By Jason Nimer
Regular readers of Gamerstemple.com might remember
a review I wrote about six months
ago for the PS3 version of the once-360 exclusive, Overlord, called Overlord:
Raising Hell. Most of the review consisted of me expressing amazement that
not only was this little-known game by the not-quite-household-name developer
Codemasters actually rather awesome, but it was, in fact, as much or more fun
than the bigger name games hitting shelves at the time, namely Ninja Gaiden II
and Metal Gear Sold 4: Guns of the Patriots. After Codemasters' last triumph, I
jumped at the chance to review their newest effort, Rise of the Argonauts, on
PS3. While the Argonauts don't even scratch the surface of Overlord's
brilliance, it isn't quite the disaster that some other reviews have made it out
to be. Maybe I'm biased, being that I share a first name with the main
character, but there is some fun to be had with this game, even if the total
package feels like a missed opportunity.
Rise of the Argonauts bills itself as an action RPG following the classic
story (and Ray Harryhausen stop-motion masterpiece) of Jason and the Argonauts.
That isn't quite the case, as the story shares similarities with both the
classic and the film, but tends to veer off in its own direction in a few key
spots. Jason still needs the Golden Fleece, but his motivations and some of the
more famous mythological characters that make appearances aren't quite based in
the original or the film. Hey, I'm not a Greek mythology scholar, and you
probably aren't either, so small deviations from the base story probably won't
bug you or even register as such. I will say this, though; the story of Jason
and the Argonauts has been around for a long, long time, and playing through
this game makes that pretty evident. It is probably too much to call the plot
formulaic, because it may have INVENTED the formula, but the story isn't the
main draw of this game.
The other issue with Rise of the Argonauts billing itself as an action RPG
with a classic story is that the game doesn't ever feel like an RPG, in even the
loosest of terms. Upgradeable skills and weapons do not automatically make a
game an RPG, and this one feels more like an arcade beat 'em up in the vein of
Gauntlet or Final Fight than an action RPG like Kingdom Hearts or Diablo. There
isn't anything wrong with that as the beat 'em up formula is a personal
favorite, but those looking for an RPG need this warning - Rise of the Argonauts
isn't one.
When viewed as a whole, Rise of the Argonauts is a fairly fun game marred by
some serious issues, both in the presentation and the gameplay. Since you'll be
seeing and hearing the game before you actually get a chance to control Jason
and play it, we'll start there. The graphics, textures, sounds and voice acting
are all, well, sub-par. The characters all have a boxy, polygon feel with muddy
textures and herky-jerky movements, both in cutscenes and in actual gameplay. To
make matters worse, the entire game has what I can only describe as a "glaze"
effect, where it almost looks as though the designers purposely smeared the
visuals, so those of us with HDTVs might not notice the below-average nature of
the game's visual presentation.
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