Too Human… ah… the game that was once supposed to be the Xbox 360’s big launch title, the game that was once supposed to come out on the Playstation on four discs, the game that was supposed to change the way we look at action games. Yes, there are a lot of things Too Human was supposed to be, and that’s where the problem lies because Too Human is not a bad game by any means, it’s just not the legendary title that most people expected it to be.

Let’s get some of the misunderstandings out of the way first. Contrary to what you may have heard, Too Human was not in development for ten years. Yes it was supposed to come out ten years ago but the Too Human we are playing today is not the same game. The project was put on hold while Silicon Knights churned out great games like Eternal Darkness, Metal Gear Solid: Twin Snakes and Legacy Of Kain.  This Too Human has been in development for a maximum of three years. Silicon Knights also had to build a new engine from ground up because of the whole debacle with Epic Games forcing them to abandon the Unreal 3 Engine and start from the scratch.

With the history behind us, let’s get down to the actual review.

Story/Characters

This is definitely one of the most intriguing aspects of Too Human. The game is set in a totally bizarre futuristic cyberpunk take on Norse mythology. The familiar Norse gods are cybernetically enhanced humans who possess superhuman powers and combat skills literally making them “gods among men”. You’ll come across many familiar characters such as Freya, Thor, Loki, Hel, Tyr, Hod and many more, each character suitably modified to fit into the whole sci-fi theme. For example Odin (or Organically Distributed Intelligence Network in this case) is an all seeing all knowing Artificial Intelligence while Grendel is a hulking mechanical beast. The “mead halls” are actually night clubs playing techno music. Depending on how seriously you take the whole thing you’ll either love this universe or think of it as a big joke.

You play as Baldur, one of the Aesir, a group of cybernetically enhanced “gods” who are in charge of protecting humanity from its enemies - a vast army of machines hell bent on destroying everything in its path. The story begins with an amnesiac Baldur (apparently taking over Beowulf’s duties) chasing a mechanical beast named GRNDL-1 (Grendel). Things aren’t what they seem and very soon new characters are introduced and Baldur’s hazy past starts unfolding slowly. Needless to say there are a lot of lies, betrayals and the usual drama. If you know your Norse mythology well you’ll see that most of the story fits in well with the original context. Just don’t expect a Mass Effect level plot or dialog. However, since the game is the first of a planned trilogy (if the sales meet expectations) there isn’t a clear resolution at the end.

Gameplay

Now this is the bread and butter of the game. Let me first say that this is not a game for everyone. From its gameplay videos it might look similar to “twitch” action games like Devil May Cry or Ninja Gaiden but it actually has more in common with PC action RPGs like Diablo or Dungeon Siege. You kill dozens of enemies, they drop random loot (armor, weapons, money), you equip better stuff or sell unwanted stuff and repeat the whole process again. If you don’t find this fun, STOP READING right here because the game is clearly not for you. Yes, it’s one of those games which start being fun only after you invest a considerable amount of time, games which make you keep playing until you “reach level 25″ so you can equip that badass armor you just found.

Being a huge fan of Diablo and action RPGs in general it was easy for me to enjoy Too Human’s gameplay. There’s tons of randomly generated equipment to be found with names like “Massive Breastplate of Heightened Aggression”… Okay, so I made that up, but you get the idea… Also by adding a combat system that is similar to titles like Devil May Cry the game eliminates the repetitive nature of action RPGs and makes the combat more fun than just mindless killing. Too Human might not play like a great action game or a great RPG, it still plays well as a sum of its parts.

Upon starting the game you are presented with a Class selection screen. Although you will always play as Baldur, the class determines how you will play the game. For example the Berserker is your ubiquitous melee fighter while the Commando is your ranged attacker. Other classes include the defense-oriented Defender (duh), the “healer” Bioengineer and the “jack of all trades” Champion who is adept with both melee weapons and firearms but considerably less effective than the specialized classes. For single player though the Champion seems to be a good choice. The other classes are generally well suited for co-op.

Combat works differently than most third person action games. You move Baldur using the left stick, jump using A, fire guns using the triggers and perform melee attacks with the right stick. The right bumper and X, Y face buttons are used for special abilities, while the B button is used to perform a dodge roll (very handy). The controls feel a little awkward in the beginning and take some time getting used to, especially the right stick melee attack. It introduces a new problem because you don’t have any control over the camera (apart from resetting it to behind Baldur’s back). The game automatically adjusts the camera giving you an “optimal” view, however as expected, it’s not always optimal. In the beginning you’ll spend more time fighting with the camera than the enemies.

However after playing the game for a couple of hours, everything will fall into place and neither the camera nor the right stick melee will bother you. You’ll realize that the combat system is actually a lot of fun once you get the hang of it. Tilting the right stick towards a nearby enemy will make Baldur perform a sliding attack. If you keep doing this Baldur will dash from enemy to enemy like a human pinball hitting multiple enemies in one long move. Taking a page out of Dante’s book, Baldur can also launch enemies into the air and use his guns to “juggle” them or jump up and perform an aerial melee attack. Using stylish moves like these fills up your combo meter faster. The higher the combo meter value, the more effective you’ll be in combat. The combo meter can also be used to unleash devastating area of effect attacks called ruiners. Each weapon has its own signature ruiner attack and can take out multiple enemies at once or severely weaken them. However it will drain your combo meter with each use. Using the combo meter wisely becomes an integral part of the gameplay.

Each class has an associated skill tree where skill points can be spent to learn additional abilities or enhance your attacks, ruiners or defense. Special abilities include Battle Cries and a handy mechanical spider which can be modified to fire a gatling gun or plant mines. At a certain point in the game you’ll be given a secondary skill tree depending on which alignment you choose - Cybernetic or Human. Note that this choice does not make much of a difference except for the corresponding skill tree and some alignment specific equipment. The Cybernetic alignment leans towards offense and stopping power while the Human alignment gives you better and longer combos.

With all these abilities and a huge arsenal of weapons at his disposal Baldur may seem like the ultimate badass but make no mistake, the enemies are quite tough as well, sometimes even unfair. The game will throw plenty of enemies at you in each area. You’ll have the lowly melee attackers who will love to rush and surround you, ranged attackers who will fire at you nonstop with deadly accuracy, a couple of heavily armored “trolls” and the very annoying “polarity” types which can explode on contact and can inflict status effects on you. The game starts out pretty easy but the difficulty ramps up without warning during the second mission. The enemies suddenly become very tough and come in larger numbers and you probably won’t have decent weapons and armor, so expect to see the death sequence often. Oh yeah… the death sequence… a 20 second unskippable animation showing a cyborg-Valkyrie descending, lifting your corpse and ascending to Valhalla. Sure the Valkyrie looks amazing and the music that plays over this sequence is pretty sweet but watching it for the 60th time might be annoying for some. However in some of the game’s more hectic battles, the Valkyrie sequence is actually a welcome break and as many players have already pointed out it may just be a hidden loading screen. Like BioShock there is no real penalty for death, you’ll start off from the last checkpoint (usually not far away from when you fell), the enemies will retain all the damage you’ve inflicted and will not respawn. The only penalty is that your weapons will take some damage, nothing that a quick trip back to base (which can be done anytime during the mission) cannot fix. This takes some thrill out of the combat and often it’s actually a good idea to just die if you’re overwhelmed than scrambling around looking for health orbs, which brings me to another rather poorly implemented gameplay mechanic… health.

During combat, health can only be restored via health orbs dropped by the enemy or by breaking containers (well not really containers, here they’re just weird glowing objects scattered around the areas) unless you are playing as the Bioengineer who can regenerate health. This is somewhat of a problem because the drops are so random that sometimes you’ll have three health orbs floating around when your health is full but won’t find a single one when your health bar is in the red and you’re surrounded. There are also some aspects of the gameplay that are rather unfinished. For example there are no counters for status effects, you can be poisoned and the poison will eat through your health bar rapidly if you can’t find health orbs sending you packing to Valhalla. Some of the random loot also has contradicting properties.

The game is divided into four major “levels” each filled with thousands of enemies and hidden areas. The levels are huge but they all feel the same. There isn’t a terrible amount of variety in the enemy types either. Apart from all the fighting you’ll also be spending some time exploring “Cyberspace”, home of the Norns, accessed via magical wells found in some areas. It looks drastically different from the game’s real world featuring lush landscapes and forests. It’s a good idea in theory but is vastly underused in the game. It might look lush but is ultimately lifeless. All you can do is run along a linear path, solve ridiculously easy puzzles (if you can even call them puzzles) and collect more loot. Cyberspace is the only place to find “runes”, items which give stat bonuses to Baldur once certain conditions are met, usually, “kill X type of enemy” or “find X number of weapon blueprints”.

Even with all the Cyberspace exploration and the four major levels the game can easily be completed in about 12-13 hours in a single playthrough. This is rather disappointing for a game like this. The game ends a little while after you’ve realized how much fun it is and that’s a shame. I would have expected at least a 25 hour campaign if not more. However, you can always go back and play all the levels with new enemies scaled up to your current level and find increasingly better loot. On subsequent playthroughs all the story elements and cutscenes are stripped off. It’s only you, the enemies and the sweet, sweet loot. A useful “Auto Salvage” feature makes it easy to automatically sell items which you probably won’t need and makes it easier to pick up only worthwhile equipment. If you love the combat and the loot system you will want to try out multiple playthroughs and max out your character’s level, which is capped at 50. You can also try a different class or go online for some co-op action with a friend. The game shines in co-op but the catch is that both players must be around the same level since the enemies scale up based on the level of the player with the higher level. Suffice to say that there is a tremendous amount of replayability here.

Graphics & Presentation

The game is built on Silicon Knights’ custom engine and for the most part it holds up well. The graphics are good but there’s nothing mindblowing on display here. The character models are highly detailed and look appropriately bulky and imposing. The weapons and armors all have a unique look and their colors can be customized by buying color runes from shops, so you won’t end up looking like a Christmas tree after equipping different types of armor. The levels however look very similar to each other with a lot of metal and machinery on display. It fits well with the setting but I would have loved to fight in varied environments. The only welcome change is Cyberspace (which features some weird lighting) and the Aesir HQ which is quite a large area with some interesting architecture, unfortunately it doesn’t have much for the player to do. The framerate is generally decent but drops drastically when you have a lot of enemies on screen, so don’t expect the action to move at 60 fps.

The various menus and inventory screens are okay but definitely could have been better. It takes a while to figure out what is where. The screens are also very sluggish. This is quite painful because you will be accessing these screens very often. A nice fast moving interface would have been great. The high pitched menu sounds also start to get pretty annoying after a while. Overall I feel the presentation is quite rough around the edges and definitely needs more polish.

Sound

Apart from the aforementioned menu sounds the sound in the game is pretty impressive. Sound effects during combat are great but some of your team mates’ banter is rather cheesy and gets old pretty quick. The music is a mix of orchestral, techno and hard rock and is generally pretty good and suits the on screen action very well.

Summing it all up

Too Human is indeed a difficult game to review. The combat is fun and the loot system is rewarding. However, issues with the presentation and some of the gameplay elements make it a difficult game to recommend to casual gamers. Anyone who is not willing to invest a significant number of hours in the game will probably not find it too appealing. However, if you love old school hack and slash action RPGs and are willing to give the game a chance to grow on you, you’re in for a great experience.

The Good:

+ Fluid well-balanced combat system
+ Rewarding loot system keeps things fresh
+ Plenty of customization options
+ Great twist on Norse mythology makes the generic plot appealing
+ Good musical score
+ Highly replayable thanks to multiple classes and online co-op

The Bad

- Presentation is rough around the edges
- Camera needs time getting used to
- Generic environments. Cyberspace and Aesir are poorly implemented
- Some gameplay issues like health and status effects need work
- Campaign is way too short, not much to do aside from the main story

The Verdict

Graphics - 7
Gameplay - 8
Sound - 8
Value - 8
Presentation - 6

7.5 / 10

Developer: Silicon Knights
Publisher: Microsoft
Genre: Action Role-playing
Rating: T

TRANSLATE

Translate this post into your favorite language. Click on any of the flags below to view the translated version. NOTE: Translations use the AltaVista Babel Fish Translation Service and may not be 100% accurate.

By N2H

• Wardy More Says:
  September 23rd, 2008 at 1:29 am

  Great review!

  It’s nice to see someone actually spend some time playing the game instead of just getting frustrated with learning new controls, being so crappy at the game they die a lot and then giving it a crappy rating.

  Good work.