Hellboy - The Stench Of Evil Review

Anannya Sen’s Review

Another day another movie tie in.

I'm a big fan of Guillermo Del Toro, simply because I think he tries to achieve visuals that other filmmakers shy away from. So I enjoyed Hellboy 1 as it looked on the screen as it should have looked on the screen.

I haven't seen Hellboy 2 yet, but I was immediately confused as the main protagonist that I saw in the trailers appears to be absent from the game. Then I read more about the game description and realised that it wasn't a game based on the film, just on the character.

In this action platformer, you have to run and fight through various levels while uncovering a strange plot with American Indian demi gods and all kinds of other creatures.

The action is fairly standard, as you shoot and pummel anything heading your way. There are plenty of things to pick up and throw, or kick towards the monsters, and failing that you can always batter them with your fists. As Hellboy is invulnerable, you do lose life but will regain it slowly over time. Also, you can enter a rage mode where you don't lose as much life and your fist glows with demon flame. You may have guessed that you give harder ass whuppins in this mode which is achieved when the flames over your life bar hit max.

Even though your energy gets replenished and Hellboy is kinda invulnerable, you can still die. Strange, I know, but what's the point of having a health bar if you're not gonna make use of it. When this happens though, you can restart from the last checkpoint you got to.

Controls are simple, use the key or D pad to jump, move, duck and roll, and fire and pummel. One thing about the jumps which isn't brilliant is you have to jump up first and then left or right to get to different areas. A diagonal jump button would have been nice because there are some times you forget to press a direction and you plummet back down again.

During the levels you can collect pieces of armour and a manuscript piece. Now having not finished the game yet (shame on me) I can't tell you what they do if you collect them all but I can tell you that one annoying aspect of the game is that you can't really go back. Yes, if you didn't know which way the level mapped out and you dropped a few stories you will miss out on those ledges you saw during your fall. And tough noogies as there's no getting back up there to explore more or make sure you collected all the junk you're supposed to.

The plot trips along at a merry pace but is quite confusing. It is made up for by the detailed and colourful graphics, which, while not comparable to some titles out there, is still pretty decent for a 2D action platformer.

At the end of each level you usually have a boss battle of some kind and then you get a score. In fact we've seen it all before, which doesn't make the game no fun to play, but rather leaves you with a fairly bland taste in your mouth when it comes to originality.

You've seen these action platform games before, so have we. If you love em, you'll love this, but if you want something innovative you won't really get it here. A quick bang for your buck but nothing to show off to your friends about.