James Bond: Quantum of Solace
Review
Bond is Back
by Chris Scott
reviewed on X360
Latest in line
It has been over a decade since the release of Goldeneye 007 for the Nintendo 64 and every game in the James Bond series is held up to the standard that Rare set with the British secret agent. Quantum of Solace is the latest in the series’ long line to have been released with developer Treyarch at the helm. So how does this game stand up to the expectations of Goldeneye fans? Let’s explore.
One-man-army
Quantum of Solace is a first person shooter based on the James Bond movie of the same name and like its movie brethren it also stars Daniel Craig as the suave super spy. While the title is the same as the latest film, the story of the game actually follows both Quantum of Solace and its preceding film, Casino Royale, albeit highly modified and rather disjointed. The game picks up during the final moments of Casino Royale and lets us see what happened between the credits rolling in that film and the start of Quantum of Solace. Bond, who has just taken down Mr. White, is about to have a little conversation with him when White’s goons force Bond to retreat allowing White to escape. The level itself is fun but it starts an unfortunate trend that the rest of the game follows.
The level basically has Bond as a one-man-army against a sea of generic guards. This is fine occasionally but when the game relies on it as regular level design there is a problem. It is one that many developers who have worked on the franchise have encountered, James Bond is a spy. Yes he is a super agent and he is well equipped to take down scores of enemies but James Bond should be doing spy stuff. Quantum of Solace tries its best to give you non-shooting, more super-spy like activities to do throughout the game. Activities like trying to hack a lock or sneak into a guarded location are all there to do but they are generally short-lived, un-fun and sandwiched between heavy shooting sequences.
Shooter
Let’s talk about the shooting as players are going to spend the majority of their time firing weapons at enemies. Quantum of Solace is run on the Call of Duty 4 engine so you would expect the gunplay to be solid. It is for the most part, although some of the control seems a bit loose, especially in the multiplayer but more on that later. The game also has a couple gameplay mechanics that work pretty well and help keep you interested in the very staged gun battles.
One of them is the cover system, using a system very similar to Rainbow Six Vegas and Gears of War which has Bond adhere himself to cover. Going into a third person viewpoint allows him to blind fire or pop out of cover slightly to target enemies. It generally works well and helps to make the game somewhat more realistic. Another major gameplay mechanic is the melee or takedown attack. By clicking on the left analog stick the camera pans out to a cinematic view and a random button press must be made; if successful Bond does a very Bond-like hand-to-hand takedown of his opponent. The attack can be used for close quarters combat or as a stealth attack and it always looks cool. There are a few more situations where players will find themselves in distinct Bond moments. These events amount to nothing more than a quick time event but they do help in distinguishing the game from other shooters.
6.0
fun score
No Pros and Cons at this time
