GoldenEye: Rogue Agent

My first stop through the private booths of Electronic Arts led me to a private theater showing the latest James Bond game in development.  Having seen the previous titles go through marginal improvement, my immediate reaction was “Oh great, another Bond game.”  I knew I was in store for another mediocre Bond title that was only slightly better than the previous installment.

After the first few moments of the game, I knew EA had finally proven me wrong.  The words flashed across the screen: “Why save the world, when you can rule it?”  A question that has surely plagued the mind of every gamer out there, playing the same adventure game where the hero goes on to do good deeds, saves the world, gets the girl, blah blah blah.  A few other titles have tapped into the idea of being bad, titles such as Black and White, Knights of the Old Republic, and the upcoming RPG - Fable.  But GoldenEye: Rogue Agent gives you no choice.  You HAVE to be bad.  And being bad never felt so good. 

GoldenEye treads where no Bond adventure has – in the footsteps of a Bond super villain.  With sets and locations worked on by Academy Award winner Sir Ken Adam (who helmed the location styles from many Bond films), costumes designed by Kym Barrett (of Matrix fame), and player models designed by Rene Morel (Final Fantasy – the movie), the game lends an authentic Bond feel for 007 junkies all over.  Sets mirror their celluloid counterparts almost to the dime.  Fort Knox from Goldfinger?  It’s there.  Dr. No’s Crab Key lair from Dr. No?  It’s there.  The Space Shuttle station from Moonraker?  It’s there too.  Each model looks fantastic and really adds to the whole super-agent feel.  This game truly captures the ‘Bond feel’ more than any other game out there. 

The first level sees the gamer playing as one of the British Super Agents alongside Bond, invading Fort Knox.  Enemies abound and blowing them away felt pretty good, particularly with independent trigger dual weapons – that’s right, L1 controls the gun in the left hand, and R1 controls the gun in the right hand, and they don’t even have to be the same type of gun.  The AI seemed pretty solid, enemies used cover fairly well, even firing blind shots from behind cover.  Don’t get me wrong, you’d never confuse them for human players of even Covenant from Halo, but it’s still quite a step up from most of the EA first-person shooters.  Progressing through the level sees several AI battles in the distance, don’t want to give away any spoilers, but let’s just say your fate is sealed within the first ten minutes of game play.  This is where the game really picks up, and this is finally the chance to be BAAAAAAAD. 

As the game progresses, your character gets kicked out of MI6 (the British Secret Service) and is recruited by an old familiar face… Auric Goldfinger.  Goldfinger outfits the character with a (surprise, surprise) golden eye after a mishap with Dr. No, but this eye allows for special vision including extended range, increased accuracy, and a cool glint in the summer sun.  Bling Bling Y’all. 

GoldenEye: Rogue Agent features 10 plus hours of gameplay, 9 plus missions, and will be released on the PS2, Xbox, and GameCube sometime in the future. 

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