The opening film is great. You are Bloodrayne, half human, half vampire, recruited by the Brimstone society to subdue supernatural elements that threaten our world. That's it. That's all your told. You don't know how you get talked into doing this, why you do this, if you want to do this. They reference, very vaguely, your sister, and that's all you hear about it. What it going on with this? Imagine watching a few minutes of a movie at a time, while fast forwarding great chunks at a time. Wouldn't make much sense, would it? Neither does the story of this game.
That, said, with really good games, I'm willing to forgo a whole lot of crappy story for a good game. This isn't one. It's obvious they put effort into the game. They put a lot of work into the engine, the physics, the weapon selection, your special attacks. No problems there. They just appear to have put no effort into this anywhere else. This is, I think an example of what happens when there are too many geeks and not enough managers. All this neat stuff with no point to it. There is no challenge here. I finished the first act in under an hour, and there are really only three acts in the game. What? According to gamefaqs, average completion time is something like 7-10 hours. And, trust me, this is not the kind of game you want to play over again on different difficulties.
What there is of the story that you can follow is cobbled together bad Nazi, mutant, HP lovecraft crap that was done better in at least three other games I can think of this year. As a release for the gamecube, which has few 'adult' oriented or mature games, this might have an impact, but on the xbox, against all the decent, violent games they have, are you honestly gonna want to buy a game that's only appeal is bloodily dismembering other creatures, watching boobs jiggle (there's a code for making them bigger, for crying out loud!) and hearing the protagonist use the F word? How exciting! I can't honestly believe a single woman worked on this game, the main character wears a leather corset and pants in 1933, says ridiculously provocative things, and moans sexually when drinking blood, which she does by wrapping her legs around the enemies.
That said, I like seeing people's auras, they show up red when they have blood to give, and the goals in the level are blue so you can figure out where you're going. By now, a concept that's been beaten to death, slo-mo, isn't original, but can come in handy. The gore is cool, the creatures are creepy, and the guns are varied. As I said before, this has pieces that could be assembled into a game that didn't suck, but they didn't do it.
It's not awful, it's not an abomination, rent it if you must, but so far as I can tell, the game will be diverting for all of an hour or so, and then you'll get bored.
*Sigh* I guess if I really want to kick Nazi A$$, I'm going to have to wait for Return for Wolfenstein for Xbox instead.
If you have a gamecube, and you want something creepy, rent Eternal Darkness, if you have an xbox, get blood omen or something. Just don't bother getting this.
BloodRayne provides an intense 3rd person action horror experience that appeals to a wide audience of gamers. With a multitude of frighteningly evil o...More at eBay
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