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Intro There's something afoot on Mars and it's up to you to find out what. Take control of Wheeler, a self-proclaimed loose cannon, and unravel a mystery that involves aliens, relics, and old family ties. Gameplay: 3.5/10 After a devastating attack by the LED, Earth is left with a bit of a bruise. Not all is bad though, as humans carried the day and were victorious over the incredibly silly-looking aliens. However, victory is short-lived as word comes that they have attacked Mars, and a lone wolf is sent to do a little recon. Needless to say, that lone wolf is the player, and the recon-only order doesn't last very long. Wheeler, whose grandfather was one of the founders of the Mars colony, is called into action. With a robotic arm that can replace hands with weapons and tools, Wheeler also has the help of his software companion, Iris. Iris becomes a dominant figure throughout RTX Red Rock as she uploads maps, unlocks doors, gives updates on objectives, and takes over objects so that the player can control them. Controlling the various items, such as laser cannons and little robots along with the non-Iris controlled rover, is one of the game's key points, but like much of RTX Red Rock, whatever positives it possesses seems to have triple that amount in negatives. Getting behind the wheel of a rover is fun, but that's until the camera decides to screw up and switch back and forth, making the entire scene very disorienting. Having a break from controlling Wheeler often means that the player has to use Iris to do something as exciting as putting her chip into a crane and moving crates; now, there's no real puzzle element to this, as everything is there in plain sight, so most of these situations end up being just a way to slow down the player's progress as they have to muddle through inane tasks. The sad thing is, those moments are often more enjoyable than controlling Wheeler himself. Despite being an action title, our hero is pretty slow and has to be one of the worst jumpers in gaming history. Not only that, but the touted ability to change out items on his arm isn't all that exciting. The normal gun turns into a yellow laser, but that'll upgrade to a purple laser, and so on. Other weapons, like grenades, are very anti-climatic and often end up hurting the player due to Wheeler's slow response time. It isn't like the weapons are all that useful anyway, since Red Rock has one of the worst lock-on features I have ever encountered; unless the character was extremely close to the enemy, and often even he was, hitting the lock-on key would actually make him turn away from the enemy and stare at a wall. Yep, he would just turn and look into a wall. Recovering from these instances proves difficult for two reasons: first, Wheeler can only take a few hits before being killed, while all but the smallest enemies can take a few good rounds head on; second, the menu is so cumbersome that, past the second mission, there's so many gadgets that the player will have to hit select to bring up the overall menu, and doing so actually causes a delay since it seems like the menu actually has to load. I tell you, there's nothing more annoying that being killed by some of the most unimaginative and boring aliens ever put in a videogame, not because of my poor awareness and reflexes, but because the hero turned towards a wall for no reason. With combat being such a chore, one would hope that basic navigation wasn't as problematic. Well, it is. The camera, despite being maneuverable with a thumbstick and having a one-click centering mechanism, is still horrible. I don't like having to baby-sit the camera controls, seeing as how I'm trying to kill murderous aliens and all, so having a camera so unintuitive and limiting in scope was very annoying. The levels themselves are also laid out poorly with paths ending in dead ends and others being incredibly difficult to spot. However, navigation problems are alleviated by the fairly linear designs, and due to the fact that Wheeler has multiple visions for his mechanical eye. Nevertheless, it isn't too much fun having to switch from view to view in the hopes that one will make something appear, although one showing interactive objects is pretty snazzy. I've heard praise about the story, but I didn't find it all that interesting. It has to do with family and artifacts, but all of it is told through some of the most atrocious dialogue that I have ever heard. I normally don't get upset over such things, but the thing about RTX Red Rock is that it's being serious. If the characters were done in a campy manner, then the dialogue would have been hilarious, but as it stands, it has to be in the higher echelon of crappy speech. I had planned to go ahead and skip over some of the technical faults with the game, but since they caused me so much aggravation, I am choosing to list them instead: - Multiple freezes, each forcing a restart - A crane tipped over and wasn't supposed to, thereby trapping me with no way to continue and a restart was needed to fix it - Enemy blasts go through walls - Rooms remaining blacked out until halfway in them, then they load completely - Objects not working, depending on when the game was saved; one forced a backtrack of 5 hours * Most of these issues have also been verified by other players. There were non-technical faults like, why does Wheeler need to get money to get health out of a vending machine? I mean, the colonists are gone and the aliens have wreaked havoc all over the place; just break the damn thing open and grab a bottle of health and oxygen. There's nothing more asinine than dying because this guy won't break a lock on a vending machine. The weapons, despite their differences, aren't all that different or interesting. And then there's the fact that you have to manually restock the oxygen supply in the space suit. Health, I can understand, since that can fit into a strategy of some sort, but oxygen is needed when it's needed; why add such a superfluous step to a game that's already burdensome to begin with? Even with all my problems,
I kept continuing on, hoping that I would outlast the game and it would finally
reveal its true self, the self that felt like a finished product and allowed me
to partake in the full scale enjoyment of the random, and small, delights that
I would encounter throughout my adventures. Alas, that never came. It's a shame
too, since there were a few moments that had me reconsidering my stance, but true
to its shoddy nature, something else would come right along to screw up whatever
pleasant experience I had. Graphics: 4/10 Sound: 7.5/10 Control:
4/10 Overall:
3/10 [ top ] | |||
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