Review: Get Even delivers a well-told story but is held back by its lackluster gameplay

Platforms: PlayStation 4 (reviewed), Xbox One, PC

Developer: The Farm 51

Publisher: Bandai Namco Entertainment

MSRP: $29.99

Introduction:

Originally announced in 2014, Get Even is a stealth/shooter that sees the main protagonist, Cole Black, trying to recount a series of events regarding a crime through the use of a VR-type headset. The technology in the headset is similar to that of the tech seen in the Animus in Assassin’s Creed or the machine used in the Jake Gyllenhaal film Source Code. In the game’s prologue, Black finds himself tracking down a missing girl. When he finds her strapped to a chair with a bomb strapped to her chest, things go south and he is knocked unconscious. Shortly after that, he wakes up outside an abandoned asylum and he becomes trapped there when he explores the mysterious building in front of him.

His only way out is to cooperate with a mysterious character behind a screen, known only as Red, who gives Black the VR-like device called The Pandora which allows the user to relive memories and even change them (although it doesn’t really affect the present, it’s not a time machine, it’s a simulation). The goal is to remember why you were trying to find the girl, who orchestrated her kidnapping, and any other pieces of information that may be relevant.

A unique, well-written tale of regret filled with twists and turns:

The story of Get Even is simply fascinating and has many layers to it. Usually, “budget games” like this have stories that are pretty forgettable and throwaway but Get Even’s is truly interesting and unique. It does have some tropes that come with this type of story, a mysterious character who knows more than they’re letting on, the main protagonist constantly uttering “Why am I here?!” or “What’s happening?!”, and more but the actual story it tells is fairly unique. Get Even centers around themes of regret, wanting to change things we know we can’t change, and not being moving on from traumatic events. We all wish we could go back and change certain things and this game offers the “What if?” scenario that allows you to do things differently.

Not only is the premise unique but the story is well-told and constructed very well. Each subplot ties to the overall plot, there’s a lot of various things happening in the story but it manages to juggle everything fairly competently, and it has a lot of twists and turns that don’t come off as cheesy as potentially could. While some twists may be a bit predictable (I was able to predict various things hours before they happened), there are a few elements that really caught me off guard. It goes to some dark places but it manages to tell a very compelling story with emotion, especially towards the end of the game.

The acting is far better than I expected. Although this game has no recognizable actors, there are a few that really give it their all. I was genuinely surprised at how great the acting was and how they managed to sell certain key scenes.

I have to give them, even more, credit due to the fact it’s very rare you see someone’s face in this game and even rarer that you see them talking. There’s no facial capture or anything to help actors really get into the scene, it’s exclusively their voice. Every time a character talks they’re either on the phone, behind a distorted screen, or a distorted character model in a memory. Every critical character in the game has this Animus-y look to them in the memories, they’re fading in and out and visually stuttering. I’m not sure if this was an artistic choice or if it was much cheaper and easier to not have to animate character’s faces and bodies outside of enemies.

Gameplay is dull despite its efforts to innovate and be interesting:

Speaking of enemies, the combat in Get Even is less than stellar. It’s arguably one of the weakest elements of the game. Cole Black is said to be a cold-blooded gun for hire but you don’t really get a feel for that in the game. For one, Red is constantly condemning you for killing people but it’s literally Black’s one and only character trait, he’s a straight up killer. I can’t imagine he went through these actual memories and didn’t kill anyone. When you do actually get into combat, it’s not very satisfying. When you knock someone out, it’s the same animation each time. When I shoot someone in the head, sometimes it doesn’t kill them. On top of all of that, the combat is painfully dull. There are two really cool combat mechanics in the game but they sadly can’t make up for how dreadfully boring it is. There’s no "oomph" to it, it has no real exciting feeling to it.

In a game like Wolfenstein: The New Order, you’re able to stealthily throw knives, use a silenced pistol, and brutally take down enemies with melee combat and that’s just for stealth. When things have to get loud, you have grenades that turn enemies into a big explosion of blood and guts, akimbo shotguns or assault rifles that feel exhilarating to shoot, environmental kills, and a variety of other methods to use. In Get Even, it’s just shoot a guy with a pistol or an AR with little ammo or knock a guy out with the same animation each time. I know this game isn’t trying to be the next big shooter or compete with a game like Wolfenstein but it should at least have enough variety so each combat section doesn’t feel exactly the same.

The most notable mechanic in the game is a weapon attachment called the “Corner Gun”. This advanced weaponry allows you to sit behind cover and shoot your gun while it’s turned at a precise 90-degree angle. You’re able to view where your gun is aiming via a camera mounted on the gun and you simply pull the trigger. The one negative about this is that by doing this, you’re taking away a lot of the danger and fun of a shooter. I wasn’t running and gunning or stealthily taking down guys while sneaking around a level, I was sitting in one area for a few minutes and picking guys off. The only way this could’ve been prevented is if the AI was smart enough to flank me or attempt to make strategic advances on me.

The AI in this game is pretty broken. You can walk right up to them and they’ll barely see you, yet sometimes I would be far away from their vision cone on the mini-map and they could see me. It was super inconsistent and made it difficult to stealth around without knowing how the AI may react, it’s the worst kind of unpredictable AI. During a scripted firefight sequence where the whole building is on alert, shooting at you, I saw a guard casually patrolling as if nothing was happening. There were bullets flying everywhere, people were collapsing right in front of him, and he just kept walking along as if everything was fine and dandy. Quite literally the worst security guard to ever live, he may have been blind and deaf.

When you’re not shooting people and stealthing around in the memories, you’re likely doing some investigating and puzzle solving within the asylum. A big component of this game is searching for evidence and clues to help remember your past. A large number of these pieces of evidence can be overlooked and you’ll miss out on a lot of intriguing backstory, a large chunk of it is completely optional and can be missed if you’re not being a thorough detective. As for puzzles, usually, they’re pretty easy which is disappointing because they could’ve really challenged your critical thinking skills in some places but they opt not to. I found myself actually overthinking a lot of things due to the fact I expected them to be more complex but they were actually things like simple addition. There are a couple interesting puzzles but not enough to stand out.

Early on, the game teases that there are some choices you’ll be making that will have long term consequences. There was only one choice that really seemed to have any major impact and it’s the first choice I made in the game, games seem to want to offer the illusion of choice nowadays but they don’t offer any major changes in the overall narrative which just seems frustrating and gimmick-y.

Get Even is technically unimpressive and feels outdated:

The last thing I’ll talk about is some of the technical aspects of the game, some of which are nitpicks, while some are legit gripes. For one, this game is not visually impressive, it’s actually pretty ugly sometimes. It looks like a PS3/Xbox 360 era game and lots of the textures are blurry and look unfinished. At times, it feels like the development team took lazy shortcuts. For example, the reflections on windows don’t accurately reflect the background, it’s just constantly reflecting one transparent still image that doesn’t actually look like the area you’re standing in. Pro tip: Don’t bother with window reflections if you’re not going to fully commit to it. Get Even also has this pretty annoying black Instagram-like filter over the screen almost constantly. I don’t know why it’s there, it makes the game look much darker than it needs to be and turning up the brightness didn’t seem to help a whole lot.

The Verdict:

While I did really enjoy the story of Get Even (even though it runs just a bit too long), the gameplay felt very insipid despite its efforts to innovate with a mechanic or two. The lack of any real style or personality in gameplay really shows and makes it feel like a chore to progress through the story and the issues with AI, textures, and more bogged down my enjoyment of the title. If Get Even was simply a movie or a TV show, I’d probably really dig it but the gameplay and technical issues really hindered my enjoyment of this game. If you see this game on sale, maybe give it a shot but there’s nothing about Get Even that makes it a very fun video game outside of its entertaining, unique, and well-told story.