The Matrix: Path of Neo
Review
Presents a visually stunning experience of the, well, path of Neo as presented in the Movie trilogy
by Rook
reviewed on PC
"Were you listening to me, Neo, or were you looking at the woman in the red dress?"
Those of you who are familiar with my past reviews may recall how important good sound quality is to me in a gaming experience. Path of Neo, despite all its misgivings and bugs, does not let any of my expectations down. The sound quality and audio are simply great! The voice acting is perfect, featuring all of the original actors from all the movies. Granted, that much of the voice work may simply be tracks from the movies redubbed for the game, but there are many examples of the opposite as well. There are several sequences in the game, where you play and interact with the other crew members of Nebuchadnezzar that never existed in the films, and new scripts and dialogue were created for these.
The Industrial/techno scene was a vital piece of the Matrix movies and carries over into the Path of Neo as well. New music mixed with the original musical score delivers an awesome soundtrack as you battle your way to become The One. The music and the voice acting aside, just the ambient noise by itself is fairly impressive when you can pick it out. The sounds of a katana duel bring the action to the next level just because of some subtle sound effects added here and there. Fans of the movie series and the Animatrix will be able to pick up on these subtle sounds and further appreciate how much of the films are actually in this title.
"Get up, Trinity. Just get up. GET UP!"
The game interface is, as was mentioned earlier, very simple. Movement is controlled via the usual WASD keys, or the arrow keys, coupled with the left and right mouse buttons which act as the primary attack/secondary attack function. The combination of movement keys with mouse clicks will result in Neo pulling off a variety of melee combos to decimate his opponents.
The Camera Angles leave a lot to be desired on more than a few occasions. Most of the time, you are free to make use of the mouse look function. Sometimes, however, you find yourself in a locked camera angle which is centered on you, allowing for almost no peripheral vision and making it impossible to connect with a foe that is tucked up into a corner of the environment in which you are fighting.
The customization menus are also very limited. You can re-map just about anything via keymapping, but video settings are very general, preventing you from doing any real fine tuning or lowering the graphics to have the game run better on a modest machine. In the unpatched version of the game, player-configured keymaps and preferences were not saved and had to be reconfigured every time one wanted to play. Again, patching at least to version 1.1, if not 1.2, is strongly recommended.
The Path of Neo offers no multiplayer support or online play. It is a traditional single player action title which will get old well before you manage to unlock all of the hidden secrets. In many cases, it may be good for a second run through just to see how much better you can do, or try the game out on a harder difficulty setting, but overall it is always the same story.
"Okay, so what do you need, besides a miracle?"
The Path of Neo does an amazing job and really makes it feel as if you were playing segments of the movie. The voice acting is second to none and the combat, though simple, is fast paced and exciting. The game itself has a great deal of potential and is fun to play, but due to the bugs that always pop up at the worst possible moments, the overall effect suffers. Despite its bugs, Path of Neo certainly delivers what it promises: a complete story of how Mr. Anderson transforms into The One. Not only does the story of Neo grab your attention, but so does the development of so many of the 'minor' characters. Cypher and Switch, for example, were killed off early in the first Matrix. In the Path of Neo, however, you find yourself meeting them on a few occasions which allow you to learn more about their personalities and characters. Overall, the trials you overcome while playing the Path of Neo will entertain and enlighten you to the universe that is the Matrix.
7.0
fun score
No Pros and Cons at this time
