The Bourne Conspiracy Impressions

The game everyone wants to know about! Yeah right! It pretty funny, that in the middle of all these huge AAA games coming out, Im picking things from the middle of the pack to play. Dont worry, young reader, I have donwloaded and installed Fallout 3 to my hard drive and Im going to give it the old college try. Im going to get Gears 2 tomorrow, Im still going to play through Midnight Club LA, and all the other good stuff like Dead Space and Resistance 2 and LittleBIGPlanet, so dont you worry, Padawan.

So, I can sum up if The Bourne Conspiracy is for you with a simple series of yes/no questions:

1. Do you like Quicktime events and interactive cutscenes?
2. Do you like The Bourne Identity film?
3. Do you like brawling and fighting games?
4. Are you good at getting headshots with a silenced pistol?
5. Do you like spy-action games and/or spy-stealth games?

Unfortunately, Ive already answered these questions for you, and we both know that the answer is a resounding no to most of them. Whats that? You said yes to all 5? Well, your gamertag must be James Bond 007. Hes the only person on my Xbox Live friends list I could say would enjoy the game - without reservation - for everyone else, theres caveats.

I have to say I thought the game was really fun. I made the slight mistake of going right for the hardcore Assassin difficulty setting, and although it wasnt impossible Im quite sure it made several parts of the game much more frustrating and "trial and error" than they should have been - its clear the game wasnt designed at this difficulty. That being said, if I didnt have to retry a few parts several times, I would have flown through the game even faster than I did. As it is, I beat it in around 10 hours of play, which is respectable but certainly not worth $60 - as this game does not feature multiplayer. As a rental, or a bargain bin find for $20 or so, I can certainly recommend this game.

In terms of film to game adaptations, its among the best Ive ever played, which I realize isnt saying much. The graphics and in particular the sound are outstanding - the game features an fantastic original score and soundtrack composed entirely by Paul Oakenfold - and you can unlock tracks so they are playable in the main menu by completing certain objectives in the game.

When I asked if you liked Quicktime events first, it was for a reason. This game features by far more Quicktime events than any game I have ever played, and this is coming from one of the biggest God of War franchise fans around. The QTEs in this game are not only way more frequent than in any other game (hundreds), they require lightning fast reflexes to trigger properly, and in many cases if you miss the event, Bourne is killed instantly and the mission ends. The fighting engine feels quite clunky at first, but once you get into it there is some nuance and subtlety to the controls, and some strategy to the boss fights. The guns dont feel or work like Call of Duty 4 or Rainbow Six Vegas 2, which is unfortunate, but they are still fun enough to form the basis for much of the gameplay. There are several achievements that reward you for headshots and high accuracy, and many of the enemies are wearing body armor - just to let you know - dont event think about aiming for the chest.

The story rehashes the events from the first Bourne film - The Bourne Identity, and even if you have absolutely no interest in playing a QTE-heavy-third-person-shooter-spygame, you should absolutely check out the film - its action moviemaking at its best. In fact, I would not recommend playing the game without having seen the film first, as the story is told in a non-linear fashion and would be quite confusing otherwise. But we all know you arent playing this game anyway, not with whats on the calender for fall 2008. I totally understand that, but its amazing to me how many quality games get overlooked simply because they get released at the wrong time - in the glut of AAA holiday releases, second tier titles get little if any attention. Also, they released it in between the 3rd and in-the-making 4th Bourne films, so there was no marketing presence whatsoever. Oh well, another game relegated to the dustbin of history. At least the developers can console themselves in the thought that even if nobody bought or cared about their game, they did a great job and gave the handful of Bourne fans who played the game exactly what they were looking for.