Captain America: Super Soldier

Review from Nat - Wednesday, 12 October 2011 @ 10:54pm

Captain America is a game that surprised me from the start. For something that arguably should have been nothing more than a cheap movie cash-in, it’s odd level of charm, authenticity and generally enjoyable combat made for a pleasant surprise. Even if it was the game that broke my television (true story) and was riddled with tiny imperfections, I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it.

You play as the titular Captain America, helping the troops win the Second World War against the dreaded Germans and evil Nazis. Midway throughout the introductory tutorial mission, heavily armoured troops carrying fantastical, futuristic weaponry join the fray and provide Cap a new target to beat upon. They are the soldiers of the dreaded Hydra, captained by the nefarious Red Skull, with nothing but ill will for the entire world in mind. The story plays to relative generic comic book conventions and ends in a somewhat predictable fashion, but it is sufficient to push the gameplay along and give Cap an excuse to go to new and varying locations.

Beware the Nazi-Bot. That thing'll hurt.

The game is played in traditional character action format, with Cap being able to perform a combination of light and strong strikes and grapples, as well as utilising special moves involving his shield. The shield is extremely important to combat, used for countering and crowd control, so when it is taken away during portions of the game it is noticeable and sorely missed. It plays like a beginners character action game, but that’s okay – ideally, this game isn’t exactly for the hardest of hardcore gamers. As an introduction to the genre, I think you could do a whole lot worse. The combat is fluid, powerful and fun, albeit a little easy at times.

Graphically, the game is fairly middling. Playing Captain America reminded me of playing something from around 2009, similar to an Overlord or a Far Cry 2. It’s not the most beautiful game in the world, but it is acceptable and not ugly to the eyes. Characters animate well, and the art style is recognizable and enjoyable. Again, it isn’t going to set new standards for visual appeal, but the locales traversed throughout the game are unique and varied enough to make the imperfections acceptable.

Not the best, not the worst.

The sound design of the game is clearly its crowning glory. Stunning background music is heard throughout, representative of the bombastic, mind-1900’s feel of the film and the dark, operatic tones during the Hydra sequences are just as enjoyable. However, the greatest part of the sound design is the voice acting, utilising much of the primary cast of the film to capture the feel of their video game counterparts excellently. Chris Evans does a masterful Captain America, whilst Neal McDonough, Hayley Atwell, Sebastian Stan and J.J. Feild all reprise their roles from the film. It’s a great touch y Sega and really ties the film to the move, and vice versa. I was incredibly impressed when I noticed the voice cast for the first time, and I hope this is a sign to come for future movie tie-ins.

AMERICA.

So what’s bad about the game? To be honest, I’m not really sure anymore. In every aspect, the game is consistently competent, but never breathtaking. It is graphically adequate, the sound design is terrific, the gameplay is a bit too easy and the plot is a bit nonsensical, but all in all it doesn’t change the fact that it was a thoroughly enjoyable game. Is it worth $100? No, but if you picked it up at $50 or $60 you’d be hard pressed to walk away unhappy. It’s a great game for people new to the genre, or massive fans of the film. If you can get a copy cheap, I’d urge you to try it out – it might just surprise you, too.

Pros

• Fun, simple gameplay – Baby’s first Character Action game
• Great sound design, coupled with real voices of characters from movie
• Achievements galore!

Cons

• Hard to pick definitive flaws – nothing so much wrong with the game as it is just not polished to kingdom come. Everything could be slightly better, but nothing is wrong per say.
• Some bad enemy designs, I suppose.
• Ooh! There was a 7-point achievement and I hate those things.