font size="-2">Genre: Action
Developer: Namco
Publisher: Namco
# of Players: 1
Memory: 10 blocks
ERSB: Mature
Released On: blah
Also On: Playstation 2, Xbox
Features: blah

Introduction:

Those who once thought that Dead to Rights was an exclusive Xbox game have been proven wrong. Now, Dead to Rights has been ported to both the Nintendo GameCube and Sony Playstation 2, and in time the game has aged for the better. If you didn’t know, Dead to Rights was a highly anticipated game from Namco that royally bombed, the game received a horde of bad reviews from multiple video game publications. Luckily, Namco took into consideration the opinions of the critics and the consumers when porting Dead to Rights to the GameCube and PS2.

Presentation:

Dead to Rights is like a John Woo film, filled with tons of martial arts and killing. Aside from that it also has a pretty good storyline, I like watching mysteries unravel and that is what happens in Dead to Rights. The introductory FMV to Dead to Rights is pretty entertaining since it is an excellent example of how more and more videogames these days have become like Hollywood films. Lots of other nice FMV sequences are found in the game before and after each one of the game’s fourteen chapters, and they progress the game’s story nicely. Load times in the game are brief and usually occur when going through doors, they’re hardly noticeable though.

Gameplay:

When I first picked up Dead to Rights I expected it to be a piss poor rip off of Max Payne, and in many ways it is. Fortunately, the game isn’t exactly a direct rip off of Max Payne; sure both games have a similar story, both involve slow motion type gunfights, but what differs between the two is that Dead to Rights is really just about running around mindlessly and shooting every living thing in your path. The game lacks depth; there are a few mini games/puzzles though. At one point in the game our protagonist, Jack Slate, finds himself in a strip club and luckily one of the dancers is his very close friend Hildy. In order for Jack to get to his destination he must make his way past the bouncers with the help of Hildy; from there you play as Hildy, when you hit the right commands you begin to do dance in your seductive thong outfit, successfully distracting the bouncers. You’ll encounter other cool mini-games in the game, especially in the prison. Unfortunately, the puzzles found in the game are too simple for a game with a “mature” rating. Most puzzles involve unlocking doors by using your pick locking skills, this brings you to a screen with rotating gears and all you have to do is press the button at the right time and like magic…the door becomes unlocked. Unlocking doors in this manner occurs way too often, and eventually becomes annoying after the 3rd time. Dead to Rights is a very linear game as well. No backtracking or anything of the sort is ever encountered, just go from point A to point B, complete level and then go to the next. Now, doesn’t that sound shallow? It does, but all the opposition from your foes makes everything a bit entertaining.

Gunfights in Dead to Rights are something you encounter on many, many occasions. In fact it’s what the game is all about, and what makes it fun. Jack Slate is lethal killing machine; he can take you down unarmed with his martial arts skills or blast your brains out with one of the many firearms that are available for him to use. In battle Jack can use his enemies as human shields, a tactic which is needed for you to finish the game successfully, and Jack can also disarm enemies when he finds himself without a weapon. Of course, like I mentioned before, bullet-time is featured in Dead to Rights. When you go into bullet-time everything goes into slow-motion, this results in giving you the ability to aim and kill multiple targets in a very short time. Honestly though, using bullet-time isn’t a skill you need to master in order to complete the game; all it really does is just add to the cool factor of the game.

Dead to Rights, like Super Mario Sunshine, features a manually operated camera. Not too many people are fond of this feature but personally I think that this is one of the best ways to solve the game’s camera problems. Aiming on the other hand is frustrating. Aiming is done by pressing on the L trigger, by doing this it locks on a target. Though occasionally it does not lock onto your nearest target, and sometimes you’ll become frustrated that the auto targeting system refuses to lock onto the guy right in front of you.

The difficulty level for the GameCube and Playstation 2 versions of Dead to Rights has been altered tremendously. The difficulty of the Xbox version was a big complaint among reviewers and consumers alike, so for the game’s GameCube and PS2 release Namco decided to tone the game down a bit. They even added three difficulty settings, but even the most difficult of these settings isn’t as difficult as the Xbox version of Dead to Rights.

Visuals:

Visually, practically zero improvements have been made to the game. If you were to put all three versions side by side you would barely be able to tell the difference. The Xbox version does look the cleanest and sharpest of the three but to the untrained eye, all three versions look identical. Unfortunately, the game didn’t look to good to begin with. Sure it’s not crappy looking but with games like Metroid Prime and Resident Evil Zero pushing the visual envelope you can’t help but be disappointed. Character models are too simple; most of the time every single enemy you encounter looks identical, it sucks to beat the piss out of punks that all look the same, but it is cool that Jack changes outfits every so often. Level design is poor, everything looks bland, well almost everything; every so often you will encounter some areas, like the strip club or the shark freezer, that do provide some atmosphere. Luckily, the game manages to hold a good framerate most of the time; sadly I have witnessed a few stutters here and there but it’s not something that anyone other than a graphics whore will care about.

Audio:

I’m quite fond of the soundtrack featured in Dead to Rights; it’s a perfect match and goes nicely with the pace of the game. It isn’t anything special but not once did I find myself ever annoyed by it. Voice acting is pretty good too, though Jack sounds monotone (which I believe was done intentionally) everyone else has a nice bit of personality. Personally, I found it very funny when I encountered a character that sounded just like Christopher Walken. Sound effects such as gunfire, explosions and things of that sort sound excellent but I did get a little bit agitated with the sound of Jack’s footsteps, the majority of the time they sounded as if he was walking on a sticky floor.

Lasting Appeal:

In all honesty my first time through Dead to Rights took about 5 hours. After that I didn’t really want to touch the game again but if I were I would make sure to replay some of the games mini-games, such as that strip club sequence I mentioned before and possibly the Speed Bag game in the prison. Dead to Rights is not a game that will keep you busy for a long time instead think of it as an ideal rental.

Final Thoughts:

Despite all the games little problems Dead to Rights manages to be entertaining title. The game has improved since its release on the Xbox but that still doesn’t make it a great game, but a good one. I don’t suggest the purchase of the title, but a rental of the game could provide to be very satisfying.

Max Payne it is not, but fun it is…