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Welcome to the inaugural run of Point to Point where two of Crave Online’s writers go back and forth about a particular topic. The topic today is about the new videogame X-Men Origins Wolverine. Read on to see the back and forth over this game between Jeremy Azevedo and Dante Maddox. The only rule is that there are no rules!
Dante:
As far as platforming beat em’ ups go this game is one of the best ever. The controls are tight, and the graphics are clean and the action is impressive. I can’t get over how violent the game is, and I love the fact that you can simply run amok. The lunge feature is probably my favorite feature in the game and it works wonderfully. It’s a little frustrating at times but since the checkpoints are frequent I don’t mind doing a few things more than once. What were your first impressions of the game?
Jeremy:
While I agree that it's a great game, I don't know about "best ever"... I do feel as if this is closest anyone will ever come to truly encapsulating the Wolverine experience in a video game though. You're right about the "Lunge" feature: It's fun and it works great, though I tended to really overuse it. I think what I liked best about this game, though, were the subtle details, like how you can "Snikt" your claw out and retract them at will. This serves absolutely no functional purpose that I am aware of, but it's just one of those things you associate with Wolverine and it's nice to have it in there.
Dante:
I agree, the trouble is I haven’t played every hack and slash game out there, but typically superhero games leave the feeling of being a superhero out, I’ll never forget how disappointed I was with most of the Superman games where you’re not very super. Wolverine in the comics is an unstoppable killing machine, and in the game you’re an unstoppable killing machine (for the most part) and that’s important to me. I also like the fact that the player isn’t mired in leveling their character, sure there are levels and you can do more stuff over time but leveling doesn’t seem necessary to progress through the game, you just get more dangerous as the game progresses, I was just talking to a friend and I mentioned that they should do away with levels in superhero games all together and I think they take a step in that direction with Wolverine. Have you had a chance to unlock any of the costumes yet?
Jeremy:
I liked the leveling aspect, actually. I think it's irresponsible to leave out some element of customization in modern games. It just adds something extra for those of us with gamer OCD to do. I don't know about doing away with levels though, it wouldn't make sense for this game. This is a controlled narrative, not an open-world Spider-Man game. In fact, I quite like the narrative of this title. Some would complain that it's more or less true to the comic or the movie blah blah blah but the Wolverine backstory isn't exactly a work of classical literature. I think they nailed it as best they could. Although I'll tell you I could do with a few less crappy ass puzzles. If I can't tear through any goddamn thing with my claws, then what good are they? As for the costumes, haven't found any yet.
