So last week I commented on the nostalgia factor of Duke Nukem Forever, sequel to an excellent 15 year old FPS from my youth, and it appears we are developing a pattern, as my latest conquest has been Alice: Madness Returns, the sequel to 2000's American McGee's Alice, which follows on from Lewis Carrol's famous fairy tales 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' and 'Through the Looking Glass'.
Firstly, Disney this ain't, not even the Tim Burton version. It's very dark, and tells the story of an adult Alice, dealing with the death of her family in a domestic blaze and struggling with her own increasing insanity, of which Wonderland itself is a manifestation. Undergoing psychiatric help to cure her dementia, Alice is slowly forgetting her troubled history, and as such Wonderland is ceasing to be, existing solely in her mind. But when new evidence that her family was murdered surfaces, Alice must fight to preserve her memories and recall what happened that night, and in the process, save Wonderland.
Firstly, the game is as schizophrenic as it's protagonist. At times it feels a lot like a child's game, with old-fashioned style platforming gameplay reminiscent of the first Crash Bandicoot games, or more recently Spongebob Squarepants: Creature from the Krusty Krab. The second world in particular, which takes place underwater (ironically very similar in aesthetics to Spongebob's home town Bikini Bottom, with shades of BioShock's Rapture), revolves around talent scouting for cutesy performers to star in a musical play, and is so juvenile I started to question whether I was actually enjoying it. Then all of a sudden you find a room full of sliced up carcases of anthropomorphic fish, and find out that the show is only a ruse (without spoiling too much), and the story takes a darker turn. It was probably intentional, some kind of comparison between Alice's past innocence and darker current self, but it carries off like that a few times and just seems disjointed.
The action is much more up-to-date though, with the obligatory God of War style combat (it seems every game nowadays borrows something from one of the 'Of Wars', be it the God combat or the Gears cover shooting) performing for Alice as well as any other game, and with some Zelda style projectile weapons tossed in for good measure too. Falling to the lower reserves of your health bar gives you a Fallout-3-Nerd-Rage style rage power too, boosting your attack power exponentially for a short time. And all weapons can be upgraded too, in exchange for collectible teeth, no doubt some reference to the original stories that went over my head.
All in all, there is so much to like about the game. The setting is suitably magical and wondrous, and slowly descends into a Silent Hill style nightmare, with some at-times amazing visuals (Alice's hair alone looked jaw-dropping as each strand moved individually, especially in the aforementioned undersea level), and some great voice acting really drags you in - Alice sounds like a Legend Trilogy era Lara Croft, only bat-shit crazy. And from time to time the gameplay is broken up by little mini-games, from great retro Arrow Flash style scrolling shooter sections and awesome Limbo style physics-based 2D platforming, to ill-advised Guitar Hero bits and some god-awful pinball inspired levels, but the standard is usually high. If I was to sum it up using one other game for comparison, I would call it this year's Darksiders. Really worth a go, and with the (albeit very dated) original prequel bundled with the game as DLC on top of the unusually long campaign, you get a lot for your money.
Also last week I forgot to mention Mafia II, which my wife bought for me in retaliation to LA Noire being a bit limp, and was surprisingly enjoyable. Out of all of the non-Rockstar involved GTA clones, I'd probably rate Mafia II as the current best, with a Bully style evolving sandbox city changing with the seasons (and indeed years in this case) and very likable characters that you actually care for. Sure, the graphics aren't great and the story is a bit linear, but the grit of the story and some awesome montage cutscenes make up for those minor problems, and the speed limiter for when safe driving is a stroke of genius, especially as Empire City's finest actually do enforce speed limits, unlike the flatfoots of Liberty City. And it's worth playing Mafia II just to hear Nolan North converse with himself in the street if nothing else.
Finally, rounding things up, it's finally paying off to be a Windows Phone 7 gamer, with fully achievement-equipped XBox Live Arcade versions of Angry Birds, Doodle Jump and Sonic the Hedgehog 4 hitting the OS in recent weeks, all of which are excellent ports. Speaking of Sonic, I played the demo of Sonic Generations too, and the 3D recreation of the Green Hill Zone from 1991, complete with the classic music, turned me into a 6-year-old again. I'll be watching that one. And I had a quick go on Outland on the PS3, which is trying to be a cross between Limbo and Shadow Complex and falls so hard in the process. PS3 owners, don't waste your cash, just wait for the port of Limbo due in the next few weeks.
