(PS3)
Release Date: 26th February 2008
Developed By Guerrilla
Publisher: SCEE
Read Our Preview
Preview: Killzone 2 (PS3)
Taking place two years after the Helghast assault on Vekta, the ISA is taking the fight to the enemy’s home world of Helghan. The ISA goal is to capture the Helghast leader, Emperor Visari, and bring the Helghast war machine to a halt. You play the role of Sev, a battle-hardened veteran and a member of the special forces unit known as the Legion, tasked with securing Pyrrhus, the Capital City. Naturally plenty of twists and turns are promised with the games story with the press release ending with, “their fiercest opponent may be the planet itself.” Intriguing.
What will make Killzone stand out is the AI and a spokesperson from Guerilla was quick to state that in a Q&A, “We are bringing very dynamic environments and the AI must deal with the nuances in each by intelligently navigating and fighting through the world. Enemies will also be able to see at night with their goggles so we wanted to make their actions accurate even in darkness.” They then went onto mention the environments, “Killzone 2 is a hostile theater of war, with a gritty look to the environments that players will find are highly dynamic and destructible. We’re introducing a completely new planet so there are numerous environments that will be unique in the game.”
Not just content with creating a great single player experience, Killzone 2 is also said to excel in multiplayer. With support for 2 to 32 players the battles can be considered suitably epic. It’s also going to be adopting a medal system. There are 12 military ranks to ascend through, 46 ribbons and medals to unlock. With the badges there are six player types including engineer, medic, scout, assault, and saboteur. Some will need unlocking, but when you do you’ll be able to utilise that player types special ability. Such as being able to revive a member of the team with the medic. Other abilities will also become available as you play through the multiplayer. Combining badges is also a possibility. Good news for those hoping to avoid spawn camping which plagues most FPS games is that you can now choose where you spawn, along with seeing a video of what’s happening in that location. Hopefully more games will follow suit.
Killzone 2 is certainly going to be one of the biggest games for the PS3 this year and from what we’ve seen it’s for good reason. It’s looking like 2009 could finally be the year PS3 makes up lost ground.
Original Preview Upon Confirmation of the sequel.
Words by Jason Julier
Killzone to date has flattered to deceive. Despite the enormous amount of hype, Guerrilla never managed to pull of the first person spectacular that many PlayStation 2 owners had dreamt of. The result was extremely patchy, with so many game play issues, Gamestyle won’t waste your time running through them, just believe us.
Despite so many basic errors, the art direction and Killzone universe was eye catching, maintaining a presence long after you’d tossed the actual game disk itself. Such a dark, foreboding world needed a better representation and Guerrilla is attempting it once again with Killzone 2. Yes, we’ve ignored the PSP version for good reason. Sony need something to at least hold its own against Microsoft’s killer first person franchise (Halo, for those unaware) and is sinking a huge budget into this sequel.
Much has been made of the Killzone 2 trailers and the ongoing dispute about what is ‘enhanced’ footage or what we’ll be experiencing when the game boots up next year. The BBC recently enjoyed a hands on opportunity, playing the same level that forms the majority of the latest E3 trailer, when the first Special Forces land on the Helghast planet. Most of their positives concerned the visuals; violence and attention to detail, but little mention of any unique game play features or engaging AI. Guerrilla could most likely be keeping such inventions secret, or at least until they’ve managed to experience Halo 3, both online and offline.
What cannot be disputed are production levels on offer and what promises to be one of the best-looking PlayStation 3 releases so far. Guerrilla are keen to point out a long list of visual effects including motion blur, internal lens reflections and depth-based colour grading (whatever that is) and so on. Yet the issue regarding this series to date isn’t visually, it’s always been the gaming experience itself and until we get our hands on the game, the jury will remain out.
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