![]() ![]() Undead will glow a murky red when examined through Necrovision, and will subsequently appear on the game's radar screen. Firstly, before the player does any sort of sneaking and poking around, NPCs must be identified as either harmless or potential threats by way of Necrovision, one of the goggle types our poor man's Sam Fisher uses during his adventures. In reality, the use of rain seems to be a cover-up for Rain's monumentally stupid artificial intelligence. According to the game's pseudo-epic storyline, the constant rainstorm featured in Rain's environments dulls the senses of the undead, which should allow operatives to conduct their espionage without too much interference. In this, the stealth aspect of a stealth game, Vampire Rain fails horrifically. Players should expect to conduct quite a bit of sneaking around, taking time to learn patrol routes, watching and learning enemy patterns. Vampire Rain is, first and foremost, a stealth game. True, but unfortunately, Vampire Rain's gameplay is far worse than its story, a feat not easily achieved. But that's okay, right? A bad story in a videogame is forgivable if the gameplay is good. Not only was it terribly acted, as is every other story segment, but it was a sloppy way to give the player a bit of background info, and could have been handled much more cleanly by way of some sort of in-game event. One team members asks, "Isn't it true that Lloyd was the only survivor of such-and-such an incident?" The reply is something along the lines of, "Yes, and he was horrifically traumatized after the event." That sort of conversation is completely unnecessary, as Lloyd's past should be and is, in fact, well known among all members of his strike team. Somebody thought this would look cool.Īnother example comes from a discussion held by Lloyd's strike team concerning his past. "908 days"? That's rather specific, not to mention the generic tone of the dialogue is both boring and poorly voice-acted. This sort of trite, worse-than-B-movie dialogue comprises most of Vampire Rain and makes the game painful to watch, let alone painful to actually play. COMMANDER: You see? This is why you shouldn't allow pencil pushers to run a country! ASSISTANT: I'm sorry about your family, sir. Instead of slowly leading into what's happening with characters and the game universe itself, the player is treated with riveting conversations akin to: ASSISTANT: Sir, is it true that if the outbreak isn't stopped, the world will be overrun with undead in 908 days? COMMANDER: Where'd you hear that? ASSISTANT: One of the lab boys, sir. ![]() Too often, the dialogue attempts to overwhelm the player with hand-holding and useless information. The in-game cinematics are well rendered and gripping for the most part, but the dialogue and voice-acting completely shatter any attempt at suspension of disbelief. Combined with "boring," "laughable," and "poorly acted," "uninspired" seems the perfect way to describe Vampire Rain's attempt at a storyline. The use of notable gaming icons might have convinced developer Artoon that they were creating a character destined to be known as renowned, but instead comes off as what it is-an uninspired rip-off. ![]() The body suit reminds me of Snake's first Metal Gear Solid adventure, while the goggles are reminiscent of Sam Fisher's headgear. The first thing players will doubtless notice about their in-game avatar is that his aesthetics are a hybrid born from video game legends Solid Snake and Sam Fisher. Lloyd was certainly in better hands than mine during this past experience, as surviving an encounter with Vampire Rain's brand of undead is a rare experience indeed-but I digress. Vampire Rain tells the story of Lloyd, the only member of a group of operatives that has been unfortunate enough to have a run-in with the Nightwalkers before.
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