The Math is All Wrong
The equation seemed simple; HULK + SMASH = FUN. I’m pretty sure it was Sir Isaac Newton himself who figured that out after he discovered gamma radiation or something. Anyway, the gameplay here proves that it’s never that easy since you are allowed the ability to eradicate everything in sight, it’s just the chalkboard the equation’s written on. When you start, you have three basic “moves,” jump, punch and grab. The grab is especially entertaining; when Hulk snatches a smaller prey, he holds on to him like it’s his own personal ventriloquist doll, dangling from his gamma juiced fist. Instead of making it talk, he stops in his tracks, looks at it, and punches it one good time. He can continue to do this long after the doll is dead. It’s definitely one of the more rewarding aspects of this title. Oh, I literally almost forgot there’s a jump attack, too! When using the “jump punch,” Hulk kind of soars through the air from one end of the stage to the other with his fist sticking straight out in front of him. There’s not much of a point to it since there’s really never anything in the air to attack. Also, when you hit a wall in the middle of the attack, you tend to stay pressed up against the wall with the screen convulsing until you drop 11 seconds later. It’s pretty distracting. I chose not to use that particular maneuver, hence the reason I forgot about it to begin with.
The main quest is pretty average. Once in New York, you can locate specified areas on your map to accept missions from other characters. This goes on for about 11 hours as you fight the Enclave’s mech robots and soldiers. With “challenging” mission objectives such as “Fight the Army,” it’s easy to get side tracked and opt to start bashing on pedestrians and taxi cabs. If walking from mission to mission is too time consuming, Hulk can take the subway to get to other areas of the city faster. Simply hit the B button when you are in the green square NEXT to the subway entrance and he’ll be “magically” transported to another area. One thing that boggles me about this is, does Hulk just get on, pay his fare and ride it like a normal dude on his way to work? Does anyone on the train even notice him?
I admit it’s fun to run around New York City destroying cars and climbing to the top of buildings to find “jump challenges” and collect gamma containers. Well, not so much the collecting or the lame challenges, but the climbing itself is cool! When running through the city and other stages, people and small structures tend to crumble anywhere within a 7 foot radius of Hulk. Of course, you don’t get to experience this “mayhem” until you unlock the “run” skill. Yeah, players can unlock skills and attacks through completing challenges and one of the unlockables is “run.” I guess I’m a little spoiled since that skill comes standard with every other game ever made dating back to the original Super Mario Bros on NES. Needless to say, the unlockable skills weren’t rewarding enough to motivate me to play anymore than I had to.
Such Great Heights
Earlier, I mentioned that destroying cars is one of the most entertaining parts of the game. The problem is in ALL of NYC, there are about 10 of them. Nine are yellow taxi cabs, and the other is a PT cruiser. When exploding autos gets tiring, the player can climb to the top of any of the buildings and jump from rooftop to rooftop. This provides a great view of the blue smog that engulfs the entire city. Graphically, the city looks like a PS1 version of GTA3 if it was written on a vinyl cd. There’s no depth! A couple of big in-game fields are honestly nothing but one giant green texture on the ground with the previously mentioned blue mist permeating the atmosphere. No grass, no trees, no people. The city is barely occupied by anything at all and when Hulk runs through the streets, polygons literally fall off of the screen. I think that’s supposed to be city damage? I’m not really sure, but it could also be a processing “trick” so the game doesn’t “lock up” with all the “crazy stuff” going on. You don’t want to have more than two cars on the screen, the “innernetz mite asplode.”
When duking it out with soldiers on the beat, some pretty interesting stuff starts happening. A majority of the time, if Hulk hurls his rivals into the street, they tend to sink under the concrete like the Toxic Avenger going back to his swamp home after saving random Mexican restaurants and blind women. One time, I was holding one of my ventriloquist dolls when a bigger member of the Enclave assaulted me with a right jab. When the punch connected, it sent my doll straight into the air with no signs of it returning to Earth. Now THAT’S a skill I want to unlock!
In game audio is somewhat, uh… entertaining. The very first thing I heard when selecting the game from the Wii menu is Hulk screaming, “RAAAAAAAAWR!” at me from the inside of the Wii. The quality of this clip was a good indicator of what was to come in the sound effects department on this disc. It reminded me of Barney Gumble yelling in disgust if his hometown of Springfield succumbed to some form of alcohol prohibition. If you were to close your eyes and listen to the game, you might think you were playing Doom 1 on the PC. I’m pretty sure some of the sound clips are ripped directly from that game and I could swear they borrowed the announcer from “Halo” for a few bomb countdowns. Though the voice actors are authentic members from the cast of the movie, the dialogue is very rushed, which makes some of the cut scenes hilariously awkward.
Kill Stuff
It seems this title has suffered the same fate as other movie based titles. Limited budget combined with inflexible release dates seem to be the most common explanation for these interactive motion picture mishaps. I just wanted a game that I could use the Hulk to kill stuff. Buildings, cars, people, whatever. To a certain extent, this title delivered on that aspect, but the world and reward was just too shallow. Even though they seemed to get the equation right, they failed on other basic gaming planes. Acceptable presentation sometimes gets taken for granted even if the point of the game isn’t as clear in The Incredible Hulk. In those titles, I find myself sucked into the experience, but may not know what I’m experiencing. With this Wii dinner, it gives you the steak, but serves it on a cold platter.