I never got to play much of the first Kane and Lynch, but those who did told me it had control “issues”. The helpful developer who game me a demo of the game insisted to me they have fixed that, and I tend to think he's telling the truth.
For those who don't know the
K&L series (or should I say 'franchise'?) it concerns an odd couple, buddy-movie-style game. Think
Lethal Weapon, except our heroes are the bad guys. You play as Lynch, the middle aged , balding, loose canon bad-ass. Lynch has been hired to pull some 'job' but quickly realises it's beyond him so he calls his old 'friend' Kane to help out. Since Kane is currently wanted and running from the law anyway, he figures he's got nothing to lose and away we go.
One of the things the developers have spent a lot of time on is a series of special rendering effects meant to make the game feel more real. Lots of games use classic movie techniques to give things a more visceral feel but Io Interactive decided they wanted to make it more 'new cinema'. So, what is thing that people today think of when they think of real looking video? Why YouTube, of course. The whole thing looks as though it's a bit grainy and shot through a cheap lens. Transitions in light take a minute for the camera to adjust to. Most notably there is a compression effect that makes the whole thing actually look like a YouTube video, and it actually gets worse when the camera is moving faster.
It's a convincing effect, though some people may not appreciate it as much as the devs are hoping. I for one actually became a little motion sick due to all the shaking and blurring that went on. I also think that being forced to stand three feet from a 40-inch screen may have had something to do with that. Not sure if there will be options to turn the effect off.
The game play is nothing new, think
Gears of War without the rolling and you've basically got it: Carry two weapons at once, take cover, hold a shoulder button to aim and tap the other to fire; firing without aiming does a blind fire. It's a solid enough system with a few slight differences. Where in
Gears of War the cover and run button is the same, in
K&L: DD they are separate. This has its ups and downs. For a lot of people, like myself, who are very used to one way, it means I'm often disappointed when I rush forward from behind cover and find that I'm not actually rushing. There are certainly times when you might not want to be rushing, so having them separated has its advantages but if you've clocked a few to many hours in
GoW it may take some getting used to.
One thing
K&L does add to the tried and true
GoW formula is destructible cover. Since this is a much more realistic world it's made up less of indefatigable rock and more of poorly constructed drywall. Often-times enemies will turtle up behind cover and your only recourse, besides rushing in guns blazing, is to just put a hole in whatever he's hiding behind. It's an effective and fun break from the usual wait ? pop up ? shoot ? wait format you may be used to.
All in all it looks to be a very solid experience with some great cutscenes and excellent action movie set pieces throughout. We'll be keeping an eye on this one so be sure to check back here for a full review when it launches August 24th.
