Bionic Commando Review

The shooting is a bit of a letdown

Another problem is enemy variety. The generic grunts come in a few guises (the heavy gunners and snipers being the core trouble makers), and you'll encounter guardian robots too, again in a number of different forms. These guys all have the same weak spot though: a glowing point on their back. To defeat them you need to latch onto this point and rappel into it. Do this a few times and they bite the dust, and if they happen to be the last enemy in the zone the blocked path opens up.

Sadly the game's real highlights, the boss fights, happen fairly infrequently. Our highlight has to be a fight at the top of a massive skyscraper against a very nimble attack chopper. With plenty of overhead beams to latch on to this small area proved to be one of the most exciting playgrounds the game has to offer. Armed with a multi-target rocket launcher and letting all three go as you saw through the air headfirst towards the imposing war machine is just superb. Had the game managed to hit this level of fun and excitement throughout we'd be putting Bionic Commando on the same high pedestal as many of Capcom's in-house classics.

One area of the game that rarely disappoints is the visual presentation. Built using developer Grin's own engine, rather than Capcom's own MT Framework that is behind the likes of Lost Planet and Resident Evil 5, Bionic Commando regularly dazzles with the scope of its environments, some beautiful lighting and a generally smooth frame rate on a decent gaming rig. It's worth noting that frame rate drops while swinging can be disastrous for timing, so don't push the settings beyond what your PC can cope with. Certain areas look a little bland, but if you're moving as fast as the game allows you're unlikely to notice these slight blemishes. The soundtrack picks up excellently from where Rearmed left off, but the voice acting is definitely a few notches behind Hollywood. Rather surprisingly the game can also be played straight off the disc without having to sit through an install, which is nice.

On top of the single-player campaign is online and LAN multiplayer for up to eight players. This works as you might expect, with the usual selection of game modes and plenty of mid-air combat, but it doesn't (at least from what we've played) reach the combat heights of the single-player game. It's also incredibly unforgiving when you're new, so until you're up to speed with the controls expect to finish last more often than not.

Bionic Commando will frustrate many gamers, but get past the initial swinging learning curve and you'll find a highly entertaining action game that tries to do something a bit different. It's not a must-own classic that Capcom has become renowned for making, but with smart presentation and some thrilling gameplay it still comes highly recommended.