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Siji · Post by **Siji** » March 4, 2004, 3:28 pm

Playing James Bond : All or Nothing (?) Pretty good game, not a zillion minute controls to remember. If you like shooters and the like, it's entertaining. My only gripe is saving the game, and the inability to skip through some of the video sequences. Saving takes way too long in my opinion; compared to other games I play.

I'm trying to decide between the new Lord of the Rings: RoTK or the new Jet Li game.. (PS2) Anyone played either and can make a suggestion as to which is better? I really liked the previous LoTR game (2nd one), and the TV commercials for the Jet Li game look good as well. Either one of these two, or Champions of Norrath.

Multiplayer/Net player stuff doesn't really matter to me since my cable modem is in a completely different room than my TV and I'm not keen about 50' of cable running around on the floor. That and I hate games with a zillion controls (e.g. most military games).

Truant · Post by **Truant** » March 5, 2004, 5:48 pm

Champions of Norrath is just another Baldur's Gate game. If you really enjoy those, go for it. If it wasn't for 2 player coop, I probably wouldn't touch it.

A friend at work said the new Jet Li game, Rise to Honor, is fucking sweet. I don't know personally, though I do trust his judgement.

Kithyen · Post by **Kithyen** » March 5, 2004, 6:36 pm

Somethingawful's Rise to Honor Review

Before the game gets under way, a brief tutorial comes up and cheerfully demonstrates the ins and outs of a godawful control setup that puts Ehrgeiz’s godawful control setup to shame. If you thought Kabuki Warriors was a pathetic fighting game for only having one attack button, you ain’t seen nothing yet. Rise to Honor features a whopping ZERO attack buttons! That’s right, you don’t press buttons to attack at all! You simply push the right analog stick in the direction you want to attack, and Jet Li will decide whether he wants to do a punch, a backwards girly slap or a strange little twisting ballerina kick. The control scheme, which consists of a “move” joystick and an “attack” joystick with an occasional tap of the shoulder buttons, leads me to picture the head developer stammering “Well, uh, it worked for Smash TV” before screaming “FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, INSERT MORE RANDOM WEAPONS!” and then choking to death on his own drool.

I've thought about renting the game to see if it's as bad as the reviewer says, but I always find something more interesting while browsing thru blockbuster *Shrugs*

Siji · Post by **Siji** » March 9, 2004, 2:30 pm

Thanks, sounds like I'll be avoiding that one. Just finished the Bond one and it was pretty good. Guess the new Lord of the Rings will be the next one to try.

Aslanna · Post by **Aslanna** » March 9, 2004, 3:09 pm

Siji wrote:Thanks, sounds like I'll be avoiding that one. Just finished the Bond one and it was pretty good. Guess the new Lord of the Rings will be the next one to try.

Thought people didn't listen to reviews.. Or does that only apply to movies?

Anyway, like just about with any bad review you can also find someone saying the total opposite:

Good-bye action buttons, hello analog joystick. Rise to Honor masterfully evolves past the staccato rhythms of the jab-punch-kick school of single button press fighting to a more smooth, awesome-looking style of action/adventure combat that’s (in this case) intimately tied to the real-life kung fu techniques of martial arts movie star, Jet Li.

The Joy of Sticking
Basically, you move your fighting character (Li) around with the right stick and merely press the left stick towards your designated victim/human punching bag to bust a move. The artificial intelligence instantly unleashes badass Jet Li kung fu on the poor sap as you spin the left stick to target another victim. Super moves are available after you build up power that’s monitored by the Adrenaline Meter.

Obviously, from the get-go you can look very good in spurts. To the game’s credit, however, the system takes time to fully master in all-out multiple opponent combat and the A.I. adversaries are no pushovers. Also there may be several different moves available for display depending on the situation, so you can experiment to find out just what you’ve got. The adventure is lengthy, too; taking place in Hong Kong and San Francisco in 11 environments broken down in to 63 chapters.

There’s also firearm combat where the left stick enables you to quickly switch among multiple targets. This system succeeds in workmanlike fashion, but be prepared to take beaucoup hits. There’s an Adrenaline-Meter-driven bullet-time move, too, that will be wasted early on while you’re in training.

Rise to Honor also does a good job of weaving orchestrated action into the gameplay. That is, this is one of those action game that during some chases prompts you to, say, jump, climb, or hide by pressing R1. Naturally, it looks very cool when your timing’s correct, but if it’s off, virtual Li either looks lost or he’s dead.

The Li Way
Rise to Honor’s look and feel is very much Hong Kong action film lite. Jet Li’s a bodyguard in H.K.; his “boss” is killed on his watch; he must find an estranged daughter in America; and he must avenge the hit.

Although the gameplay mechanics are the critical feature, there’s no doubt who the star of this show is. Jet Li, his favorite movie stunt fight coordinator Cory Yuen, and a gang of martial arts stuntmen and wire-artists spent countless hours at motion capture mania to record all the potential fighting moves you can bust in this game.

The payoff is your ability to command and view some amazing Li kung fu. Among the show are great multi-hit kicks, gravity defying runs along walls, and (in areas where you team up with another character) Li’s signature two-person team attacks. You can chain moves and fire-off combos. Li also uses weapon techniques with staffs and double sticks with ease, and can also turn some unlikely items into fierce forces if you’re imaginative enough to search around (hint: the term “food fight” takes on new meaning here).

Although the repertoire is great, it appears some concessions had to be made. In particular, because so much about 360-degree fighting technique relies on angles of attack you’d like to have a sideways “strafing” move to set up your offense. Also, while Li (as observable in his films) is master of the counter-strike, so, too, are some of his opponents here and you’d like to have a jump back move in addition to the normal block and counter.

Fung Swayed
Honor’s cinema-influenced presentation is effectively entertaining. The sounds and music sustain the tension in the story that’s fueled by authentic Chinese dialogue of course. The visual style is clean and sharp, but the fluid, diverse animation is really the star of the show. Rise to Honor displays great imagination and attention to detail that is at once challenging, innovative, and fun. It accomplishes the task of re-creating the venerable beat-em-up genre with honor.

I have no opinion.

Truant · Post by **Truant** » March 10, 2004, 6:19 pm

received the demo for rise to honor from a friend...it's just part of a level, but includes all kinds of melee and gun fighting.

The game is pretty fucking sweet (the demo anyways). And it handles fighting multiple enemies at once without rediculously complicated controls.

Kithyen · Post by **Kithyen** » March 11, 2004, 2:15 am

Well maybe I'll pick it up this weekend from blockbuster. Seems more like rental material. Then again I don't get into many fighting games, so my opinion's probably biased in that respect.

Jice Virago · Post by **Jice Virago** » March 11, 2004, 2:27 am

Take a closer look at that something aweful review, particularly the movies of their "amazing AI". Theres an amusing sequence where the reviewer just held down the R1 button and autograbbed all the guys who came near and tossed them into the corner on top of each other.