Killzone 2

PLAYSTATION 3

By Scott Bartley / Tuesday, March 31 2009

My Killzone 2 review copy arrived sandwiched between the pages of a glossy brochure showcasing a selection of art and screen grabs from the game. This kind of thing isn’t unusual in the land of promotional gear and many review copies arrive all dolled up to try and catch the eye of a bleary-eyed game journalist staring at a knee-high stack of games waiting to be reviewed. With Killzone 2, however, the accompanying marketing paraphernalia, for once, was outdone by the game itself.

From the very first scene Killzone 2 drips with detail and turns in an eye-poppingly gorgeous claim to the coveted title of “graphical benchmark”. The design team behind this game certainly pulled out all the stops in the development of Killzone 2 and everything about it looks great, from textures and models through to lighting and level design.

Of course there’s more to a game than good looks and I have to admit that counter to the many positive and hyperbole-filled reviews doing the rounds, I was left more than a little bored during the opening levels of this game. Was I suffering an overdose of one too many sci-fi shooters in recent times? Could it be that Halo, Gears Of War and Resistance had left me too jaded to enjoy Killzone 2? For all the game’s technical prowess I found I was being underwhelmed by details such as the horribly clichéd military banter and the all too familiar backdrop of a war-ravaged alien world. As I plodded a linear route through the dark, dank back streets and bombed out buildings of planet Helgahn, snuffing out the lives of countless bad guys along the way, I couldn’t help but feel as if I were simply going over old territory in a new suit.

Well, things did perk up considerably once I left the city and the game was allowed to show off a diverse repertoire of action sequences and stunning locations. Now, the game began to shine for me. As my character, a marauding invader, rampaged around a foreign planet engaging in all kinds of fantastically entertaining set pieces, I started to understand why Killzone 2 had been so well received.

This is more than an average shooter and while I’m not sure it can lay claim to one of the best shooters ever, deserves its place up there in the upper echelons of gaming goodness. Certainly, for the PS3
it’s the new benchmark for showing off your system.