Alex Mercer stumbles around New York. He is stronger & faster than other humans, and has the ability to shape shift. The problem is he has no memory of how this happened to him, why the military is after him, and what caused the mystery illness that is rapidly spreading throughout the population; but he is sure that they are all linked. Slowly memories start to come back as he finds people from his past, gathers information, destroys mutant creatures, and consumes military officials. His path leads him to Gentek and a horrible truth they are keeping secret.

 For me the story was secondary. Sure there was some thought put into it; but it isn’t too different from other zombie type games and it is not necessary to follow in order to enjoy the game. Luckily they provide the option to skip storylines. If you are a story-driven gamer you will probably find this one to be common and not as strong as others out there.

The graphics go back and forth. As you run through the city and stand on top of large buildings New York can be quite beautiful and the skyscrapers are very detailed. The humans you encounter on the street have only about 6 or 7 different looks so you end up running past 30 people that look exactly the same wearing basketball jerseys. For the storylines the scenery looks good; but often the people’s faces almost look like they are made of melted wax and are somewhat boxy. Once again this is another average feature.

GAMEPLAY:

Alex is a shape-shifter in a variety of ways. First you will be able to transformer his arm into a whip, sword, hammerfist, or even a shield. The shield is amusing because when you run around it basically turns into a cow-pusher and knocks people out of the way. Alex can also take on the form of the last human he consumed. This is very useful in trying to evade the military or to even infiltrate military bases.

In order for Alex to gain information, some new skills, health, or a new identity to take over he must consume either humans or the mutant hunters. It is surprisingly easy to do this, but the catch is if you do it in front of military eyes you may be discovered. You can also take off running once you start the consuming process, granted you will have someone else’s legs or torso being pulled into your body while you are moving but it does not hinder you.

Alex is given tons of moves and abilities. However they have somehow managed to keep the controls very simple as most things only require pushing one button. This is accomplished by the upgrade feature. As you complete missions, find hidden items, and take down zombies you earn experience points to purchase the upgrades and make Alex much stronger. You will gain thermal vision which will make those infected or military glow on the screen separating them out from civilians. There is even a patsy move, when discovered by the military you can point to another person and pass the blame.

Now if you have ever played GTA you will have a decent idea about how you play. You are given missions to complete and smaller mini-challenges. These start to get very redundant but the difficultly increases. You are pretty much finding this person, fighting that creature, protecting a person or item, and consuming a specific thing. But when you choose to tackle them is up to you. In-between the missions or instead of the missions you can free-roam the city. Keep an eye out for blue & pinkish glowing orbs. These are landmark points and hints, by finding them you earn experience points.

Alex has the ability to run up walls, jump from building to building, and glide around the city. It’s a little similar to that of Spider-Man games just without the webs. This is useful to travel quickly around the city, evade the military, take down helicopters, consume without prying eyes, or get a better view of what is going on. The one issue with this though is the lack of control that sometimes occurs near the tops of buildings. Often when running up walls Alex will overshoot the top sending you right over the other edge. You can opt to climb the walls which gives you more accuracy but this is a very slow process.

Fighting can be simple or difficult if you want. You can either just mash buttons and cut through enemies or you can choose which weapons to use, switch them up during battle, add a shield, target specific creatures, or pull off a variety of special moves. There are also chances to steal tanks & helicopters. For some missions though it is important to not let the military know that it is you in the tank. The problem with that is often when you use the targeting feature it will choose a military vehicle first instead of the creature you are after. So be careful to not fire immediately or your cover could be blown and then you will have both the zombies & the military attacking you.

On the screen there is a mini-map that has your next mission and the mini-challenges marked. It also has marked military personnel & vehicles with white dots and mutant creatures with red dots. Red shaded areas mark the infected sections of New York where you can enter and fight zombies and other mutant creatures to earn experience points. Military bases are also marked and carefully entering you can find military personnel to learn new abilities from such as driving tanks or flying helicopters (though it is also fun to run right in and create chaos). If you manage to take down either the military base or a hive in the infected areas you will temporally give yourself some breathing room in those sections before they re-group. One small helpful tool is a gage next to the map, when it has yellow on it military is taking note of you, once full it will turn to red noting they know who you are and will use excessive force to take you down. If you evade them or the strike team once they are called in you will earn experience points. You can also try to stand your ground and fight them. If you manage to defeat them you will earn more experience points.

If you want to upgrade your moves, see a larger map, see mission logs, or check out your stats (kills, items found, tanks stolen) simply push the start button to access the screen. If you want to change between weapons or visions you can accomplish this quickly by pushing the LB button and choosing it from there. This will slow down game-play but you can still be hit.

OVERALL:

I am addicted to this game (at least for the moment). Truthfully I am having more fun with the free roam feature than the actual missions as once again those can become boring and at times tedious. Being able to run around slicing zombies into pieces, making humans puke blood, and run up and down buildings is mindless entertainment. However if you are someone that needs a storyline, a laid out game, and variety to keep things new maybe you should pass. I am sure soon I will grow bored with it and put it away; but I can also see myself pulling it out at a later date just to hack at zombies again. Recommend to those that like mission based games and hack and slash styles.