lift straight out of
the anime series and that in itself is pretty cool. But when it comes to
in-game action, the game has a very strong deja vu feeling as you seem to run
into the same bad guys over and over as you run past the same metal crates and
parked semi trucks. The level design isn’t all that inspiring either, as you
can activate the map and see exactly where you need to go, so that really
eliminates the whole "surprise" aspect of the game.

Likewise, the voice acting is
straight from the anime as well and done with spot-on quality. The music and
in-game voice work are also pretty decent but the explosions, gunfire and
other action noises seem to be on the lacking side of things.

Gameplay: 4.8
Very bad controls on this one, I can’t play for long stretches as it
isn’t at all comfortable. The auto aim feature helps, but still…

Graphics: 7.4
The anime cutscenes are directly ported from the cartoon, but the
in-game graphics are filled with repeat characters, poor level design and
small areas that don’t do a good enough job of giving the game some depth.

Sound: 7.0
Paying the voice actors to reprise
their roles was smart, but allowing the sound effect part of the game to fall
flat was just plain mean.

Difficulty: Easy/Medium
There is like six levels in the
game each with three or four parts, and I flew through the first few with no
problem. It’s more of a challenge fighting your way through the very heavy and
unnecessary plot.

Concept: 6.1
First-person shooters are new to
the PSP, and this one is better then the other, but only just. There needs to
be some creative thinking done if this genre is going to be a viable medium on
the PSP.

Multiplayer: 6.0
You can go at it with some friends via ad-hoc if they, too, possess
the game. The multiplayer levels are a bit on the small side and given the
complete absence of cunning that is required it’s not much more then an
exercise in holding down the fire button.

Overall: 5.8
The PSP still has a way to go in
the FPS genre. I must say if you are looking for a decent action game you’d be
better off with SOCOM; this ghost just has no legs.