Rara vez los videojuegos basados en películas resultan experiencias agradables.GoldenEye 007 o El Retorno del Rey son gloriosas excepciones, y también recuerdo con cariño el Indiana Jones y la Última Cruzada, en la época en la cual LucasArts nos deleitaba con sus aventuras gráficas. Los más recientes lanzamientos, caso del X-Men Orígenes: Lobezno o The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena son dignos intentos que se quedan a medio camino entre un juego decente y uno inolvidable. Lamentablemente, Terminator: Salvation se queda muy lejos de estos dos.
The story of the new installment of the saga created by James Cameron is well known: John Connor is the leader of the resistance in a post-apocalyptic future in which Skynet, an artificial intelligence designed by the United States Army, leads the machines to wipe out all forms of human life. Bad thing.
The video game developed by GRIN takes place sometime between Terminator 3 and Salvation, and as it could not be otherwise, it follows the outline of a third-person shooter in which we will control John Connor. Of course, not everything will be dropping lead: covering yourself and not easily exposing yourself to rival shots will be the key to success.
La primera sensación es imponente: una secuencia cinemática de gran calidad aparece tras comenzar una nueva partida. Nos vemos inmersos en un espectacular tiroteo que da paso al tutorial consabido. Los fans del GOW están de enhorabuena aquí: se apunta con LT, se dispara con RT y se entra y se sale de las coberturas con el A. Al igual que en el juego de EPIC, el Y también se usa para que la atención se centre en los acontecimientos importantes (la aparición de un nuevo enemigo, por ejemplo). Eso sí, no hay motosierra que valga, y el B sólo nos cambiará entre las dos únicas armas que puede llevar Connor, mientras que si se mantiene pulsado, podemos seleccionar arma con el stick izquierdo, cosa que yo no acabo de entender cuando sólo puedes elegir entre dos armas. A pesar de esta aparente limitación, con eso y unas pocas granadas bastará para reventar todo lo que las máquinas osen mandarnos.
And the machine guns are of very little use in TS, and it is perfectly possible to finish it at once only with the shotgun and a heavy weapon, such as an RPG or a grenade launcher, vital to safely confront the T-600. These are undoubtedly the toughest enemies in the game, especially because they have a rarely seen ability: they are capable of killing you with a single hit without even being close to them. Even if you’re inside a building and they’re outside, one swing of their metal arm and John Connor will be history. What’s more, one comes to wonder why they need machine guns: by making them wave their arms, humanity would be doomed.
In addition to the T-600s, there are two other types of enemies: the “spiders”, only vulnerable from behind, which requires you to surround them to damage them or attract their fire so that Connor’s companions can take advantage of shooting them; and “wasps”, small flying devices that are not very powerful, but annoying. And that’s all, except on the (three) occasions in which we will be mounted in a vehicle and will only handle the machine gun, when the motorcycles appear; and that type of ship called the “hunter-killer”, which despite its size cannot withstand more than three or four shots from the rocket launcher. I say that Skynet, for such a powerful military artificial intelligence, falls short in its catalogue, but it is what it is.
That’s all you find in TS, throughout 9 fairly short phases in which variety is conspicuous by its absence. Basically everything consists of advancing and standing still while one or two waves of enemies arrive, destroying them, and advancing through a predetermined scenario, without the slightest freedom of exploration, until one reaches the next wave, destroys it and advances for a while until the phase ends.
Why does this development, which works like a charm in other games of the style, as happens with the adventures of Marcus Phoenix, become tedious and boring here? First, the combat suffers from the intensity of EPIC’s gameplay. The enemies simply shoot at the bulk, and many times it only requires patience to turn their backs on us, or to stay crouched until our platoon mates hit enough shots. What’s more, there are areas where just crouching and attracting enemy shots is enough: Angie or Blair will do the rest. And although they may die in the middle of the shootout, in the next sequence they will all be alive and well. Unusual.
Also, the game is full of glitches. For example, the difficulty varies enormously from one moment to another, practically at random, so while sometimes we will destroy robots without flinching, on other occasions we will be massacred by the same type of enemies without almost knowing where so much fire is coming from. What’s more, it is not strange to be covered, and still continue to receive bullets, making survival almost impossible. By the way, they could have included a jump button: it’s not that much is needed, but when you have to go around half the stage because a cardboard box is blocking your way, you feel a little frustrated.
At a graphic level, lights and shadows. The successful post-apocalyptic setting and the beautiful explosions coexist with completely expressionless faces, which not even with the effort of the original actors (except Christian Bale, who must have smelled the calico) manage to convey a minimum of emotion. It doesn’t matter losing a comrade in combat or destroying a “screed” (that’s how it’s translated, seriously), the faces move less than that of a wax statue of Nicole Kidman.
El sonido es algo mejor, sobre todo cuando suenan los acordes de la famosísima partitura de Brad Fiedel, si bien las melodías machaconas y repetitivas que se oyen durante la mayor parte del tiempo acaban volviéndose molestas. En cuanto a disparos y explosiones, suenan como se les supone.
Perhaps worst of all is that there is never a sense of reaching a climax: there is no striking final confrontation, no truly epic moment. Difficulty is achieved by accumulation: more spiders, more T-600s, and that’s it. Finishing the game, even on the highest difficulty, will only take about 4-5 hours at most, counting the endless loading times (I timed up to 30 seconds at ease) in which we can “entertain ourselves” by turning the head of a Terminator, and all that will remain is the final feeling of “well, okay.”
Of course, the “achievement bitches” can rub their hands with their few 11 achievements (nine correspond to completing the missions, and the other two are unlocked on their own by selecting the high difficulty), easily adding another 1000 points to their accounts. In addition, those who want to share their suffering can use multiplayer (in reality, only two can play at a time), which to make matters worse, is local and split-screen.
In short, Terminator: Salvation is short, repetitive, and somewhat unforgivably: bland. And on top of that, the L.A. The future is made of foxes. Like to accompany Connor.
Many thanks to colleague Loberto from El Reverso for the article.