XIII

I finished playing XIII today and I can tell that this is by far a great game! Not only the graphics are unique (in a comic book style that will definitely blown you away, unless you hate comic book style graphics...), but everything including voice actors, great number of weapons and a great story that is barely seen in a FPS game are all great! However that are some low points that must be reported. I've been fascinated to know that David Duchovny, star of one of the greatest movies I've ever seen, Kalifornia, is the voice actor for the character XIII. But sadly Duchovny's voice in this game is kind of boring. He speaks like he's depressed or not feeling very well at doing a video game character. His voice is by far not as great as other actors like Ray Liotta as Tommy Vercetti or William Fitchner as Ken Rosenberg both from Grand Theft Auto : Vice City, who made a masterpiece of a job performing Tommy and Rosenberg. I understand that there always will be the low points in the career of an artist, but just give me an explanation for Duchovny's bad performing in XIII, even though he's a great actor, a great performer in my opinion. If you get past Duchovny's bad performing, you'll find that the others are great and I think that this game is more special that many other FPS around there, for being so long! We can't find FPS games like XIII around there... at least not much... But I've always been dreaming of playing another game which could be in the same style of Strife. Heard of? Well, play XIII if you like FPS games... and comic book style graphics also...

The only way to make the game slightly harder is to try to go through the stealth levels completely undetected. But overall, it's way too easy to kill the soldiers, and the bosses are overall not a challenge.

I would have to disagree with the previous comment about the shotgun...that's actually one of my favorite weapons. One shot, one kill for each soldier. It's also really fun and satisfying when your shots land! :)

All in all, it's a relatively fun game and it's amusing to hear David Duchovney and Adam West doing their voice roles...they definitely add flavor to the story! I think it'd be amusing if in the middle of the game, David Duchovney would randomly say "Where's Scully?"

I first read a review for this game in Maximum PC, who seemed to enjoy the game. I decided to buy it, and it was worth the $50 and even more. This game had great gameplay, and a good plot. The only downside in my opinion is that this is the type of game that you play once. It ruins the game to play more than once because you already know the plot. But games where you don't play more than once are also games in which people desire a sequel. This game is one of my personal favorite games, and is actually number 3 on my list, which reads Half-Life 2, Half-Life, and XIII.

Overall: 91%

Amazing gameplay, great gadgets, cool visuals and storytelling.

Mediocre plot and voice acting.

Horrible save system. I mean horrible! Might be the worst part of the game because you can't save manually and everytime you fail (or die) you restart from the previous checkpoint.

8/10 want to play the sequel!!

You wake up on a beach with no recollection of how you got there. You're sore and have gunshot wounds. A life guard finds you and patches you up for the time being and tells you she found just one key to a NYC bank on you. Then... you're attacked. You're savior is killed and you quickly realize whoever put you in this position is out to finish the job. In getting away you slowly gather clues as to why you're accused of assassinating the US President (!!), what the mysterious tattoo 'XII' means, and figuring out the web of a sinister conspiracy of global domination.

From the get-go this is one terrific game, no two ways about it. It incorporates the clever comic book look, which is an homage to the source material. Shoot a guy and a trail of 'AAAAAAAAs' will follow him down as he plummets. You also get nice close up of some of your kills. For instance if you get a guy in the head with the crossbow or throwing knives, three sequential windows across the top of the screen will detail your kill. The cinematic scenes are also in comic book style with multiple windows showing many things going on, or even cooler, the same image fragmented, giving you that thriller feel as you piece the clues together to the puzzle of what is going on. The game doesn't just stop with weapons, there are also useful gadgets like a lock pick and grappling hook which you must use for infiltrating bases and general sneaking around. The game doesn't stop there. Since you play an elite soldier/agent, as you uncover your past in the form of documents you will regain your abilities that you had before - more effective use of med-kits, ability to hold two guns at once, being able to dispatch foes from behind with a blow to the neck, and others which make the game ridiculously exciting and allow many approaches to many situations.

Also the settings must be mentioned. Starting in bank vault and going all the way to a secret nuclear launch site with a submarine and a secret desert prison in between along with others this game just refuses to be repetitive. Each level offers new challenges and a new way to use the skills and weapons which you have acquired.

The game's few negative points are David Duchovny's fairly dull voice acting and a difficult save-game system which only allows you to save in certain points. But the latter isn't really all that bad as it keeps you on your toes and other popular games like HALO also have it, so it isn't a factor against the games enjoyability, but rookies of FPS will have that to complain about. Everyone else, this is a great game that comes highly recommended. 9/10

Rated MATURE: violence