Rick O’Connell has survived many a
gun battle, a long trek through a desert and a fight against the undead armies
of an Egyptian mummy that has come to life to destroy the world of the living in
order to resurrect a long-lost love. Yet somehow, the same Rick O’Connell isn’t
able to jump over a barrel that instantly kills him if it even comes into
contact with him. In The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, a PlayStation
2 game based on the recent summer movie, the action heroes seen in the movie
star in a very flawed and forgetful gaming experience.
Tomb of the Dragon Emperor’s story,
narrated wonderfully by Michelle Yeoh who plays a powerful witch, is a rather
interesting one. It deals with a Dragon Emperor that once ruled China with an
iron fist and dreams of immortality. As fate would have it, he does find
immortality but only as a stone statue … the result of a witch’s curse that
sealed the Emperor for eternity. Several years pass and a different O’Connell
discovers a different hidden tomb during an archeological expedition and awakens
the power of a new kind of mummy.
You begin the game playing Alex
O’Connell, the grown-up son of Rick and Evy from the past two Mummy
films, as he finds the Emperor’s tomb to the annoyance of armed Chinese
soldiers. Serving as a tutorial mode, the first level simply reveals much of
what you can come to expect from the rest of the game. In the first level, you
will be brawling and shooting your way through the tomb as well as performing a
few Tomb Raider-like climbing and jumping. Oh, and there are some puzzles
that require the use of the analog sticks as well.
The problem is that the game does
action and the Tomb Raider moments badly. Since the aiming feature in the
game is erratic, you’ll find yourself kicking at nothing unless you turn to face
your enemy and forget targeting altogether. This, of course, can’t be done when
you’re shooting any of the available guns so you will often find yourself
targeting the farthest enemy in your line of sight or nothing at all. To make
matters worst, the camera often obscures enemies so oftentimes you won’t know
where an enemy is until they shoot at you.
There are also moments in the game
where you will scale walls, leaping from platform to platform while avoiding
booby traps or environmental hazards such as landslides or falling debris from a
cavern. While the game does its best to make these moments challenging, it’s
most a trail-and-error approach that will get you through them. As for the
game’s puzzles, you use the analog stick to open doors, pull levers or turn
wheels in a clockwise direction. Some doors require you to pull and turn at the
same time using both sticks but other than that there is not much to these
puzzles.
The story isn’t told really well
either so anyone who hasn’t seen the movie will be a bit confused by a number of
things such as when exactly did the Dragon Emperor was resurrected and running
around the modern streets outside a Shanghai museum. The game does follow the
events of the film, though, and you will also get to play as Rick O’Connell who
fights just a tad differently than his son. The game’s levels try to add some
variety but fails by bringing anything original. Rick, for example, will jump
behind a mounted gun to take out enemies that suddenly pop out of everywhere and
there’s even a mine cart level.
In other words, there’s nothing very
original or fun about the game’s levels even with the number of weapons (dual
guns, a Thompson machine gun and shotguns) or the number of different enemies
such as wolves and Abominable Snowmen. It’s hard to enjoy a game when the hero
can’t even aim one gun let alone two of them. Even the boss battles are
wearisome since they ramp up the difficulty to an insane degree.
Sadly, the game isn’t very
good-looking either. Just about the only positive thing I can say about the
graphics is the fact that the characters look a lot like the actors so Rick does
look like Brendan Fraser and Alex does look like Luke Ford. It’s just too bad
that the rest of the game doesn’t look as good seeing as locales are wonderfully
exotic in the movie and here they look flat an uninteresting. There is footage
from the movie but the video is so choppy that this feels more like a PSOne game
than a PS2 game. Oh and there are clipping problems aplenty.
At least the game’s sound is a bit
better than the game’s visuals and this is mostly because actors such as Brendan
Fraser, Jonathan Hannah and Luke Ford handle the voice work. As I mention
before, Michelle Yeoh handles the story narration and she does a stellar job.
The music is not bad at all and the sound effects heard throughout the game are
not detailed but do an adequate job.
The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon
Emperor for the PlayStation 2, sadly enough, just seems to maintain the idea
that nothing good can come from translating a movie to game form. It can be done
if a genuine effort is made to not only make it fun but also crafted well enough
to be a perfect companion piece to an interesting summer blockbuster.
Unfortunately, this game simply feels rushed and is just too flawed to recommend
to anyone. Sorry but this is one mummy that should stay in its tomb.
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Gameplay: 3.5
Weak controls make aiming
downright frustrating and nearly impossible no matter which character you play
in the game. The brawling and shooting are also handled boringly throughout the
game and even though the game follows the movie’s plot the cut scenes makes this
story seem so dull and confusing.
Graphics: 7.0
Visually, the graphics feature
some weak textures and flat backgrounds but at least the game’s main characters
look a lot like the actors in the movie. It’s just too bad that there are some
bad clipping problems and the cut scene footage of the movie is choppy.
Sound: 7.5
With the exception of Maria Bello
and Jet Li, most of the film’s cast reprise their role and do a rather good job
with the voice acting. The best performance goes to Michelle Yeoh who does a
magnificent job as narrator. The rest of the sound is just decent but not great.
Difficulty:
Medium
The puzzles are painfully obvious
and most of the enemies don’t provide much of a challenge in this game. As for
the platform jumping, it’s all trail-and-error so it won’t take you long to
figure out all the booby traps.
Concept: 4.0
While the game tries to add some
variety with some on-rails shooting sequences and poorly conceived analog stick
puzzles, not even most of the film’s cast can make this game any better. There
are a few unlockable features such as concept art and weapon upgrades if you’re
into that sort of thing.
Overall: 3.5
Simply put, Tomb of the Dragon
Emperor is a sloppy and uninteresting PS2 game that doesn’t come close to
matching the spirit of this summer’s Mummy sequel. Plagued by a series of
problems that go way beyond the awful controls, the action just isn’t fun or
rewarding enough to keep gamers wanting to see this through to the end.
