Rogue Ops: Phoenix Unleashed (GameCube) Review

The basic idea behind the game is a pretty tedious one. Nikki Conners, a big bosomed 'babe' with big guns and an attitude you could kill a Guinea Pig with. Her husband and daughter have just been murdered and surprise, surprise, she is now seeking revenge. As you do in such a situation, Nikki Conners joins up with a covert government agency and goes about hunting members of the terrorist organisation, Omega 19, who she believes are behind the deaths of those close to her. When you have quite finished rolling your eyes at that one there is actually a game to be played.

If Splinter Cell oozed class this one oozes that 'wannabe factor' of knowing what it should be doing but not quite getting there. The guys at Bits Studios have gone to great lengths to introduce all the best elements from other titles in the stealth-'em-up genre but it just does not quite feel right. Nikki Conners can do everything that Solid Snake and Sam Fisher can do and in certain ways she can do it even better. Throughout the games eight, excellently designed levels. It all starts off with the training mission where you simply have to kill fake enemies, it introduces the game very nicely indeed and means that when you get going you can execute all the moves and do everything you need to in order to progress. As you move through the levels you are able to sneak up on, creep up on, climb over, under, through and around guards, you can hide bodies, use your gadget filled goggles and even blow things up, horah! Explosives, rifles, snipers and even big automatic things that hurt all they touch...a lot

Executing moves may look great, but it isn't all that easy. The control system is hugely suspect and doing anything with a vague degree of coordination is nigh on impossible. Whilst the stealth sections all work fine, manoeuvring things slowly and going about in the shadows is a synch, if you have to go into anything above second gear you are in severe trouble. When put into direct combat everything goes horribly wrong. You crawl about trying your best to be acrobatic and cool, but the fact is the game doesn't seem to let you. If you happen to get into a massive shoot-out with a terrorist group you might just find the controller sitting on the floor in pieces. This game is hugely ruined by the fact that everything is difficult to execute. Whilst we like a challenge in a game the challenge has to be fair and fun and based on good gameplay, not poor game design.

However, Rogue Ops does have quite a few rather handy redeeming features. Just about everything around you in this game can be manipulated and used in some sort of way. When Nikki approaches a ledge a green display appears on screen to show if you can whiz off down it or not, if she can simply hit the action button and the game does it all for you. It is a very well implemented feature and one that helps the game to feel very well put together. Everything is included into the games on screen display and it helps to make sure you never feel lost and you always know what is going on. Unless of course, like us you get hugely confused by the system, that never quite seems to do what you want it to. You can latterly spend hours of gameplay over the time it takes to complete this wondering about trying to work out what is going on. The system is simply too rigid, it does not allow gamers to enjoy the game outside of how the system wants you to. As we are sure you can imagine it isn't hugely good fun.

The missions, whilst confusing at the times, are very challenging and well thought out. There are numerous very cannily worked out puzzles incorporated into the environments. Sadly, not everything is quite perfect, in fact a fair percentage of the game is a bit off centre. Whilst it all rewards skill it is horribly tedious at times. Thankfully, if you get so bored that you accidently die the game wont be so cruel as to make you play the whole level again, you are simply booted back to the last place where you completed a mission objective.

Sneaking, as we have said is done terribly well. Anything Sam Fisher or Solid Snake can do, Nikki Conners can also do. There are numerous movements to perfect, all of which are wonderfully realised. Tilting the control stick one way will allow you to kill someone in a totally different way to what happens when you tilt it the other. If you can manage to perfect it all a whole world of neck-snapping goodness will be at your fingertips. If you don't get your perfectly rehearsed routine quite right you will not kill the enemy and in a very well animated flash they will turn around and have a go at you.

Graphics wise, Rogue Ops is a fairly average romp. The main character is just like every other female lead with huge breasts. Blonde hair, a rear end you could set your watch by and even a tight fitting suit. If we were glazed over adolescents we might be impressed, but the whole thing is wearing a bit thin now. The worlds are nice and varied with all sorts of environments to be enjoyed. You have hideouts, military bases, public buildings and outdoor settings all mixed into one single game. At times it looks great, at others it could be straight of the N64, the whole things is horribly unbalanced. The animation is slow and creaky and the framerate is ugly at various points during the game but one thing we can't knock the game on is its style. The gadgets all look superb. The X-Ray goggles use a very nice effect and the lighting techniques used for the laser are very special indeed. Whilst this isn't a patch on Splinter Cell, Rogue Ops does try very hard to be a visual monster; just a bit of a shame it falls short.