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Nov 02 2005
X-Men Legends II: Rise of Apocalypse Review
PSP Game Review | Action
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| Summary: Some games are made to be portable
90
Over the last few months of owning my PSP I have heard many complaints about PS2 games being ported to the handheld. Complaints that often ended in lower scores because the PSP version wasn't quite as good as the PS2 version. Well, I have no such bias against ports. After all, what is wrong being able to play a PS2 game on the go? That is why I bought my PSP and I got what I signed up for.
All of this brings me to X-Men Legends II, a port of a PS2 game. I have to say though, that if there is any type of game that needs to be ported to Sony's little handheld masterpiece, it has to be the action RPG. This game screams portability and is one of the better action RPGs of late. It is the perfect game to pick up and play a while, then put my PSP into sleep mode as I trudge through a day at work, only to pick up where I left off on my lunch break.
Controls and gameplay go hand in hand for any game, so I will just lump these together. The game controls about as good as you are going to get. It took me a while at first to get used to using the L or are buttons as a pseudo-"shift" key but once you get further into the game it truly becomes second nature. Which is why the game slowly ramps up the difficulty. Had the game been difficult at the beginning I probably would have tossed my PSP in frustration over forgetting which "shift" key to hit when.
Gameplay boils down to simple special attacks, hacking and slashing your enemies. There is overall strategy as you typically need to have the correct balance of which four characters you will use at any given time. You don't want to have only long range "spell casting" characters or you will die a quick death. You also don't want to just try to have melee characters because some of the larger enemies will stun you leaving you totally vulnerable to attack. Larger brute like characters are slow but super powerful. So the idea is to keep balance with the characters you play with.
This all brings me to my biggest complaint, load times. The load times between levels isn't bad, but the loading of menus can be frustrating. I still have not played with all of the characters only because I didn't want to have to load out to the character select menu just to try them out. One piece of advice...set character upgrades to Auto. If you have to jump out of the action, wait 20 seconds to upgrade Wolverine's attack to be slightly more powerful, then wait another 20 seconds to get back into the action, repeating this action with each character every few minutes you will quickly become irritated with this game. So just let the PSP decide what to upgrade it will save you a lot of headaches.
My other complaint pertaining to Load times is the fact that you can only carry a few items at a time. This typically wouldn't be a problem except that you have carry more items you either have to drop the items or load back to the start of the level unload your weapons into your item box, then load back to where you were. For the PSP version they could have just made you able to carry more items relieving you of these annoying troubles.
Graphics, the very reason the PSP is superior to all other handheld systems. In a word, nice. Nothing special but not much to complain about. There is a bit of slowdown when lots of effects are happening or when you just come out of sleep mode (am I the only one experiencing that?). Typically, however, the game is pretty. The effects are awe-inspiring the further you get and characters are easy to recognize desptie being fairly small on the screen.
Sound, the other thing that makes the PSP great. Overall I have yet to complain about the sound in a PSP game. Again it is PS2 quality sound on the go. One minor complaint, which could be logged under load times, is the fact that voices some times take a few seconds to load when there is character dialog.
Like I said earlier, this is the perfect game to port to the PSP. It is quick action that you can jump in and out of at an moment. The PSP version loses a little luster by making character customization more of a chore (read: load times) than of a benefit. But the action is all good. You don't have to be a fan of X-men, either, to enjoy this game. There is enough character variation and brutal action to make this game a fun romp for any action RPG fan. If you liked Baldurs Gate, Untold Legends or others like it, X-men II outdoes them all with more characters and more varied abilities and strategy. While it isn't perfect it is pure simple fun on the go.
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