Gaming Trend

Gaming Trend Review

by Mitch Youngblood

Gaming Trend Editor-In-Chief Knightshade Dragon once asked me if I’d ever heard of Destroy All Humans! and if so whether or not I’d played it. The conversation went roughly like so:

Knightshade Dragon: Hey, have you tried out Destroy All Humans! yet?

Yours Truly: Heard of it, haven’t played it.

Knightshade Dragon: Dude! It’s right up your alley. You control a space alien who blows up everything in sight. Don’t you like 1950’s sci-fi?

Yours Truly: I have a soft spot in my heart for The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms, yes.

Yours Truly finally played it this year and I did, in fact, love quite a lot of it. As much fun as it was controlling a hyper-violent, under-sexed, Little Green Grey Man who sounded like Jack Nicholson, there were plenty of times when the game was more frustrating then fun. Anyone who went through the final few missions knows exactly how tough the endgame was. My worry regarding the sequel was that it would actually wind up harder than the original and therefore be akin to Ninja Gaiden starring a trigger-happy alien.

It’s a testament to how well Pandemic understood the inherent fun of their original creation that Destroy All Humans! 2 kept everything that worked in the first one while vastly improving upon everything that didn’t. While there are a few missions where the insanity level is completely off the scale, the majority of the game is so laugh-out-loud hilarious that you’re missing out if you don’t pick this up.

Besides, those of us who admit to being shameless collectionistas will find days worth of playtime picking up all available alien artifacts and accomplishing the numerous side missions. One of these involves the main alien setting up a cult in each city to worship his alien god named Arkvoodle.

Now that’s my kind of game.

It seems to me that the graphics have received something of a polish since the first game. By no means is it a complete overhaul, but Destroy All Humans! 2 definitely appears sharper and cleaner than the original. This is definitely a good thing because while the first game certainly looked sharp enough, the sequel feels more refined in its appearance. Characters don’t appear as stiff as they did before, and everything from people to vehicles to monsters all pack a lot more "oomph" than in the first game. Since Crypto takes over bodies now instead of simply mimicking them via hologram, it feels far more immersive to run around in a body instead of looking through an image of one.

Unlike recent titles like Just Cause where things looked better the higher in the sky you were, Destroy All Humans! 2 simply looks terrific whether you’re on the ground or in the air. The details of the hippie revolution and the 1960s in general across the world show just how devoted Pandemic was to getting it right. Whether you’re surrounded in Bay City by the free love hippie movement, complete with detailed peace paint jobs on VW vans, or flying across the pond to England and body snatching a chick wearing a Union Jack and go-go boots, you enjoy just how exacting the developers were in getting the time period just right. It’s also exciting to blow up your first Aston Martin DB5, but that may just be the Bond freak in me.

Grant Albrecht and Richard Horvitz both deserve medals for how well they perform as Cryptosporidium and Pox, respectively. I would imagine their voices were recorded separately but the banter between them is so fast and furious you’d swear they were shouting at one another while in the same room. Each one has their own set of problems in the game and how they deal with them, and with each other, provides endlessly funny (and frequently brutal) comedy. Whoever came up with the idea of having Crypto sound like Jack Nicholson must have struck a vein of pure inspired genius. Crypto is mercilessly funny as he tries to bag every chick he can while blowing up everything else in sight. Pox’s exasperation from the first game reaches a completely unheard of zenith here considering what happens to him in the first few minutes, and his righteous fury through the rest of the game caused me so many belly laughs I lost count.

But the best part of the soundtrack is how utterly inspired everyone else is. While Albrecht and Horvitz remain front and center start to finish, the supporting cast scores plenty of zingers along the way. The game even brings Buffy the Vampire Slayer veteran Anthony Stewart Head into the proceedings as a British secret agent, which is about as perfect casting as one can hope. The downside is he’s not in the game as long as I would have liked but he makes a strong impression while he’s around. But make sure to scan every person you can find. While some of them do repeat phrases, there are plenty of times when you’ll find yourself stunned by what was said/thought. One Japanese schoolgirl’s thoughts on her relationship with her boyfriend left me agog that this found its way into a game.

This script is pure, unfettered genius.

The remaining sound effects are equally spot-on. While the first game spoofed 1950’s sci-fi movies, this one focuses on 1960’s spy and espionage thrillers and the sound effects beautifully reflect that devotion. The final two levels truly exemplify this but it’s difficult to describe any further without going into heavy spoilers. Suffice it to say that watching the dance styles on both as Crypto fires off a burst of Free Love will cause further fits of hysterical laughing. Otherwise, vehicles, explosions, and weapons fire from Crypto’s lengthy arsenal all sound terrific. There’s even one weapon that recalls the infamous shark gun from Armed & Dangerous, and it’s a fun crowd pleaser.

Controlling Crypto isn’t very difficult at all. What makes things even better is how Pandemic streamlined the interface and made things vastly more intuitive than they were in the first game. Whenever you walk directly under Crypto’s spaceship you have four options to select from. The Y button takes you into the ship (you can immediately skip past the landing/taking off animation by hitting the A button; I can’t begin to say how appreciated this is). The X button takes you to the Pox-Mart where you can upgrade your equipment. The B button puts you on the Navi-Comp which lets you jump between the different levels. The A button takes you into the Gene Splicer menu, and hitting this button while in the spaceship will do the same.

On the ground, the thumbsticks offer control of both the camera and Crypto per usual. The left trigger targets people or objects while the right trigger fires your weapons. This is the only point where the control scheme can get a little wonky because it’s very easy to target something you’re not aiming at. Letting go of the left trigger and moving Crypto to the side then squeezing the trigger again is usually enough to resolve it, but it becomes a problem when he’s surrounded by an angry military. Once Crypto successfully targets a person or object, he is presented with a few options on what to do next.

If he targets a person then rapidly hitting the B button sends Free Love into the air and everyone in the target’s immediate vicinity breaks out into dance. This distracts the "natives" long enough for Crypto to target someone and rapidly hit the Y button to Body Snatch them. Instead of mimicking whichever human you target, this game lets you actually snatch their bodies. The mini-game aspect comes into play here because the more gene splices you build up, the faster you can snatch particular body types. The Y button also interacts with story-related characters.

The Select button brings up the map, and the start button brings up your main menu which you scroll through with the triggers. Holding down the X button brings up your weapons menu. Simply scroll through to which weapon you want and release X and you’ll find Crypto armed with his new toy. Pressing down the A button launches Crypto into the air via his jetpack, and if you continue holding it down he’ll slowly glide back down. There are a few different combinations too but since the game is very good with its tutorials you’ll have Crypto disintegrating humans in no time.

Crypto may not have the widest assortment of mission types to choose from in his latest adventure, but each and every one of them has enough quirks and twists to them to distract players from realizing how repetitive it truly is. The "Odd Job" side missions involve either ruining peoples’ lives or assassinating them. The "Cult of Arkvoodle" missions involve establishing a cult per city to worship Crypto’s alien god, and the main missions run the gamut from destruction, to protection, to simply picking up something from Location X and delivering it to Location Y all while being shot at by the military.

So while the missions themselves appear on the outside to not be all that different than what they were like in the first game, every single one has a delicious twist to it. Admittedly, the twists and turns come fast and furious more towards the end, in particular the final "Odd Job" mission in Takeshima, but Destroy All Humans! 2 definitely keeps you on your toes throughout. Even missions that start off as "go blow up something" usually end up with Crypto fending off some giant monster or an entire battalion of tanks.

The color commentary and dialogue though are what make the game. The story manages to build off the groundwork laid by the original, which is mockingly referenced throughout, and enhance the characters of Crypto and Pox. Their banter and quips are reason enough to play through the whole game even if the missions start to run together after a while. Even though these two are clearly the stars of the show, the game leaves enough room for plenty of supporting characters to come in and flesh out the world. The world has evolved over the prior 10 years and it becomes increasingly clear that Crypto has evolved along with it.

And I’m not just talking about the latest addition to his arsenal.

What makes Destroy All Humans! 2 fun to play start to finish are the many ways in which you can approach missions, the hilariously spot-on humor, the vast number of missions, the even more varied amount of things to collect per level, and the sense of sheer fun Pandemic obviously had in making it. It’s the sort of infectious enthusiasm you can’t fake and seeing it in every mission, of which there are many, makes the game all the more special. Games made from the heart are increasingly rare so it’s important to treat them with the respect they deserve. Play Destroy All Humans! 2 and bask in the glory of a game that brings the funny in a big, big way.

At $40 retail, gamers will find an amazing amount of game for their buck. There are hundreds of things to do and find and collect, and just about everything is fun to do. There are a few glitches here and there but even those can be looked past for the greater good. I only experienced one instance where a major character was hung up on a door, and early in the game there is one mission I couldn’t beat unless I essentially exploited a glitch (specifically, the "Odd Job" in Bay City where you have to guard the radio tower as Pox makes a transmission). As if all this wasn’t enough, the game is fast and furious with the funny and you’ll find yourself frequently laughing your head off.

Add to this the unlockable art galleries and videos and there are plenty of things to enjoy outside of the game itself. My recommendation though is to unlock as many things as you can as quickly as you can in order to get the "Crypto & Pox: Salad Days" video which is essentially a DVD-style commentary by both Crypto and Pox as they "look back" on the highlights from the first game. Words are not enough to accurately describe how funny, and off-color, it is but this one video alone is worth buying the game for.

With all the games currently packing shelves, the discerning gamer must pick up that which stands apart from the crowd. Destroy All Humans! 2 does that in spades with its combination of lightning-fast and constantly funny humor, solid story, fun gameplay, and plenty of things to do and collect. It’s a great way to spend the next few weeks of your life and it’s funny enough to warrant revisiting again in the future. Pandemic should collectively stand up and take a bow because they have expertly crafted a sequel that goes above and beyond the top-notch original.

Gaming Trend Score

93

1. Graphics: 90
2. Audio: 97
3. Controls: 92
4. Gameplay: 92
5. Value/Replay: 94
6. OVERALL:93