Doing America Proud | Captain America: Super Soldier Review

<p>For my taste&comma; Marvel’s <em>Captain America <&sol;em>is the best of their pre-Avengers films&period; <em>Iron Man<&sol;em> was great and all that but I think they really hit it out of the park with <em>Captain America&period;<&sol;em> It is however&comma; with great trepidation that I went into playing the game based on said film&period; Producer&comma; Sega&comma; had been in charge of producing the games based on the other Avenger’s members &lpar;<em>Iron Man 1&amp&semi;2&comma; Incredible Hulk&comma; and Thor<&sol;em>&rpar; and they hadn’t exactly done the properties justice&period; With new developers Next Level Games at the helm &lpar;who at that point were most well-known for their Wii games&rpar; fans of Cap had plenty of reason to worry&period; Well&comma; I am happy to say that although <em>Captain America&colon; Super Soldier<&sol;em> is by no means a perfect game&semi; it is a solid and fun effort&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The story of the game takes place sometime during the middle of the movie&period; Remember that sweet battle montage when Cap and his friends were wiping out all those Hydra soldiers&quest; Yeah&comma; well this game takes place sometime during that montage&period; Captain America becomes aware of some dangerous weaponry being manufactured by Hydra and he manages to track production of the weapons back to the secluded castle of Dr&period; Arnim Zola&period; Most of the game takes place in and around this castle and the atmosphere of the locations is one of the great strengths of the game&period; Whether it’s the surrounding German village&comma; the underground sewers&comma; or the castle itself&semi; much work went into making sure that the player feels immersed in a rich&comma; detailed world&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;12616" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-12616" style&equals;"width&colon; 300px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;america-proud-captain-america-super-soldier-review&sol;captain-america-review-fist-snadwich&sol;" rel&equals;"attachment wp-att-12616"><img class&equals;"size-medium wp-image-12616" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2012&sol;04&sol;06213336&sol;Captain-America-Review-fist-snadwich-300x168&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"300" height&equals;"168" &sol;><&sol;a><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-12616" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Have a taste of a fresh baked Fist of Justice&comma; you Hydra scum&excl;&excl;&excl;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>The combat had me immediately drawing comparisons to <em>Batman&colon; Arkham City<&sol;em>&period; While Captain America’s combat is nowhere near as deep and polished as Batman’s&comma; much of the combos are pulled off in a similar fashion&period; Just like the Caped Crusader&comma; Cap can find himself surrounded by enemies and come away with nary a scratch as long as the player pulls off carefully timed combos while mixing melee with ranged attacks&period; Cap’s famous shield will be your primary weapon and it is every bit as effective as it should be&period; It’s used as your main line of defense against incoming bullets and fists&period; Offensively your shield can be used to knock Hydra soldiers out with ease and after leveling up enough it can even be used as a range weapon to take out up to four enemies at once&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The downside of combat is that it does sometimes rely too heavily on what I call &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;<em>God of War Syndrome<&sol;em>” which is an over-reliance on &OpenCurlyQuote;Quick Time Events’&period; The combat system is set up in such a way that a certain flow needs to be established to take out enemies efficiently but when a QTE pops up in the middle of your combos&comma; you can easily be thrown off your rhythm&period; Whenever the combat is flowing like it should however&comma; it’s a satisfying experience&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;12617" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-12617" style&equals;"width&colon; 300px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;america-proud-captain-america-super-soldier-review&sol;captain-america-review-shield-tug&sol;" rel&equals;"attachment wp-att-12617"><img class&equals;"size-medium wp-image-12617" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2012&sol;04&sol;06213325&sol;captain-america-review-shield-tug-300x168&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"300" height&equals;"168" &sol;><&sol;a><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-12617" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">The tug-of-war mini game was thankfully scrapped for the final product<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>Exploration also plays a large role in the gameplay&period; Many have decried the amount of backtracking that is required and how easy it is to get lost&period; I never felt that any of this was an issue in my playthrough&period; The environments may be large but the map system is more than enough to keep you on the right track&period; The biggest amount of backtracking you’re likely to do is directly tied to how many collectibles you want to find&period; Collectibles are plentiful in this game and I spent several hours just searching for things like Hydra dossiers and Faberge eggs but these side diversions can be completely ignored if you so wish&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Often times during your exploration you’ll come across acrobatic platforming sections&period; These sections are interesting the first few times but they do grow tedious after a while&comma; mainly due to the fact that it’s impossible to fail&period; You are required to time your button presses as Cap flips through the environment but all a successful button press nets you is an increase in your focus meter to use in combat&period; Not pressing the buttons in time will not make you fall&period; This level of handholding detracts from what should be a challenging and rewarding process&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Sound design is also a big plus in <em>Captain America&colon; Super Soldier<&sol;em>&period; With the notable exceptions of Hugo Weaving and Toby Jones&comma; most of the cast from the movie reprise their role in the game&period; Unlike other stars who have&comma; in the past&comma; voiced their super hero video game counterpart with all the enthusiasm of a sweat sock &lpar;I’m looking at YOU Ed Norton&rpar;&semi; the cast of <em>Captain America <&sol;em>knocks it out of the park&period; Chris Evans plays his part with as much spirit as he does on the big screen&period; The best element of sound that this game has to offer though&comma; in my opinion&comma; is the shield&period; The sound of Cap’s legendary shield as it bounces off the skulls of Hydra soldiers is so satisfying that I would venture back to areas I had already cleared just to shield bash some re-spawning enemies&period; It may seem silly and trivial but I couldn’t get enough of it&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;12618" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-12618" style&equals;"width&colon; 300px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;america-proud-captain-america-super-soldier-review&sol;captain-america-review-staute&sol;" rel&equals;"attachment wp-att-12618"><img class&equals;"size-medium wp-image-12618" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2012&sol;04&sol;06213315&sol;captain-america-review-staute-300x168&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"300" height&equals;"168" &sol;><&sol;a><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-12618" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Cap&&num;8217&semi;s unsuccesful attempt to blend into his surroundings&period; Next time he&&num;8217&semi;ll bring his trumpet<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>After the credits rolled and I had racked up every achievement the game had to offer I looked back at my time with the game with fondness&period; There was too much hand holding and most of the puzzles were over-simplistic but the good far outweighed the bad&period; <em>Captain America&colon; Super Soldier<&sol;em> is far from perfect but it is one of the best Marvel games released to date and it’s the best option to tide fanboys over until we get the inevitable <em>Avengers<&sol;em> game&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;