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| Summary: Quite playable, if it's your style
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The best way to describe X-Men Lengends II is that it's as if Baulder's Gate: Dark Alliance and Kingdom Hearts had a child. The game features a fitting mix of elements from both games to create a unique blend that is something very entertaining to play.
When I first started playing the game, I wasn't sure what to expect. I had never played X-Men Legends, so I had no clue. Once I figured out that the game was mission based (didn't take long), the pieces fell into place.
The controls for the game seemed slightly off the first time I played it. I kept picking up boxes when I meant to slash them to ribbons, but after about five minutes, I found the controls to be a perfect fit for the PSP. They manage to keep a highly evolved, intuitive set of commands at your disposal, without requring too much effort.
The graphics for the game are pretty good, but I can be honest and say I have little to compare it to, since this is the only PSP game I own (now). However, I was quite impressed with how clear things were. I remember playing Dark Alliance on my friend's PS2, and quite often being unable to figure out which person was my character. No problems like that here. Even in the darkest of areas, finding out which character is my own is no problem. Finding enemies is a little more difficult. Not because they're hidden in some obscure way, but mostly because the areas tend to be a bit darker, and the enemies aren't exactly all sunshine and lollipops with big orange stipes painted on them. Still, this isn't completeley a detriment. I mean, if I released a race of large, carniverous insects, I'd expect them to blend in with their environment, not be a blazing hot pink.
The sound was alright. It wasn't very intrusive, but it added to the ambiance of the game. I have a little trouble with the voice acting, however. The only original X-Men actor to reprise his role was Patrick Stewart, taking on Professor X, something he did as well in the portable version as he did on the big screen. Wolverine and Sabertooth weren't exactly impressive, but not exactly awful either. Can't say I liked their Gambit either, but he did the job. The writing for some of the bit phrases, however, can be hit and miss. While Storm shouting "I'm as strong as a hurricane" makes me wonder what age range the game was intended for, Wolverine's "Aww, look at you, all busted up," and Magneto's "Once again, I am victorious" are quite fitting.
Can't speak for multi-player mode yet, though. I'm the only one of my friends who owns a PSP, so no Ad-Hoc, and my WiFi AP happens to be encrypted with WPA, which is a cypher that X-Men Legends II doesn't support.
One of the things I found annoying was that I'd find and unlock things like comic book missions, and I'd literally find items called Comic Books, but as to what I can do with the Comic Books, isn't exactly easy to figure out. It would be helpful if the game could have a savable option to remember if I want my leveling up to be handled automatically or manually, though.
Finally, the fabled load time. Load times are so long you could put down your PSP, make a sandwich, eat it, come back, wash up, and then play. Alright, so it's not that bad. The load screens take longer than I would like, but they're far from making me hate the game. At least I get some good X-Men artwork to look at. Resuming the game can be slightly annoying as well. Turn on the PSP, give it a second to retreive the save RAM state, game starts running, you move, game hiccups, loads, resumes, you try to jump, hiccups, resumes, no more loading. However, some of the on-the-fly loaded items aren't too bad. In Kingdom Hearts, when an AI character starts shouting for help, the load time is pretty snappy. In Dark Alliance, however, my mage will be complaining he is "Out of Mana!" about five minutes after I restored my mana, and the time when a reminder like that would have been useful is long gone.
Dark Alliance was never a game that impressed me too much, but I loved Kingdom Hearts. When I picked up X-Men Legends II, it seemed like a compromise between the two, one I could live with. Entertaining action, a good plot, decent voice acting, and a multi-player mode. What more could you ask for in a game like this?
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