Reviewed and available exclusively on PS3
At the risk of sending you – dear reader – off to another page on MyGaming before absorbing the entirety of this review, I’m going to sum up the Killzone 3 experience in one simple sentence: ‘It’s quite a bit of fun and the graphics and sound effects are good too.’ Now there’s a reason why I would resort to such an unsophisticated description of Killzone 3; it fits perfectly with the tone of the game.
The Killzone 3 Story
Let’s set the stage for Killzone 3. For those who missed out, or are perhaps a bit fuzzy regarding the events of the previous titles, MyGaming has handily posted a Killzone story retrospective. The sci-fi tale of Killzone 3 begins a heartbeat after the concluding events of Killzone 2, and the opening scene takes place on the home world of the Helghast – aka the bad guys – in the midst of an invasion by the ISA (Interplanetary Strategic Alliance) – aka the good guys.
The ISA are kind of annoyed with unplayable protagonist Rico Velasquez and his execution of the Helghan Emperor Visari. The Helghast are massing a counter-offensive against the ISA forces and the rag-tag forces of the ISA are trying to regroup after the Helghans dropped a nuke on their own city, wiping out large numbers of their own along with the ISA ground forces. Playable protagonist Tomas ‘Sev’ Sevchenko and the rest of the ISA forces push forward against a tide of Helghast while waiting for some sort of direction from high command.
Meanwhile it is established via cut-scenes that the Helghan leadership is in a bit of disarray after the loss of their emperor and internal political struggle develops between two new antagonists – capitalist and weapons supplier Jorhan Stahl (voiced by Malcolm MacDowell) and old-hat militarist Admiral Orlock (voiced by Ray Winstone). These two distinguished actors lend their voice credibility to the game (and to an extent, their appearance), but the script does fall flat in a number of places.
I don’t want to reveal any more of the plot, such as it is. Developer Guerrilla Games had noble intentions with the storyline in the light of criticism of Killzone 2. Despite this, it feels as if they missed the mark a bit. The one-legged script hobbles along with a crutch of Deus Ex Machina, punctuated by numerous sudden changes in direction and dubious plot twists. The characters interact painfully and never really develop, making it difficult to care about them; except for the two Helghan leaders Orlock and Stahl – their performances are the best in the game. Toward the end it almost feels like the developers were running out of time, and the edges fray all the more, with some cutscenes and story resolution just cobbled together at the end. Thankfully it never crosses the brink into the oblivion of failure, and the story is sufficient to propel the player through a number of fun-drenched action-packed moments. If you’re playing a game such as Killzone 3 for its story, you’ve probably missed the point.
Killzone 3 Gameplay
This is where Killzone 3 shows its mettle. Stuff all that wishy-washy plot and character development rubbish! This game is all about shooting things until they die and then blowing everything up for good measure.
Visually, Guerrilla Games has delivered a stunning and colourful journey across the ravaged Helghan planet. From the nuclear blast devastated city of Pyrrhus, through colourful and foreboding alien jungles, across glacial snow-scapes, and into the heart of the Helghan military beast itself, one never feels bored with the scenery, and it feels as if there is some new spectacle around each corner. The texturing is detailed and colourful enough to lend definition to the environments, and being up close and personal with the Helghast is quite an invigorating visual experience, especially as players will likely be murdering them with a variety of melee attack animations. The lighting and shadows are worth noting – pulled of with aplomb. Behemoth war machines wreak devastation in the background scenery, warships fill the skies, and all the while the manic sounds of all-out war resound across the battleground, successfully filling out the ambience of the game’s setting.
The sound effects do deserve a mention here; they are crisp and clear, with plenty of variety depending on the situation, and they serve to either set the aural scene or supplement the gameplay objectives through audio cues – all this without becoming an overwhelming audio malaise. The screams of dying Helghast have a chilling sub-human undertone to them, amplified by their mechanical re-breather masks, juxtaposed by the all-too-human wails of a dying comrade.
The game flows through a number of linear levels, all crammed with Helghast that pop out at predictable moments. This is not really a problem, but one will begin to learn the enemy spawns after a few playthroughs. Luckily the AI makes up for this, especially on harder difficulty settings, with their aim and reaction times tightening, and their use of cover-breaking grenade throws bordering on cheating. The Helghan troops are well animated and make good use of cover and flanking techniques when possible. The ragdoll physics are pretty cool, and it’s always satisfying to see bodies soar through the air and land in a tangled, crumpled heap thanks to a perfectly timed grenade.
Killzone 3 also introduces a number of vehicle combat sections. Players will hop into mechanised battlesuits and jet-packs, as well as a few on-rails segments with tanks and drop-ships, manning the cannons and machine guns. All of these are great fun, and leave one wishing the segments were longer and hoping that more are to come. The set-piece levels are also quite spectacular, and players will scale massive moving vehicles and take on behemoth Helghast war machines – also great fun and a visual and aural spectacle to boot. Overall, the levels flow together nicely, although things can occasionally feel a little disjointed.
The shooting mechanics are workable and I have no real complaints about the aiming. The cover mechanics can become slightly annoying, especially when you want to dash out of the range of a grenade, but find your character is committedly hugging the corner of a concrete block. Still, one learns to overcome these things. Although I used the Dualshock 3 controller long enough to form an opinion about it, I soon switched to a third party mouse controller, which dramatically improved my in-game performance (yes, I’m an old school PC gamer). There are a number of cool weapons to play around with, but one will probably find they’ll stick to the standard assault rifles, as the scope abilities can’t be beaten. There isn’t much difference in the feel of a heavy weapon when compared to a normal primary weapon, which might be a slight disappointment to those looking for a bit of ‘realism.’ For a closer look at the array of weapons on offer, check out the Killzone 3 weapons list.
I take issue with certain ‘immersion’ elements that have been introduced – the use of motion controls for arming bombs and turning valves. In these cases one has to hold down a button, turn the controller in the right direction, release the button, turn the controller back, hold down the button, and repeat until said valve is turned. Why do this? If I wanted to live out the exhilarating thrill of turning a valve I could go water my garden. All these segments do is serve to break immersion with the game as players scratch their heads figuring out how to waggle the controller in the correct way to progress. These sections aren’t even performed under duress of enemy fire, so one can’t even argue that there is a point to learning to do this skilfully. Thankfully these sections are few, but that does add to the feeling that they were simply tacked-on as an afterthought. It would be far better to have a simple ‘Press Circle’ command so that one can get on with the real point of the game – shooting stuff.
Bugs were few and far between. My PS3 did lock up a couple of times when loading cutscenes, but I’m not sure if the game or device is to blame for this. At one point, I witnessed a Helghan soldier fall into the wall of a level, effectively stopping the level from progressing because he couldn’t be killed. Frames did drop on ocassion, when approaching a new area, or when assets are loading in preparation for some scripted event. It’s difficult to say just how much actual game time you get from the singel player experince, as it is interspersed with plenty of deaths and cutscenes – I’d hazard a guess of around 8 hours.
Multiplayer
Unfortunately my time with the game fell right in the period between when the open beta had finished, and the game launched, so I didn’t get any online multiplayer time. This did give me the chance to check out the Botzone mode, which is essentially multiplayer filled with bots. There are eight maps on disk, and three game modes, with five players classes to choose from.
The classes are Marksman, Engineer, Field Medic, Tactician, and Infiltrator and each has its own skills and weapons. The modes are Guerilla Warfare, Warzone, and Operations. Guerilla Warfare is a classic team death match with up to 16 players. Warzone is a mission based game (i.e. Assassination, Search and Destroy, Capture and Hold). Operations is a scripted game that features cinematic scenes in which two teams will either try to capture or defend a base, for up to 16 players. These modes are all great fun, and the bot AI is pretty good to play with – a great way to practice for the real online mayhem.
The split-screen co-op mode is offline only, and it follows the single player campaign. The screen layout is done well, dividing the screens vertically, but obviously things do become rather tiny. A large screen will be appreciated here. The co-op is good fun, but sharing a screen with a friend is never as good as having your own all to yourself. The PS3 also chugs slightly in the busier scenes while handling co-op. This mode would have been fantastic with an online component, but alas.
Conclusion
Killzone 3 is a lot of fun if you can overlook the poorly delivered script. The visuals are top-notch in a cool sci-fi setting, as are the sound effects, and the gameplay is solid. If you’re looking for a fun shooter that doesn’t’ require too much intellectual investment, Killzone 3 should hit the sweet spot. Coupled with a compelling multiplayer component, the game should offer quite a bit of value for PS3 owners.
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