X-Men: The Official Game (PC DVD)

Wolverine and company arrive just in time for the movie. X-Men: The Official Game serves as a bridge between X2 and X-Men: The Last Stand. The game picks up right after X2 and tells the story of Wolverine, Nightcrawler and Ice Man. You'll be able to play as these three characters as you progress toward the beginning of the third movie. Activision is coming off the success of the previous two X-Men Legends titles, but can X-Men deliver top-notch gameplay even though it's by another developer?

The story was given a lot of consideration for this title. It tells the stories of Wolverine, Nightcrawler and Ice Man. You'll find out even more details from Wolverine's tragic past, find out the struggles that Ice Man deals with as he becomes a full-fledged X-Man, and discover why Nightcrawler is absent from the movie. Each of them is dealing with something different, but they'll help each other and other X-Men accomplish their goals. Its just a pity that the gameplay didn't have the same attention to detail lavished on it.

The game is divided into a number of levels. Each of these levels will star one of the aforementioned X-Men. Occasionally, you'll be joined by other, computer controlled X-Men who'll provide some cover for you. For instance, you'll have to assist Colossus as Nightcrawler or have Storm cover you. The three characters are rather diverse but ultimately all equally repetitive.

Nightcrawlers offers up the most fun out of three, thanks to his fun transporting ability. This power comes in to play not only for combat, where it can be used to zip around enemies and pummel unsuspecting foes, but also for exploration. In Nightcrawler levels, you'll notice small wisps of blue smoke. These points indicate that Nightcrawler can transport to them. As such, most of his levels are multi-leveled, allowing for some high altitude transporting fun. The downside, however, is that most of his levels also usually have you tracking down some annoying switch to open some mundane door, which really cramps the otherwise enjoyable gameplay.

Wolverine's stages are nothing more than button-mashing affairs that have you using the same attack combos over and over again, while occasionally pausing to heal some of your wounds. Most of his levels are full of machinegun-toting enemies, which unfortunately, can usually fill old Wolverine with lead. Since you can't really block their bullets, you'll find yourself running headlong in to their fire, slicing them up, and then stopping to heal. It's disjointed, repetitive, and highly annoying, and not something that I can recommend.

Ice Man seems to get the short end of the stick in terms of cool factor, however. He rides around on a slide of ice, which operates a bit like a flying game. To attack he can utilise his special ice beam, and to fend off incoming attacks, he can also throw up a temporary ice shield. While unique in that "wow, that's kind of cool" sort of way, Ice Man does offer up a bit of variety compared to his counterparts, but also ends up sticking out like a sore thumb.

The visuals are in line with the style of the movie. The three main characters are very detailed and authentic to their film counterparts and the animation is solid, as well. Wolverine slices and slashes enemies with grace, Nightcrawler teleports with the help of some nifty particle effects, and Ice Man's gliding ice follows him and crumbles up realistically. The enemies look good, too, but a few character models repeat too often. This is most noticeable in the Wolverine bits when you're taking out a hundred enemies but are only seeing a handful of different characters. The sound is packed and works very well with the game. You'll hear Wolverine's claws smashing into enemies, the smooth sound of Ice Man gliding through levels, and the hesitant sound of Nightcrawler teleporting. The background music fits the game's theme well. The voice acting is provided by the film's stars. Hugh Jackman provides the voice of Wolverine while Patrick Stewart provides the voice of the Professor. Alan Cumming and Shawn Ashmore play Kurt Wagner/Nightcrawler and Bobby Drake/Iceman, respectively. The dialogue is solid.

X-Men: The Official Games is worthy of a pick-up only if you're the most die-hard X-Men fan around. What's most annoying however is that it gives you glimpses of how good it could have been. It does offer up some cool Nightcrawler action, but truthfully there are far better games out there.