Just Cause (PC)

never learn from my mistakes, like so many computer game players I always fall into the trap of thinking that the latest release will herald a new era of gaming/ will live up to its hype/ or at least provide a decent gaming experience. Sadly, Just Cause does none of the above, and is stable as the cliched notion of tinpot regimes in banana republics that it so poorly emulates.

You control one Rico Rodriguez, superagent sent in to the South American country San Espensita to overthrow the dictator Presidente Mendoza. What follows is a clumsy mix of sterotypes, spoofs, and general stupidity. What am I talking about? Well, one of your contacts is a fat American who smokes a cigar, has a Texan accent and wears a tropical printed floral shirt and says "Yee-haw" an awful lot. You have a wise-cracking Latino protaginist, a total womaniser and super slick. You have the feisty female sidekick who gives as good as she gets. You have drug Cartels, Guerillas and the constant and frankly repitive use of the phrases "El Presidente" and "Viva la Revoulcion."

Get the idea?

The firs thing that strikes you is the quality of the graphics. In a word, there very simplistic, almost embarrasingly so, considering this is a game just released this year. Sure, viewing the island from the sky whislt flying gives a lovely vantage point of the ytropical sky, the ocean etc, but when you approach ground level thats when the doubt sinks in.

In GTA Vice City, the water sparkled and glistened, and even swayed, and hence was incredibly realisitc. That was a couple of years ago. In Just cause, the trees simply have a blob of green on top of them which is supposed to masquerade as foliage, the cars look like transformers, and the people are so unfocuse its painful.

Another major criticism is just how much of the game is influenced on GTA, sure, stealing cars and colleting guns is standard fare for many a video game, but it really is like playing GTA: Banana Republic. When you steal a car, you throw the driver to the ground, the lock on system used for shooting is also directly imported from GTA. Safehouses are included, with the option of storing vehicles and picking up weapons, all of which are unlocked by completing side missions and secrets within the game. Sound familar? Even the weapon pickups themselves are totally GTA, in GTA, the guns will have a coloured circle surrounding them to denote their type. It is incredibly frustrating just how much GTA has been so blatantly copied, the least the procuders could have done was actually import some of GTAs quality while they were at it! Sadly this is not the case.

Gameplay revolves around doing either plot missons, or working for the two factions in the game the Riojan cartel or the Guerillas. This unlocks extra weaponry and safehouses making the game a bit easier, that said the combat is nothing too taxing and most missions can be completed with little challenge. Main missions involve attacking strategic locations to weaken the President's power, or occasionally attacking the Montano Drug Cartel. In short, the gameplay becomes very dull and predictable very quickly.

The adverts all boast about the level of freedom in the game. Sure, you can travel by bike/boat/car/plane, but whats the point? Except for during a mission it is possible to be extracted and transported to a safehouse, meaning that if you unlock several safehouses then you can get around the island a lot easier.

To be honest, the only reason you will travel around the various islands is to collect the items as part of the side-quests. Once these have been completed there really no point travelling around the island, certainly not to explore. Seen one sandy beach seen them all. All the vehicles and travelling is a cheap gimmick nothing more. Sadly it just painfully reminds the player how crap the actually is.

This game is as long-lived as the reign of a Presidente, I completed this in a paltry 7 hours and thats with me completing all the extras. Summary: A game that fails to match its own hype.