Time Crisis: Crisis Zone Preview

Led by Derrick Lynch, the U.R.D.A. has taken over control of Garland Square, a complex on the outskirts of London.

“So you will understand and fear your own foolish mistakes,” laughs Lynch, somewhat maniacally, like extreme cartoonish bad guys are prone to do.

Garland Square hosts a variety of amenities, from department stores to a hotel to a park and office buildings. It also has a lot of other things – bad guys. More than you can shake a fist at, but not more than your machine gun can engage in short bursts of conversation with.

Namco has Time Crisis: Crisis Zone, a PlayStation 2 title, slated for release in mid-October. But that didn’t stop them from shipping out a preview build, nor asking GameZone to duck occasionally behind that shield and then doing the reflexive attack thing with the pop-up targets that resemble the U.R.D.A.

Crisis Zone is very much a reflexive title. There are two ways of playing the game, in either story mode or in the Crisis Mission. The latter allows players to pull up and play through the missions individually, while the former strings them together with a cursory storyline to hold it all together.

Like the other similar titles in the Namco stable, players are pulled through the mission. This is not a freewheeling, go-where-you-want environment. You are yanked from point to point through the game, and given a host of foes to shoot. They have different weaponry, and different skills, but the idea is rather simple – use your cover to stop from taking too much damage (and there is a difference – you will take damage, just try not to take too much), and pop up and blast them, duck, reload and repeat.

What makes this game challenging are the multiple difficulty levels. What makes it fun are the fully destructible environments.

‘Think you can hide behind those statues, huh? WRONG! Plaster or marble, they can’t stop bullets!’

Moving ahead in the mall, another room, another bunch of bad guys …

‘One hiding behind those priceless paintings …’

The machine gun does its rat-a-tat-tat rap, and the bad guy falls down.

‘Not any more …’

‘You shot holes in those paintings ..!!’

‘So?’

‘But they were priceless …!?!’

‘Not anymore.’

The graphics of Crisis Zone are very nice and three-dimensional. The enemy has health bars above their head to show how much damage they are taking. Different armor means different amounts of damage. Some fall quickly, others take a few more bullets. The sound is totally in line with previous Namco releases, robust and presenting a fine supporting role to the graphics. The game controls are somewhat simplistic, which allows players to focus entirely on the game. The targeting is easy to use and responsive.

This is a game that is arcade based in design, but quite a bit of fun. While months away from release, shooter fans looking for non-stop action in a challenging and entertaining venue would do well to keep an eye out for this game.