I usually pass hack-and-slash games off as typical Japanese animated, linear games, and historically, I have found these games to be quite dull and repetitive. Conan was different…sorta.
It was a long weekend…Ace Combat was out, Project Gotham Racing 4 wasn’t there, and there weren’t even any copies of Turok left. Deflated, I stumbled upon Conan, and being a young man who reads game reviews and previews, I decided to rent it.
Conan follows the story of a man slayer and a lady killer, bent of destruction to reclaim his armour. Early on, you find that Conan previously unleashed something known as the “The Black Plague” and has been stripped of his armour (which is magical…???) and after each boss a piece of armour is returned. He is assisted in his quest by a warrior princess type character who helps you out during the cinematics, yet while playing the game she really only narrates.
Conan is third-person hand-and-slash that has wonderful game mechanics as it was very easy to pick up and play and at the same time more advanced moves required a significantly more amount of skill. A vast array of moves are available to you and are split into three categories: single weapons, dual-wielding and grappling.
The game set players in different environments and has countless enemies thrown at them throughout, and each level ends with a boss.
These environments vary from islands, caves, and castles. Visually, the game may have a generic feel to it, yet it’s impressive nonetheless. Highlights of the game’s graphics include such things as having very good lighting effects, and being able to see every curve of every maiden, and every muscle in Conan’s impossibly chiseled chest. Foliage such as plants and trees, and structures such ships and towers were also noticeably well done.
Even though every level looked different from the previous one, all levels seemed to have that ‘same old’ feel to them. Things such as time of day changes, and weather effects could have really made this game have more of a creative feel to it. While main characters were done well, most common enemies had the exact same look as the guy’s head you chopped off previously. And lastly, decade old invisible walls definitely dragged the visual aspect and fun factor of the game down.
From an audio perspective, I suppose you could say this game was average. Conan’s original score was actually done very well, but that’s only when it eventually came, as there were too many long periods of silence. And at the opposite end of the scale, the music heard in the background of boss battles can become downright annoying, largely due to the fact that boss battles require multiple deaths first, to complete.
Perhaps Conan’s largest negative, is exactly what I expected it to be. From levels, to characters, to fighting moves, a one word description for Conan is simple: repetitive.
The game suffers from having such linear play, with such straightforward levels and the story in the game has extremely little depth and is hardly engaging. And most importantly, Boss battles may be unique, but all levels end in one, making them completely expected. They also all have multiple stages and obvious, yet strangely hidden checkpoints.
Maybe the only real interesting part about the bosses were once you got their health to zero, the game would go into a cinematic but would still have you in control. Conan would do some awesome moves to add the finishing touch to killing a boss by having the player press a series of buttons, if an incorrect button combination was made, the boss regained health and you’d have to start over. This part was interesting, but because you had to focus on pressing buttons you never really had a chance to watch Conan kill the boss! How did the boss die!? I don’t know, X, Y, B, B?
Conan is a singleplayer only game with varying difficulties and one unlockable difficulty. No splitcreen or online multiplayer is added which is a big negative for this game. I know I would have had a blast playing through the game in Co-op with a friend.
I’ve gotten 250/1000 achievements, and I am decently satisfied. This game really won’t bring me back for another go around, but some achievements look excessively hard to get, so hack-and-slash fanatics might get a kick out of going for some of them.
For being visually pleasing and surprisingly fun, but repetitive and singplepayer only, Conan finds a secure spot on the rental list.
