KILLZONE 2 REVIEW

Before I go on to the real review here, I want to explain the history behind this extraordinary purchase of mine...

Long ago there was a thing called "E3 2005", where few and far between any of the tech demos shown during Sony's rendition of the conference ever made it into real time in-game form. One of those games that ended up actually happening both in game and graphics form was KILLZONE 2. Known to some as the most infamous trailer of the 2005 show, about 4 years later the game came out and somehow matched or surpassed the quality of the prerendered trailer.

While this was all happening I was still under the guise of my family's taste of not touching M-rated games, and after two years and quite enjoying the KILLZONE 3 beta...I decided to take the plunge and buy KILLZONE 2 after realizing how good this series really is. Now let's start this review...

FIRST: This game is by no means a run-and-gun game, and to which you constantly have to be in cover. This game in this sense of progressing slowly through an area hails back to the fact that this game is pretty much "World War II in space" given the fact that Helghan looks like a degenerated Germany and the Helghast are just "Nazis and Darth Vader-esque suits". The game is pretty much a sci-fi medal of honor, so expect plenty of armored enemies, cover-filled areas, and weapons that are nothing but WWII weapons given a sci-fi facelift.

SECOND: This game is by no means easy due to this, and while the game is pretty fun..expect some of the "boss battles" to moderately irritating, especially the final boss. Besides that the game feels and looks like something out of an insane military simulation, as if Guerrilla's intention was to make a Medal of Honor game that's on overdosed steroids.

THIRD: The story while not amazing isn't trash either, as the characters while somewhat tactful are still believable in the setting they are in. Characters die, live, and have revenge just like any other similar war game on the market, and that's not neccessarily a bad thing in my book.

GRAPHICS: This game pretty much is the pinnacle of FPS graphics, while people might disagree and start screaming Crysis at this point...This game is oozing with detail, visual effects, and animations that pretty much comes to life, as far as how gritty looks go. You won't be disappointed definitely when you set the game to 1080(i/p).

MUSIC: Joris De Man pretty much makes this game the game equivalent of "prequel Star Wars", and sometimes he does a better job of booming themes and creepy sub-tunes than John Williams himself. You almost can feel what's going on in the cut-scenes thanks to this pretty much perfect score for such an underrated FPS franchise, and I don't say that lightly.

CLOSING: I highly recommend this game for someone looking for a "out-of-the-ordinary" military shooter, is good at cover systems, and willing to admit that some of the boss battles might want you to pull your hair out. The graphics are probably superior than anything else on the market, besides maybe games that are native DX11, which don't count really since this is a console-only game. That and while the multiplayer is mostly dead thanks to the third iteration, is quite fun in and of itself even if you're just sparring with a few enemies.

IN MY OPINION?

GRAPHICS: 10/10
STORY: 8.5/10
GAMEPLAY: 8.0/10
MUSIC: 9.5/10

OVERALL: 9/10

"Epic when Fun"