With Skyfall now out in theatres, I got the urge to finally open up GoldenEye 007: Reloaded and play through the single player on 007 Classic difficulty. I’ve already beat it on the Wii, but does the PS3 version improve anything, or is this vodka martini half empty? Read on to find out…
Short nitty-gritty plot description from IGN is as follows: You are Bond, James Bond. Your mission is to recover the key to a
devastating Soviet orbital weapon, GoldenEye. This reimagining of the
action classic GoldenEye allows players to channel Daniel Craig’s lethal
and gritty James Bond in an innovative, modern take on the legendary
Bond adventure, GoldenEye. GoldenEye 007: Reloaded improves on the Wii
hit with HD visuals and realistic environments running at 60-frames per
second.
Let’s get one thing straight, no James Bond game will ever beat the original GoldenEye 007 for the Nintendo 64, but that doesn’t mean there can’t be any other good James Bond games out there, because there are plenty that are a lot of fun (Nightfire, World is Not Enough, Everything or Nothing to name a few). GoldenEye 007: Reloaded, thankfully falls in line with those other games. It’s great fun, with an interesting, albeit tired, modernized twist on the story we all know.
The overall plot is pretty much the same as the movie, with some modern updates here and there. Personally, I preferred the more over the top story of the movie, than this one. I felt it tried to ground itself into reality a little too much and removed most of the humour. There is however a nice amount of action and twist and turns, that the game never feels stale. Add on top of the that, having Daniel Craig as Bond, is icing on the cake, as I think he ranks up there as the best Bond yet.
GoldenEye 007: Reloaded, is your typical first person shooter, with varied objectives (which aren’t always in your face and are easy to miss) and linear paths. You move from point A to B, rarely deviating from the path, which honestly, the N64 version was pretty much the same. Still, I would’ve rather had a little more variety in the missions, instead of the shoot all baddies to complete game. You do get the tank mission, which was fun for a bit, until the tenth helicopter shows up and destroys you. Also, the ending mission in which you have to protect Natayla and chase after 006, was a giant pain in my ass, due to having chosen to play the game on 007 Classic difficulty, which has no regenerating health and sparse bulletproof vests. I swore a lot during these last few parts and finally after finding a glitch in the last boss, I was able to beat the game and feel somewhat good about myself.
Having been released before on the Wii, Reloaded has now been, well, reloaded for the HD consoles. It’s a great looking game and runs really smooth.The game has been updated quite a bit in the graphics department compared to the Wii version. It can at times look beautiful, but other times, some low res graphics can rear their ugly heads. Overall though, I have to say if your only decision to play the game is based on the best looking version, go with Reloaded.
Sound design is nice, with voice acting being provided by Daniel Craig and Judi Dench. You get a few other voice actors, with the voice actor for 006 sounding okay, but not as cool as Sean Bean. Henchmen all pretty much sound the same. The music is sadly not as awesome as the N64 version or movie, which is a shame. It’s more on par with what we get in the Craig films, but my love of the GoldenEye soundtrack, made be feel disappointed in it being changed.
Multiplayer has plenty of modes to play through, with a lot of options and maps. I didn’t dive into multiplayer too much, so like other reviews of my site, I don’t want to give an opinion on something I’ve barely played. However, if you’re interested in finding out what this game offers, check out this great GoldenEye wiki page with lots of information. An added feature not in the Wii version, is a new mode called MI6 Ops, which offers up challenges that take place in the single player levels. This is similar to Spec Ops mode in Call of Duty, but only single player and not as much fun.
GoldenEye 007: Reloaded is an above average first person shooter, but when compared to the N64 version, it pales in comparison. Trying to modernize the story of GoldeneEye actual hurts the game more, as the cheesiness is one of the best things about the movie. Still, the fun of being Bond is very much alive and kicking in this game and I can’t see any major problems that would hold you back from picking it up.
Story – 3/5 – Updated to be more modern and less cheesy. Unfortunately, GoldenEye was always about the cheese and taking that away from it, only goes to hurt it.
Gameplay – 3.5/5 – A first person shooter where you play as Bond, James Bond and shoot a lot of bad guys. It can however get repetitive, especially if you play on the harder difficulties and die a lot.
Graphics – 3.5/5 – The game looks much better than the Wii version and at times it looks almost of good as some other modern games. Still, every once and awhile the low res textures pop in and the repeating enemy models become noticeable.
Sound – 3/5 – Voice acting is great, with Daniel Craig and Judi Dench lending their voices. Music isn’t as memorable as the movie, or N64 version.
Overall (not an average) – 3.5/5 – A fun game and probably one of the better Bond games of late. Still, it can become stale after some time, as really all your doing is shooting the same people over and over again. Wait, isn’t that every FPS?