Written By Shaun McCracken
EA must have one hell of a time with the Bond series after they acquired the
license back in 1998, after Rare passed on the oppertunity to do a game based
upon "Tomorrow Never Dies" (and they should have taken it, rather than spend
so much of their time with Perfect Dark.). The first 007 game under EA was
Tomorrow Never Dies for the PS1, which is by far, the worst game in the series. Now EA
kind of has an excuse, they didn't develop it, Black Ops did. But still, who
was in charge of quality control? The next year, EA recruited two different
companies to handle the N64 and PS1 version of "The World Is Not Enough". Black
Ops was once again in charge of the PS1 version, and Eurocom was in charge of
the N64 version. Both turned out pretty good, the N64 being better just because
it was longer, had a multiplayer mode and felt like GoldenEye. The PS1 version
looked nice, but was way too short. Then comes Agent Under Fire (I'll ignore
007 Racing, because it's better compared to Spy Hunter than GoldenEye), an original
Bond game form EA, that wasn't based upon a 007 film. At first, I wondered "What
the F- were they thinking?". But after playing it, it wasn't so bad. It's a
fairly adequate FPS, but again, could have used more.
Agent Under Fire's premise is about cloning. Someone wants to clone big
government figures around the world, and of course, Bond must investigate and
stop whoever is behind this. Sounds like a standard 007 script to me. And the
writers and conceptualists behind the game have actually done a good job of
re-creating a 007 movie, although this one doesn't exist. It follows the formula
of Guns, Goons and Girls, and does it well. We have our established mad man (or
woman?) with their henchmen, the "Bond Girls" who seem to always come up at the
most oppertune times, and of course mindless destruction and gunplay. While
stealth elements have been implemented into the game, they're not always apparent.
Most of the time, the game hints at what you should do in terms of gadgets, but
there's also hidden elements of stealthiness, ones you wouldn't think of, such
as crawling through air shafts. It seems like the game was designed to have people
shoot everything in sight, but when you go through everything, things don't seem
right.
The graphics, in the GCN version, have been greatly improved over the PS2
version of the game. The framerate is noticably smoother, the look is smoother
and everything seems to run a lot better on the GC hardware. The textures are
still pretty much the same, but the PS2 version never really had that problem.
The sound, is pretty much the same as the PS2 version. All the voices and effects
are intact, and sound like they should. Guns sound like guns, cars sound like cars,
and oofs sound like oofs. The voice acting is adequate, and kind of comical in
a way, but it really does match the game.
The control is pretty tight for the most part. I found this easier to grasp than
the PS2 version, although I encountered the same problem here as I did with the
PS2 version when it came to the gadgets. Fumbling around for important equipment
drives me crazy. It's so unnecessary going through your invetory for your
grapple wire. The better control mapping comes from the driving stages. The developer
efficently uses the analog triggers for the gas and brake pedals.
Overall, AUF is a fairly solid game if you plan on using the multiplayer
stages and modes. As a single player game, it can be beaten within a rental.
I played it from start to finish in about 3 days, even when I repeated a couple
of stages (either because I had to or because I wanted to). If you really need
a first preson shooter, this could have fit the bill when it first came out,
since it was the only FPS. But now we have TimeSplitters 2, Medal Of Honor
Frontline, and the new 007 game , Nightfire; plus games such as Red Faction II
on the way. The gameplay here is just too short for one to play, and unless you
can pick it up for $10-15, I would just recommend a rental.
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James Bond 007 in Agent Under Fire
