I must admit to never having heard of Zone Of The Enders prior to taking this collection to review. It wasn’t until the game arrived that I then realised I had actually heard of it but under its shortened name of ZOE. Not that I had any inkling of what to expect. The main reason for this is the fact I have never owned a PS2 and as such, haven’t paid an awful lot of attention to what Sony have been chucking out. Both the games in this collection Z.O.E. and Z.O.E: The 2nd Runner were released on that platform back at the start of the millenium, but now they can be found paired up with some lovely visuals for this HD re-release.
So who do we have to thank us for ZOE? Hideo Kojima is who. Best known for his work on the Metal Gear series, Kojima is a bit of a fans favourite, especially to those who like the Japanese style of action game. Am I one of those fans? Not at all, but can I be turned?
In ZOE, the first game, you take control of the main protagonist, Leo, in a futuristic world in which ‘orbital frames’ (robots), fight each other for control of the land and ultimately, control of the world. I say land, but these fights take place way up above the rooftops so really you are fighting for airspace and it is this that sets ZOE apart from other mechanical fighters. You may be in a giant robot type thing but there is no lumbering around as every move you pull off is precise and full of good old Japanese Anime style. The game prides itself on ‘High Speed Robot Action’ and it certainly lives up to that tag.
The style is however what lets things down, at least for me. I know from previous experiences with this type of game that storyline is all important and our friends from the East like a good cheesy story more than most. Within the first 30 minutes of the game running, I had probably contributed to less than 30 seconds worth of action (and part of that involved hitting the start button....twice!). I was pretty prepared to accept the story playing out, but fully expected it to tail off slightly so I could get in on the action a little. No hope of that happening I’m afraid. Cutscene, bit of music, bit more cutscene followed by a bit more music etc... etc.. etc... You know what I mean. Yes, I could have skipped them but what’s the point in playing a game if you have no idea what the hell is going on?
On the whole though once you do get to do something it’s pretty good fun, even if a little repetitive. The world is split down into ‘blocks’, all with its own number of enemies and on the most part you can choose which block you wish to attack, however the game is constantly keeping you up-to-date and tries to guide you the way of the story as much as possible. After only a short time of being out on your own, you find yourself being pushed along even if you don’t want to. Most of the fighting is straightforward enough with button timing being all important. Mash the ‘X’ button for your close range stuff, push the ‘X’ button some more from distance for your long range attacks and hit the ‘B’ button occasionally when you want to be fancy and hit out with a harder punch. You can chuck in some shields and dashes but essentially that’s about it. Both long and short range attacks work well during fights but the main highlight is the speed in which everything works. Even with a lot going on at the same time, the pace of action was always top notch and I never noticed any slowdown no matter how frantic things got. Once you get rid of the simple standard enemies (and believe me, they are pretty damn simple), you’ll come up against a bigger end of stage boss. These are a lot more difficult (as is usually the case), and were the only times I ever found myself dying. Even with death in mind, strangely they were also the most enjoyable moments in the game as it finally felt like what I was doing was worthwhile. These boss fights were something to actually think about and they took many a try to finally defeat.
Visually it’s all pretty damn good even for a game that is over 10 years old. The HD update works wonders, but in a way I kind of wish I had checked this out when it was first released. I have a feeling I would have been blown away whereas nowadays, its all just run of the mill stuff. Ahead of it’s time I should think it was and it has graphically aged well albeit with the HD rehash. Updates are all well and good but they can’t stop the boredom striking from the constant repetition in fights and the overly long, drawn out, badly voiced, limp story.
The sequel to ZOE, entitled The 2nd Runner sees us sadly say goodbye to Leo, but hello to Dingo, our new main space fighter dude......he is, well, the um, 2nd frame runner. See what they did there?
After another nice long introduction (yep, I’m pretty much bored of this story telling now), you find yourself starting off in a ground based frame. What’s that you say? Ground based? No aerial fighting? That must be a bit clunky. Yes it is, but you need not worry as thankfully it doesn’t take long before you find yourself out of the lumbering ground frame and into the Jehuty, the nimble fighting machine we grew to love from the first game.
I should now sit here and chat about the new characters, the new enemies and all the new bits and bobs that come with a sequel but the truth of the matter is this.....I got bored of the cutscenes and skipped them. Yep, shoot me. As such, I don’t know or care what is going on with the new storyline apart from it’s too long! What I do know is the gameplay is pretty much the same as first time round. Defeat wave after wave of enemies, come up against a boss, die a few times whilst you figure out how to beat the bugger, rinse and repeat. The graphics have again been given the HD treatment and again could hold their own with a recent release but once more the old button mashing and repeating of the same thing over and over again lets the game down for me. The voice acting is slightly better than the first and there seems to be a little more emotion in things but that isn’t something that’s going to keep me wanting to go back for more.
I guess one thing that could maybe make me go back for more is multiplayer. But there isn’t any. So I won’t. You get a single player story mode for both games and that’s about it folks. Nowt else apart from some horrible instruction manuals. For both games, the ‘manuals’ are accessible from the title screens and take the form of PDF lookylikeys that are both horrible to read and rubbish to navigate through. Why the hell they chose this way to show the instructions is beyond me. Yes, paper booklets have been phased out slowly but this is a terrible substitute.
If you’re a fan of Anime, Japanese action games or like to be told a story, then you’ll want to be checking this out, even if you did hit it first time round. If however you prefer your games to be more hands on and with a little more to them than a bit of button mashing, give this collection a miss. You could always buy it for the storyline if you have a few hours spare but personally I’d rather ‘play’ a game than ‘watch’ it.
