Sometimes the lines between reality and fiction blur to the point where it
becomes intriguing. Take the Warner Bros. 360 release of Watchmen: The End is
Nigh. The beginning of the game utilizes cel-shaded comic book style panels with
Nite Owl and Rorschach, the two main characters of this title, exchanging
comments about the 1972 race between Richard Nixon and George McGovern.
That’s when the alarms go off announcing trouble at Sing Sing prison. After
fighting through hordes of escaped prisoners, much to the chagrin and threats of
the warden, the duo find out what was at the source of the trouble – it was the
planned escape of the villain, the Underboss, a notorious criminal Nite Owl and
Rorschach helped put behind bars in 1966.
While other members of the Watchmen do make appearances in the game, the only
two playable are the aforementioned Nite Owl and Rorschach.
To get a clue about who might have helped engineer the elaborate escape plans
for Underboss, the duo head for a bar known as the Rum Runner.
The thing that is striking is that the alley ways toward the Rum Runner are full
of bikers, who would like nothing better than to rip the heads off the heroes –
just as the prison halls were full of prisoners who wanted nothing more than to
… well, you get the idea. The experience is very directed and quite linear. The
game, which is a download through Xbox LIVE, is comprised of chapters, played in
the third-person perspective, and has unlockable abilities scattered in levels
in the form of floating circles you pass through to gain the new ability.
Which brings us round to the combat system … Timing during combat can mean the
difference between succeeding and restarting at the last checkpoint. To perform
the combos, you have to time the next key stroke to coincide with the impact of
your previous attack. For example, if the combo calls for a Y X X Y combination
of key strokes, you throw the first Y attack and as it lands, you hit the next
key in the sequence.
What this essentially means is that the game is not a button masher, but rather
you have to plan moves and find the rhythm of the attack. Once you do that, the
enemies fall easily. And both Rorschach and Nite Owl have ways of dealing with
groups. For example, Nite Owl will find upgrade tokens that electrify his suit.
Since the game has a lot of rain in it, running around in an electrified suit
might not be the wisest thing in the world but let’s not get too carried away
with reality intervening in gameplay matters.
When it comes to the actual gameplay, the camera can be a bit spotty. You will
have to manipulate it to find targets, whether that means enemies or scanning up
for Nite Owl to find access areas for scaling walls. And the game is quite
linear. You should not have that difficult a time finding the right path through
the game since the players can’t really find other avenues down the labyrinth
of level design. You have one direction to go in … period. There are signs on
the wall to show Nite Owl where to scale, as well as signs on doors that need to
be lifted to move under them. The game does some hand-holding, which makes it a
much shorter-feeling experience.
However, graphically, this game is delightful. From the way the cut scenes are
handled with graphic-novel style panes to the live action, the game is a visual
feast. Though it rains a lot, and there are a lot of shadows cutting through the
environments, the texturing is terrific. You can see raindrops hit the group,
splash or cause radiating circles in existing puddles. The environments may not
present the greatest challenges, but still manage to sparkle.
Aurally, though the game is rife with clichés. The writing for the narrative
could have been tighter.
Watchmen: The End is Nigh is a decent downloadable game. It does not really
offer much that is new, sparkles graphically, but is bogged down by a short
story, repetitious fight sequences and overall linear play. The game is six
chapters long, culminating with the battle with the underboss. You can likely
get through it all in a couple of hours, if you have the patience to work
through the repetition.
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Gameplay: 6.3
The camera can prove to be a bit of an enemy at times – which seems to be not
uncommon for third-person action fighters – but that aside, the game is very
linear, and there is some hand-holding that detracts from the game itself.
Graphics: 8.5
Ok, the maze of each level is not much of a maze, and the enemies are clones,
but the texturing, use of lighting and overall animation are very well done.
Sound: 6.5
Clichés and the steady staccato of rain dominate. The musical score is under
there somewhere and decent enough. The game also has a fair amount of expletives
sprinkled through the dialogue.
Difficulty: Easy
Concept: 6.8
The look and tone of the game is well done; unfortunately few strides were taken
to make the game mechanics feel original.
Overall: 6.5
This is one seriously good-looking game that is bogged down by a short story,
linear gameplay, repetitious combat and a lot of hand-holding. The intent was
there, but the execution was fumbled a bit.
