Iron Man 2 (PS3 Review)
It might have the Iron Man 2 movie poster for the front cover, but this is pretty far removed from the film, with only Iron Man, War Machine and Nick Fury putting in a decent day’s work. At least their movie-counterparts faces and voices have made it in.
The game takes place ‘beyond’ the movie with the Russians stealing some tech from Stark Industries to make their own robot armies and so on. Players have the choice of playing as Iron Man or War Machine which is a nice touch, but the lack of a two-player option feels like a missed opportunity. You can at least change character at the start of each mission.
There’s a decent range of weapon customisation for the two characters. Each can have four weapons including shotguns, rockets, missiles and lasers. Some weapons can only be used by one suit though. Iron Man gets his palm blaster, the Unibeam and a laser. War Machine is arguably better equipped as he gets a minigun which has a terrific rate of fire compared to IM’s painfully slow weapons. There are also different ammo types and performance module enhancements to unlock.
Both fly-boys suffer from targeting issues though. You can lock-on to targets from afar, but you won’t actually do them any damage till you’re much closer and their health bar appears. In an absolute nightmare of a design decision the right stick swaps between lock-on targets and moves the camera. This can be infuriating when you’re in the air surrounded by zippy targets. You’ll have a swarm of almost dead enemies as you try and get your bearings and finish each one off in turn.
Most of the game is spent moving around in hover mode as it’s easier to shoot from here. It’s a shame that the full-flight mode is so dull. It doesn’t feel fast enough and with most of the levels being really small and narrow you never really need to fly far. Spider-Man 2 (the game) managed to win players over with the superb web-swinging around New York and Arkham Asylum did atmosphere and fighting to perfection pleasing gamers everywhere. If flying as Iron Man feels dull, something’s broken.
Click here to read the rest of my review and see the score for Iron Man 2 at Dealspwn.com
