Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy (Xbox)
This is one of those titles which I almost missed. I had a huge amount of fun playing around with the various psychic powers in a demo that was cover mounted on one of the drivel filled Xbox mags but, for some reason, I never seemed to have money on me whenever I remember about this one.
So, there I was in Game (spit) today, when I noticed this game and Sudeki sitting side-by-side on a shelf with a “Two For 20 Notes” sticker on them. I’ll have them, I thought.
And so I nabbed em. Tell you what, though, Psi-Ops really does make some more successful games look silly. It’s a massive amount of fun, combining third person shooting, sneaking, and jedi l33tness in one bundle. The sneaking part was worrying me a little because, as regulars may know, I’m not a big fan of sneakers. Try typing ‘hiding simulator’ into the search box to your right.
In Psi-Ops, the Stealth is pretty forgiving. It works on the basis that it’s a sodding game, therefore if a character isn’t looking at you you really don’t need to creep around the place. As a result, the stealth components add a little bit of tension to the mix without spoiling the game – which is, of course, all about picking people up and throwing them against sharp things using the power of your mind.
Alright, so so far it’s been a bit Wolfenstein 3D. Find the keycard, open the door, kill everything, wash, rinse, repeat. Then again, mario is a case of jump, stomp, collect the star. When the play mechanic is as good as this, it reallly doesn’t matter how deep the experience is. Also, I’m only an hour into the game, so it’s maybe a little early to cast judgement.
