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kill.switch Review

“In a world on the brink of global conflict, you find yourself back on the front lines of battle. Only this time, you’re not here to prevent a war… you’re here to start one.” Unfortunately this is the only background information your given in kill.switch. You know nothing about your character nor anything concerning the plot of the story. But as you progress through the game you will learn more.

Kill.switch is an innovative military shooter that emphasizes realistic cover tactics and awesome firepower for the ultimate experience in combat gaming. Featuring the unique “Offensive Cover System”, and utilizing the “Blindfire” combat mechanic, kill.switch demands the use of conventional warfare tactics, forcing players to utilize surrounding environments, and quickly adjust on-the-fly through each intense and challenging mission. Using the “Offensive Cover System” players can offensively engage the enemy using the environment as cover. “Blindfire” allows the player to launch a frontal assault against the enemy without being exposed to counter-fire. The “Sophisticated AI” uses the same tactics available to you and works as teams to take you down. You will need to make use of the Offensive Cover System and Blindfire if you want to complete each level with less difficulty.

The graphics are nice, showing good detail and lighting effects. Although the character models have nice detail, they lack in variety. Every enemy you see looks alike; the only difference among them are the weapons they carry. The levels are large in size and also have great detail. Even the non-interactive environmental surroundings have great detail. However, the fact that you usually follow a path to complete the objective takes away from the exploration of a level. A nice element within kill.switch is seeing the effect after a chaotic battle, bodies laying everywhere, shell casings on the ground, and bulletholes around the area. The bodies do disappear after a certain amount of time and there is no blood or any type of gore in the game. Although there is no blood or gore, kill.switch makes up in various ways such as the screen going white and the high pitched ringing when a flash grenade goes off too close to you. I also like the fact that when you have low health, the screen acts like you have bad video feed. Very impressive on Namco’s part. The full motion videos are good as well, although there aren’t very many of them and they are too short.

The music goes well with the game, but is not very noticeable once the mayhem starts. During that time, all you will ever hear and notice are the sound effects. The sound effects are quite good, although all you hear are gunshots, explosions, and the enemy commentary. It’s really funny to see and hear your enemies diving to the side and yelling “GRENADE!” when you throw one in their direction.

The controls are easy to learn, nothing too complex. The gameplay isn’t too hard to comprehend. There’s a basic pattern to every level; hide and shoot. If you can master this basic combination then you should have no problem completing each objective.

The game is great fun until you finish it. There is no replay value, so once you finish there’s nothing more to the game. The only thing I can see that would make you want to play the game a second time would be to play it on the next difficulty level. A multiplayer or co-op mode would have raised it’s fun factor ten fold and the replay value to that of many great first person shooters.

Final Verdict

The concept for the game was very good and if Namco took their time developing the game rather than just completing it in a single year then the game would have been a whole lot better. The story is interesting although it takes a while for the player to know what is going on since no background info has been given from the start. Kill.switch is enjoyable the first time through, but leaves you wanting more than what you just experienced.

Score

8.0 out of 10

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Related Information

Posted by: gawl126
Date: November 11, 2003
Publisher: Namco Bandai Games
Developer: Namco Bandai Games
Release Date: 10/28/2003
Genre: Action
Number of Players: 1
ESRB Rating: Teen
System Reviewed: Xbox

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