Be
notified of site updates. Sign-up for the Newsletter sent out
twice weekly.
Enter
E-Mail Address Below:
Bionic
Commando Rearmed 2
Score: 6.5 / 10
No series has likely risen and fallen from
the grace of gamers this generation faster than Capcom’s Bionic Commando
reboot. The first of two titles developed by GRIN, Bionic Command
Rearmed was a 2008 downloadable remake of the classic NES game that was
quickly praised by critics and gamers alike for its re-imagined visuals
and gameplay tweaks, combining old school platforming with a 2.5D
perspective that always seems to be a hit with the hardcore gamer crowd.
Shortly after came Bionic Commando, the 2009 3D follow-up that Rearmed
was merely building up to. It ended up being the high point of a failure
flop that was shunned by fans and soon led to the death of GRIN itself.
With Spencer’s comeback cut short, all hope seemed lost for a proper
sequel to Rearmed.
Fortunately, Capcom gave many of Rearmed’s developers a new home under
the company Fatshark, and quickly began work on delivering the
downloadable follow-
Taking place a few years after Rearmed (but not entirely removing the
2008 story out of continuity), Nathan “Rad” Spencer returns to the
battlefield with a new team of bionic soldiers (along with a sweet new
‘stache) in order to take out a South American general named Sabio. When
his new team quickly goes AWOL, Spencer must rely
Advertisement
on a new repertoire of weapons and gimmicks
to defeat the general’s men and machines… along with his new ability to
jump.
Spencer’s new jump ability sparked a flood of controversy across the
internet, with hardcore purists instantly denouncing the sequel as
“easier” because of it. In truth, the ability to jump is no more
detrimental to Bionic Commando’s gameplay then Mario learning to fly;
while jumping is indeed more convenient, particularly when scaling
chasms and crates no more than a foot high, the areas are still spread
out widely enough that players will still need to get their bionic
swinging down to a science in order to avoid a sudden drop into a pit of
death (be it filled with water, spikes, or quicksand). It should also be
noted that an option to disable the jump entirely is available upon
finishing the game, which should help keep players from mashing that
button and screwing themselves out of the Achievement.
If only the jump button was the only problem with Rearmed 2. Even though
the game retains the same style and visuals from the first Rearmed,
something's missing.
The levels, while featuring the same
multiple layers filled with secret weapons and upgrades (most which are
unobtainable without the proper ability), feel more lifeless this time
around, as do the recycled enemies. New weapons are made available in
addition to some returning favorites, but with every enemy and boss
susceptible to the same damage regardless of what you use, there’s
little reason to switch from the default machine gun and its infinite
ammo.
New to the sequel are passive and active
upgrades, the former featuring character enhancements such as increased
health and faster speed, and the latter adding secondary weapons like
grenades and a bionic uppercut. Unfortunately neither of these abilities
can be swapped on-the-fly like Spencer’s primary weapons, and must be
switched manually in the inventory screen.
This hurdle around the new additions to Bionic Commando could be
forgiven were it not for the features that were removed entirely; gone
is the ability to choose between multiple areas on the map screen,
instead forcing players to take a single, linear path. Also gone are the
top-down shooter segments, along with the computer hacking mini-game.
While neither of these were considered the high-point of the original
game, the fact that nothing was added in their place makes their removal
all the more unfortunate. The Challenge Rooms have received a bit of a
downgrade as well, both visually (no more neon Tron-style look) and
difficulty-wise (with the exception of a few rooms, many of these new
challenges are a cakewalk compared to the original).
But by far the most infuriating change revolves around the bosses. While
they are every bit as massive as the mechanical monsters from the first
game, their attack patterns are easy to memorize along with their weak
points; the bad news is that the weak points are only available once the
boss has finished its string of patterned attacks, and regardless of
what weapon players use, it will only take a set amount of damage before
beginning the attack process all over again. This means that even if you
memorize the patterns, you must sit through and endure the entire
animations multiple times until the weak point is available again,
making these encounters far longer and more irritating than they should
be.
Capcom deserves all the praise in the world for bringing back the folks
behind Rearmed. It’s just too bad their attempt to win back Bionic
Commando lovers after the devastating (in more ways than one) 3D
experiment fell short. Hopefully there’s still time to extend
development to another 2D game before the series falls into the
bottomless darkness for good.
