Breakdown
Score: 60% ESRB: Mature Publisher: Namco Developer: Namco Media: CD/1 Players: 1 Genre: Miscellaneous
Graphics & Sound: Breakdown has some nice 3D graphics, though it lacks in variety most of the time. The special effects are put to good use yet they can't seem to help alleviate the blandness of the hallways in the seemingly endless levels. If this wasn't bad enough, the camera, at least for a FPS, is so amazingly bad that it brings one to the edge of nausea. Sickening jumps from one angle to another plague your view, taking mounds away from the experience. The sound is mediocre. The music isn't anything we haven't heard already in any other Japanese game of this type, meaning if you don't like that type of music you're going to loath the soundtrack in Breakdown. The sound effects aren't anything special either, but they at least do their job without causing too much attention to be focused on them.
Gameplay: Breakdown sells itself as a type of First Person Action game with more emphasis on hand to hand combat. In reality, it's the same old FPS with a few more unarmed combat moves. The storyline comes off as a sort of movie, with authorized preview and everything. This makes things look really cool at first, what with the copious amounts of ass kicking and what seems like a fluid fighting system in the opening movie. However, once you get into the game, you will find not only a bland storyline but also some extremely bland gameplay. Breakdown has all the makings of an FPS. Yet the developers seemed to want to throw everything that worked in generic FPS's out the window in order to focus on first person hand to hand fighting. Level design seems to be the first thing to have been put on the backburner. Each and every level is a series of corridors with an occasional open area. All you have to do is find the door that isn't locked and go through it. Occasionally you have to hit a button to open a door. It's as simple and as boring as that straight through to the end. The storyline is another casualty. Though it is presented in interesting ways (hallucinations mostly, with images of things like cats and strange landscapes), the meat of it doesn't make any sense. Over time you discover that you have an uncanny ability to beat the crap out of people with your bare hands. Though you can use guns as well, you'll mostly be fighting biologically enhanced warriors who fight with their fists as well. This type of gameplay is strictly opposite that of traditional FPS's; instead of run and gun, its run and punch. The replay value is slim to nil. There isn't a lick of Multiplayer to be found, meaning you can't take your fisticuff skills online. Beating the game will only unlock artwork and musical tracks that you can listen to in your spare time. Yay.
Difficulty: The concept of Breakdown isn't difficult, but playing it is. The controls are jittery at best, and fighting multiple foes with only your fists is nearly impossible. If the combat system worked a little bit better, things would be a different story. That's the main source of difficulty, as finding your way through levels is only a matter of hugging walls and looking for that lone unlocked door, not a demanding task.
Game Mechanics: The essence of Breakdown lays in its hand to hand combat. This is what effectively makes it a first person action game. Without any weapons equipped, you can wreak major havoc on humans and bio engineered mutants alike by utilizing a number of combo moves that include both kicks and punches. There aren't a whole lot of them here, but at least the small variety you get is enough to satisfy. The system falters when more than one enemy start coming at you. You can lock on to only one person at a time, but switching between them, coupled with a horrible camera system, always leaves you open to an attack from whoever you're not fighting. The quick timing needed to navigate around the battle is not facilitated at all by the system you have to work with. Using weapons is almost as difficult. Aiming is handled the same way, meaning you can't mow down groups of people in front of you. Instead, you have to constantly switch between targets, moving relevant to whoever you are locked onto at the time. Picking up items only encumbers this procedure. Whenever you pick something up, you are forced to stare at it, even in the middle of a gunfight, unless you hit a button right away. It's the same for any other peripheral action; opening doors, climbing things, all make you unnecessarily vulnerable to attack. Breakdown makes a good effort to bring an interesting twist to the FPS market, but instead just ends up being a bad FPS. Though the story delivery is clever, the game is hampered by a poor plot and bad controls. The game's ambition ultimately brought about its downfall.
-Snow Chainz, GameVortex Communications AKA Andrew Horwitz
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