Too Human Reviews

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Written by BuckGB on August 20th, 2008

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The characters involved in the story all do their part. They aren't the most interesting bunch, but hopefully they will develop more as the trilogy carries on. You definitely get a sense that they all know each other, but the problem is we do not know them and aren't really given an opportunity to.
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The voice acting is good and definitely does an admirable job, especially towards the end of the game when things become a lot more dramatic. This is also accompanied by some truly fantastic music. The orchestra sound pieces set the mood and tone perfectly throughout the game, along with all the appropriate sounds you hear during combat or finding that extra rare item while playing.

Aside from customizing your character and loot hoarding, Too Human doesn't have a lot of the extras that you would expect in an action adventure/ role-playing game. The level design is super linear without too many alternative paths to explore. Granted Too Human provides one central area that you can explore, but it's basically a forest you can navigate if you want more loot. This simply is not enough. Given the volumes of atmosphere Silicon Knights try to create it's too bad they didn't expand on the world with some optional side-quests or made the world a little less straightforward. Hopefully Silicon Knights didn't hold out extra content because they plan on the series to reach their planned trilogy.

Finally, the online co-op mode is very engaging and allows players to team up with a buddy or acquaintance; having another powerful champion of ODIN at your side makes the game much more tactically sound. After all, the grunts that surround you during the single-player campaign are, for the most part, pretty useless and quite whiny.

Additionally, playing co-op with various people allows you to trade for items. This will undoubtedly become a crucial component to acquiring complete item sets in a timely manner. The only mild downside concerning multiplayer is that the game is only coded to accommodate two players at a time. It would be awesome to go through the levels with four, eight, or even sixteen brawlers, going toe-to-toe with the legions of machines and Hel's undead minions.

So what are the games strong points? Well apart from the major omission that is split screen co-op (a big mistake not including this in my opinion), it has to be said that the online multiplayer is definitely the best part of the game. Online co-op basically takes all the levels you can play through in single player and adds another player, minus the cut scenes, when you can find someone to play with this is a great mode and almost worth the price of the game along, my main question here though would be, how long before you can't find anyone willing to play through with you?

The cyberpunk conceit sounds like a stretch but, on the whole, it works. The art direction manages to seamlessly blend the grandeur we think of with this mythology and make it come alive again with a healthy dose of futurism. In particular is Baldur himself, his face scarred with luminescent lines that could be either tattoos or battle scars. Small touches like this make Too Human, a very compelling game to watch as well as play. The storytelling is also strong, but those without some background in the source material may find it decidedly opaque while those well versed in it might be driven to distraction trying to establish the equivalencies.

Hopping back to some of the issues in this game, setting the title back again the bugs are a plenty. It seems a little strange that a title which has been in development for so long, even though it has been on and off, has featured quite a few bugs. some more serious than others. One which is most frequent is the magical disappearance trick played by enemies and allies. There has been a couple of times when I thought one of the larger enemies in the game, the troll, and half way through killing it it would fade away. This might not seem like a problem, but it is when you're hoping to find some very decent equipment and now you can't because your target has just vanished. Another bug has happened only once, but again worth mentioning, is with clipping. In fighting another large enemy I had jumped got stuck on the enemy and after it had been killed I fell through the floor and fell through cyber space, literally this time. Let's just thank god that the game saves frequently. Other bugs include converted enemies still being able to attack you, and invisible allies on certain occasions during co-op. This all can be fixed from a nice patch, but that isn't the point, some of those bugs are highly noticeable and should have been tended to before hand, this does effect the immersion and the experience you'll have with the game.

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