Goldeneye 007: Reloaded

written by Worssam, Ian Worssam on 5.12.11

I must be one of the only people who didn’t own the Nintendo 64 and therefore didn’t really have any previous experience the original golden eye game released in 1996.

I know having spoken to a few people that the original game put split screen mutliplayer games on the map. I was hoping that this 2011 remake would show me what i missed all those years ago when.

• Likes

  • Voice characterisation
  • Split screen multiplayer goodness
  • Good level of multiplayer options

• Dislikes

  • Health regneration
  • A.I. Inconsistencies
  • Auto aim is annoying

This incarnation of the game is brought to you by Activision, who have been around since 1979 and have such games as Pitfall (1982) Tony hawks, Transformers and Blur under their large belt as well as the almighty Call Of Duty series and Eurocom who were founded in 1988 have the james Bond series, Beijing 2008, Ice age and Disney Universe which is a little hit and miss in terms of quality gaming fare.

In 2010 Goldeneye was released on the Wii and was a big hit, so this version is technically a re-release of a re-release, so nothing like cashing in on a good thing eh!!!

The first thing I noticed is that James bond was Daniel Craig , now correct me if i am wrong but was the film Pierce Brosnen, i mean i am not complaining but continuity??? I suppose it is a licensing thing as Mr Craig is the current Bond and would fit to the present day theming.

The game starts you in a training centre being told how to use the various . You then have to work you way through the office assassinating people before the game fully starts. What a start it is too, its like being in a multiplex watching the real thing. The MGM lion roars and then you have the semi clad women gliding across the screen and the music plays out!!

The single player game itself is a great mix of combat and stealth throughout. On the stealth levels you have to creep around avoiding cameras that set of alarms informing everybody in the area where you are. You also have to kill the guard that litter the area and this highlights a couple of the AI inconsistencies. You can murder one about 6 feet away from his patrol partner and on numerous occasions the living one fails to react but seconds later will wise up to your presence and track you down like fox!

The other strange thing that goes along with this is the disappearing bodies . What i mean by this is that you can kill numerous people and their corpses disappear , leaving there guns where they were, so another guard for instance with be standing where in theory there should be a bloody mound of bodies but will not even bat an eye!

The guards etc are mobile and will duck and dive for cover but with the pistol having auto aim that i have never encountered before , it is quite easy to kill them at distance if required. This does take out some of the skill of having to aim yourself.

James bond also has the inability to jump. Now i have seen a few of Bonds films and believe me he can!! He only seems to be able to clamber over pre determined items during the game. This does make the action a little bit unrealistic as you can only climb over what the designers want you too.

The on screen radar is good as it shows you the amount of enemies and from what direction the will be approaching. It does come into its own on the stealth levels as you will clearly see who is moving towards or away from you.

During the game the game you are equipped with a mobile phone ( down on pad). This can be used throughout the game to hack alarms, find plans, unlock doors, identifying contacts etc. This is signalled during the game by “i” appearing just above the radar. It is not always obvious although where you have to be looking as it is triggered if you are in the vicinity of the object or task.

The range of guns is good as you can hold 3 at anytime. Some have silencers attached, some have grenades attached and all of these are initiated by the pressing left on the d pad.

At times there are also night visions goggles to use ( up on d pad). You know when these will be as the appear on you screen on the gadget wheel.  Also, to add a little variety to gameplay tank and helicopters can be accosted and driven to break up the mix of stealth and shooting levels.

Hardened players of single player shooters may not the like the regenerative health but it does play into the strengths of older styles shooters like Halo and at least give the player half a chance when confronted by a hoard of guards.

After each mission you given a time and side quests are added in ie collecting photo’s. There are also what i can only describe as orange and black tokens with a face on to collect in each mission to complete it perfectly. There are to be honest not the easiest things to locate .

Overall, the single player is well worth a play even though the cinematics between levels can be more exciting than the levels you are playing.  This is not to say that the whole single player experience is like this but I felt that some of the level designs were lacking that little spark to keep you engaged.

After the single player why not try the MI6 ops Missions of which there are 11 starting at jungle which is an elimination round and ending in solar that is an assault game . In all of the 11 games within the ops there are 3 different types.

Elimination is to basically kill a specified amount of enemies. Defence is a game where you activate a computer and have to defend it for a set period against wave of enemies and finally stealth where you have to kill without be spotted. If spotted once the game ends. Only once you have collected enough stars do further levels open.

The online game has 13 different game modes. These start with conflict ( death match ), team conflict, Golden Gun, Black Box, Golden eye all the way to Classic conflict. These are all the standard games on most “shooter” game but given Bond themes.

Sticking too its roots , it still has local split screen. You can have four people on one consul with an impressive amount of playable character from old bond movies and the current game. I counted at least 30+ including : Jaws, Baron Samedi, Dr no, Scaramanga, Blofeld and Oddjob to name but a few. There is also an impressive 14 maps and although so there is plenty of variety and is great fun with friends.

Overall, Goldeneye 007: Reloaded left me ” shaken but not stirred”. It isn’t anything that is particularly wrong with the game as a whole but is something that we haven’t already seen in other shooters which raise the bar a lot higher than this title.  If you’re a Bond fan then this is a gimme but from what I was told, the original had a special kind of magic that brought people together in a way that is hard to recreate today and although a lot of fun falls short of my expectations.