GunGrave: OverDose
Score: 90% ESRB: Mature Publisher: Mastiff Developer: Red Entertainment Media: DVD/1 Players: 1 Genre: Action/ Third Person Shooter
Graphics & Sound: For those of you who remember GunGrave, and groan at the mere mention of its name, then cheer up. GunGrave: Overdose is the game you were looking for the first time around. To put it simply, the graphics of Overdose look like a full-rendered 3D anime. It took me a while to put my finger on the style. As you move through the huge levels, you will encounter cemeteries, office buildings and casinos that seem to come straight out of just about any modern anime. This isn't the cartoony style of the older animes; Overdose takes on the "not quite realistic" look found in shows like Ghost in the Shell, Trigun and of course, the GunGrave series. The between-level cut scenes come in two flavors. For the major transitions in the game, you will be blessed with lengthy anime movies. The rest of the time, the story will progress via a conversation between the various characters, well stills of these characters that shake and jump around as they talk to each other. This last aspect caught me a little off guard at first, but at times served as a nice comedic relief. As far as the music and sound effects are concerned, there isn't much to talk about. In general, the music was good and kept in the background most of the time, and the gunshots and bullet hits sounded about right. Basically, these features didn't hurt the game, but they didn't do a lot to pull me in either.
Gameplay: It has been three years sinse the Millinion Organization was defeated and the drug Seed was taken off of the streets. But it seems that vile substance has cropped up again, and Mika Asagi has once again resurrected Beyond the Grave to stop the drug once and for all -- thus starts the GunGrave: Overdose storyline. Thankfully though, Grave doesn't have to take out the mafia all on his own like he did in the past. This time he will be joined by two other dead men named Juji Kabane (a blind soldier) and Rocketbilly Redcadillac (the ghost of a singer haunting an electric guitar). As I played through the game with Beyond, and watched the various cutscenes that put him at the center of action, I was eager to play through with the other characters. I was hoping to see the story from their perspective. What were they doing as I was tearing up the lobby of the Gargoyle Hotel or roughing up a local casino? But, when I started playing through with the other characters, I was slightly let down when I realized I was actually playing through the exact same missions -- just with a different character model. Though there are only nine stages in Overdose, each is huge and filled with several locations to save your progress and Tally up your Skull Points. Skull Points are gained based on how well you did during that portion of the mission. You will be graded on the number of kills, amount of health left, Art Points (how well you looked while tearing up that baddies) and more. Earn enough points and you will unlock new attacks and various extras that will make your overall gaming experience that much more enjoyable.
Difficulty: GunGrave: Overdose has some difficult moments, but in general, you can plow your way through a room of baddies with out any problems. I only really had trouble when going up against the bosses; either they were extremely powerful, or their vulnerable spots were hard to get to. This was good because though I played through a good bit of this game in one sitting, it was a really, really long sitting, mostly because of these hard to take down bosses.
Game Mechanics: GunGrave: Overdose's control scheme isn't anything new and shouldn't be any problem for gamers experienced in the shooter genres. You can fire your weapons (be it the twin Cerberus handguns, the electric guitar or the machine guns) with the X button. Overdose uses a fairly dead-on auto-aiming system that will allow you to just rapidly press the fire button in the general area of a slew of baddies and mow them down. And if you want to focus on a particular target instead of shooting at all of them, then you can hold down the L1 button, and cycle through the targets with the R1. However, I found the only times this became essential were during the various boss battles. Each character also has a series of close range attacks that are activated by the Circle button. Combinations of these two types of attacks will increase your Art score and if you get a high enough rating, you will be treated to some cool moves as your chosen character cleans out the room. On top of these two basic attacks, there are also the more powerful Demolition Attacks. You earn the ability to use these after you increase your Beat counter enough (this counter climbs as long as you are hitting objects -- whether it is an enemy or not). These shots can do some major damage to the surrounding enemies. Each character can learn up to 9 attacks -- you start with one, and the rest get unlocked as you complete levels. Though people might complain that it is a short game (compared to most shooters that are out now), each of the nine stages are huge and it has a lot of replay value considering that the only way to unlock all of the extras is to go through all stages with all three of the characters. GunGrave: Overdose is a solid game that belongs on the shelves of anyone who claims to be a fan of the third-person shooter genre.
-J.R. Nip, GameVortex Communications AKA Chris Meyer
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