Headhunter

Headhunter opens with you, Jack Wade. You wake up in some funny lab and manage to escape and wind up in hospital. It turns out that poor old Jack has a touch of amnesia. He used to be a headhunter-the best. Someone responsible for bringing to justice various criminals. Now, some young lady comes to visit you, wanting you to investigate her fathers death, and also, she knows a little of what happened to you, thus your thrown into the game.

The gameplay is fantastic. There are three main elements to it. Firstly, you drive from location to location on your motorbike. Now this could have gone horribly wrong, and although it is difficult to control to start with, once you have the hang of it, its great fun. Secondly, the steaklth element. You wont always play as Jack, so when your unarmed and weak, you need to be careful. Finally, there are the all out shootings and boss fights. This ALWAYS makes you think. You cant just run in, guns blazing, you need to plan your attack. Plus there are many different weapons and gadgets to unlock.

The graphics are fantastic. Its hard to believe it was a dreamcast game! The locations are varied and all look incredibly detailed. Especially the supermarket level at the start of the game. The city you get to drive around is crisp-only annoying thing is, theres always somewhere you just cant go, and this is shown by the imfamous, invisible barrier! However, the FMV (cutscenes) are incredible. Always funny and punchy and action packed-WELL DONE SEGA!

So what about the sound. Mediocre, and fairly aggrivating voice overs from Jack at bad moments will have you reaching for MUTE. However, it still desearves its 4/5, even now, nearly 3 years since release. This is a great game to get into if you have about 8 hours spare and you like a good story with great gameplay. Get this game

Other reviews have pointed out that the combat parts are great fun, but for me the puzzles and driving sections provided that extra level of variety which helps lift this title to the top rank of video games, even above games such as MGS, which becomes somewhat repetitive after a while. The puzzles are pitched at just the right level: the player will have to explore and think a little, but at no point are the solutions so obscure that one has to end up resorting to a walkthrough.

A quick point about the motorcycle sections is perhaps in order. Other reviewers have griped about the controls but I found they posed no problems whatsoever if you bear the following in mind: it's not necessary to keep the throttle on full the whole time. You wouldn't do it on a real motorbike when going round a 90 degree corner, after all!

Finally, the production values of the graphics, sound and video sequences are generally very high. There are one or two places where the graphics become a little sketchy, such as the docks, but otherwise they are excellent. The musical score is also the best original soundtrack I have heard in a game.