phungus's Full Review: X-Men Legends 2: Rise of Apocalypse for Xbox
X-Men Legends II: Rise of Apocalypse is a fun sequel to the original game. If you liked the original, then you will surely enjoy this one. It’s basically the same type of game again, but with a few new features. Fans of the X-Men series will also enjoy getting to play a lot more characters than in the original. I just wish it had a different kind of game saving system.
Most of what I know about the X-Men comes from the movies and some from conservations overheard among friends who actually read and keep up with the comics. I know who most of the major characters are and know a little bit about their histories beyond what takes place in the movies. For that reason, I really can’t go in depth into the accuracy of this game and who was left out when they should have been put in. Suffice to say, I think most X-Men fans would be pleased by what all you can do with the characters in this game.
The plot of this game involves a very powerful mutant named Apocalypse who has launched an attack on all mutants. Apocalypse kidnapped some of the mutants and is trying to steal their powers to make himself more powerful. This means longtime enemies Professor X and Magneto must combine their forces to take on their common enemy. For you as the gamer, it means you get to play with both good guys and bad guys. You can expect a lot of in-fighting, too.
This game allows you to start out with a choice of 15 different players, then you can unlock a few more along the way. By default, you begin with Wolverine, Magneto, Storm, and Cyclops. This quartet will get you through most of the early parts of the game, but later on you’ll need to trade out members of your party in order to utilize their mutant powers to get past certain obstacles. The game’s leveling system is also balanced so that even if you play with one character, when you decide to switch him out with another, that new character will be able to level up to where the old one was.
Just like the original, this game is pure hack and slash. It might try to pass itself off as a quasi-RPG because you can level up your characters and manage equipment, but this is really just a combat game. If you ever played either of the two Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance titles, this game is pretty much like that. Throughout the game, you’ll be presented with a series of missions that usually involve rescuing someone, finding objects, or destroying something. The levels are fairly linear and involve what you might call a ‘dungeon crawl’ had this been a medieval fantasy game rather than something inspired by comic books. Even though this game uses a four-player party system, there really is no need to formulate strategies like you would in a party-based PC role playing game. About the only strategy you need for this game is not to charge in too quickly and always keep a stash of health potions.
I found a few issues with the control system in this game, mostly dealing with minor obstacles. The characters have trouble climbing over things on the ground, so often you have to hit the jump button to get over small rocks. While this is only a minor annoyance, it does disrupt the flow of the gameplay. I also noticed that with Wolverine, he is a bit hard to control when he starts slashing. Trying to hit a moving target with him involves a lot of running around in circles. There seems to be a general control issue with the targeting system in this game, but that could be more of a difficulty factor than a design flaw.
The graphics in this game are pretty impressive and have a nice comic book look to them. During cutscenes, the characters are drawn with black outlines that make them appear just as they would in a comic, and the colors are all bright and vibrant. There was a lot of detail put into the animations of this game, especially when the X-men get to use their mutant powers. When you get into some thick combat, the screen is often filled with explosions and movie people and all sort of animations, but the game never slows down. The sound effects and music are pretty good, but the game is really too chaotic to make much use of surround sound effects. A good subwoofer will help bring out the thunder in the noise you’ll make along the way.
The only real complaint I have about this game is the save system. The original game had the same problem. You can’t save any time you want. In fact, you can’t even save in between maps. The only time you can save your progress is when you find an ‘extraction point’, which also lets you change out team members. The problem is that these extraction points are few and far between. For example, there was one evening where I played for 45 minutes straight before finding one, then two of my party got killed before I could save. That meant the other two mutants couldn’t handle the job and they were also killed. I ended up losing those 45 minutes because I had to play that whole section all over again. That kind of stuff makes me want to stop playing for a while because it’s so frustrating. I never finished the original X-Men Legends because I got bored with spending so much time to get stuck on one part and have to go through it all over again. Because there’s nothing extremely difficult about the regular gameplay, having to play sections over again is very tedious and the fun quickly fizzles out. The boss fights can be tough, but you can usually save before and after one of them.
In addition to the game itself, there are a lot of extras to be found in this game. While fighting your way through the levels, you will find items to unlock these special features in the main menu. These items include comic book covers, art, previews, and more. Most of these objects can be found in plain view in the maps, so long as you take a few steps off the main path to locate them.
Ultimately, I enjoyed X-Men Legends II: Rise of Apocalypse, though I wished it offered a little more than what it does over the original. Being able to play the new characters is a great bonus, but that save game system seriously needs to be reworked.
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