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Hysteria Project 2
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Graphics & Sound:
Hysteria Project 2 is an unusual game for the iPhone, at least as far as genres are concerned. It's hard to think of the iPhone as a fully-featured gaming system, so the idea of anything other than a puzzle game on the system just doesn't quite fit with the image in my head. Hysteria Project 2 is a survival horror game and while an interesting execution of the genre on the platform, I'm still not really convinced the device is good for anything more complex than the more casual games typically found on it.
Visually, the game is great. It either uses live film or really good CG, or most likely, a combination of the two. Your character (what you can see of him) and the world around him are really crisp looking, and considering the creepy feeling of the late-night hospital surroundings, a lot of that high-quality visuals goes a long way in keeping you on edge. In fact, the quality of the in-game graphics when compared to the spliced in cut-scenes are so close that it actually causes some problems in the gameplay department... but more on that later.
The game's sound also adds a lot to the feel it is trying to portray. While it isn't absolutely necessary to survive the experience, it adds a lot of atmosphere. The background music is haunting and keeps you on edge, while the sound of your character's heavy breathing and fairly constant panic is playing loudly in your ears. The game actually recommends you play with headphones on to "enhance the effect." I guess that is to make your character's heavy breathing feel more like your own since it is all played through that character's eyes.
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Gameplay:
Hysteria Project 2 starts off with you waking up in a hospital bed. You don't really know anything about what is going on, but your first job is to get out of the strapped down bed and get away. If you take too long though, a man in a black hoodie charges into the room and kills you. This is pretty much the theme of the entire game. You are presented with a video that takes you from one location to the next, and once that video is over, you have a task to complete. If you do well, then you get the next video and the next task. Because of the chopped-up nature of the gameplay, it feels more like an interactive movie than an actual game.
Everything sounds pretty straightforward, right? Watch the video, get past the puzzle, watch another video. Remember what I said earlier about the in-game graphics looking just like the video? Well, the problem I alluded to earlier is the fact that there is no indication of when the video stops and the interactive segments begin. Pretty much every part of the game that had me taking control of my character again lead me to dying immediately. Another early example has your character running down a hall... he starts to swerve and he falls down. All of a sudden, a Game Over screen appears saying that you need to keep your balance. A reload later, and you are running down the same hall and this time you realize you are supposed to put your finger on the screen and counter-act the swerving nature of your character's jog.
Similarly, a little later, you see the killer down the hall dragging a body. Before you know it, he sees you and kills you. Turns out, you were supposed to duck out of sight, but still peek out of your hidey hole enough to keep an eye on him so you can get past him at just the right moment. This whole series of events is pretty constant throughout the game. The only times I knew for sure I was in control were when my character simply stopped and just stared at whatever was in front of him. And those times usually had a time limit in place to do whatever you needed to before you were attacked and killed yet again.
At first, the nature of this game made things very aggravating, but I eventually just accepted the fact that I was supposed to die every time I was supposed to do something and the game simply wanted me to learn from that experience so that when I reloaded from the last check point, I would have a better idea of what was going on. I'm not saying that necessarily made the game any better, but it was easier to deal with at that point.
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Difficulty:
Well, obviously, you should expect to die a lot in Hysteria Project 2. As you might suspect, the hardest part of the game is simply knowing when you are supposed to do something; not what you are supposed to do, mind you, simply when. For the most part, I found the puzzles themselves to be easy and hardly any trouble to solve. There are a few times when my timing wasn't right and I had to redo parts several times to actually get by, but even during those parts of the game, I knew what I had to do.
While I appreciate the fact that Hysteria Project 2 has seamless integration between its in-game graphics and its video, any kind of visual cue that I was in control again would have made things a lot better. At first, I thought the little pause symbol on the lower right corner of the screen was for the video and when that was up, you didn't have to do anything... that is, until I realized it was always up and it was simply the way you get onto the Menu Screen. |
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Game Mechanics:
Hysteria Project 2 does offer a wide variety of puzzles, and for that, I found the game somewhat interesting. While I didn't know when I was in control again, I found pretty much every obstacle set before me involved some interesting tasks to complete. I am going to stick to only early examples from the game so as not to walk you through any of the later problems it gives you.
At one point, you find yourself facing a keypad for a locked door. At first, you really have no idea of how to find the code to get you through it. All you can do is look around the room (mind you, you can't walk around, just look), and examine the keypad itself. Eventually you hear a voice telling you someone wrote the code on your arm, and you have a place to go. After realizing you can tap one of your arms to get a better look at it, you can swipe your finger down the sleeve to pull it down. Then you are presented with your code, well, most of it. It is a bit smudged.
While there are several interesting mechanics that use the iPhone's touch screen in that puzzle alone, there are also some pretty big gameplay issues that drag things down as well. In that particular puzzle, there is no way to look at the code and the keypad at the same time, or even a single click away. Unless you have a pen and paper handy, you will have to check the arm, tap a couple of times to see the keypad and then put in what you remembered of the 10 or so character code. Then, there is the smudged part of the code. Each attempt will have you re-inputting the code and attempting a new character for the part you can't quite make out, and until you get what you can see memorized, you will have to make frequent trips between your arm and the keypad before you are granted access.
That was just an example of both the interesting uses of the touch pad, and the issues built into several of the puzzles. But that is also a good example of the overall game. While it has a great presentation and an interesting concept, there are enough built-in issues that make it hard to recommend. In the end, I still don't see the iPhone as a good gaming device for anything other than the casual stuff it has primarily seen.
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-J.R. Nip, GameVortex Communications AKA Chris Meyer |
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