MadWorld [Wii]

19 Mar 2009 at 13:32:32 by Chris Schilling
Systems used to review this title: (WII)

A ten-second snapshot of MadWorld’s uberviolence should be enough to get certain tabloids into a foam-mouthed frenzy. Take this as an example – I’ve just smashed a painting over a man’s head, shook up a soda bottle and forcibly inserted it into his face, before punching him out of a window into a fountain. Ah, but this isn’t an ordinary fountain. It’s a fountain which is covered in spikes, one of which is now protruding from his lifeless corpse. Another man staggers around with a spiked ball on his head – I think I’ll slam him into a table and hurl him kicking and screaming towards a fire. A third one I’ve already stunned with several vicious headbutts is about to hurtle into the moon via a giant catapult. And the fourth behind me is about to be split in half – lengthways – by the chainsaw that’s handily attached to my avatar’s arm. And I’m going to get wild cheers and riotous applause for doing so. DeathWatch isn’t your average gameshow, and Jack Cayman isn’t your average contestant. But Jack’s art is death, and he’s about to paint his masterpiece. Welcome to MadWorld - the slickest, sickest game on Wii.

It represents Sega’s second gamble on ultra-hardcore Mature-rated content on Nintendo’s previously family-focused console, following on from the gloriously profane House of the Dead: Overkill. Yet while that might have been adult in tone, its simplistic rail-shooter mechanics and low difficulty level weren’t exactly ‘hardcore’. That’s not the case with MadWorld, whose standard difficulty offers a fearsome challenge on the later stages, with a lives system that forces you to restart an entire level should you lose them all. Go exploring and you’ll find several opportunities to pick up new ones if you’re struggling, but chances are you’re not going to finish this without having to replay a stage at least once. Hardcore in word and in deed, then.

The concept behind MadWorld is nothing really new – Jefferson Island has been cut off entirely from civilisation, with its remaining residents forced into competing in a violent gameshow, apparently to amuse the rich and famous. There’s a little more to it than that – indeed, there’s more to Jack’s presence on DeathWatch than meets the eye, but the story goes to some surprising places, offering as compelling a reason as any to keep playing to the end. What’s particularly impressive is that the drama of the narrative doesn’t impinge on the silliness of the game itself. The plot is fairly dark and serious, yet the gameshow itself is more Happy Tree Friends than Hostel. It’s a gorehound’s delight, sure, but it’s damn funny at the same time. Every death is so hysterically OTT that it’s hard to be offended – even when you sit a man on a spike so long it punctures both sphincter and skull. “That reminds me,” gabbles one commentator, “I must go and see my proctologist.”

With the tone nailed, developer Platinum Games goes for broke on the visual front, offering a stark monochromatic colour scheme with gaudy splashes of red and yellow. Frank Miller’s Sin City is an obvious influence here (indeed, there’s something of violent anti-hero Marv about MadWorld’s Jack) but the look is pretty unique in videogames. Initially, it almost seems too much to take in, with the action moving so quickly that it takes some time for your eyes to grow accustomed to what you’re seeing. But once you’re used to it, it’s almost undeniably Wii’s most striking game, besting No More Heroes in the style stakes, and rivalling Mario Galaxy as the console’s best technical achievement. It’s matched in the audio department with co-commentators Greg Proops and John ‘Bender’ DiMaggio on riotous, profanity-spitting form. Roughly half the lines are too crude to print here, but while the dialogue can repeat on occasion, it’s brilliantly written and often splutteringly funny, particularly as it keeps up with the more elaborate kills. The hip-hop soundtrack might be a little more divisive, but it’s an undeniably thrilling backing to some stages, with one Asian-themed level getting particularly effective sonic backup. Spot effects are suitably squelchy, and the remote buzzes as your chainsaw revs.

It’s all building up to a classic case of style over substance, and admittedly, MadWorld’s gameplay can’t quite match up to its terrific presentation. The opening tutorial is a little too slow, punctuated too often by interruptions when you’re just ready to cut loose. Just about everything you do is accompanied by a text box explaining the controls or mechanics in some way, while enemies are the most brain-dead cannon fodder it’s possible to imagine. As it turns out, during the later game you’ll be praying for less aggressive foes like these, and their seeming disinterest in anything but staggering around waiting to die ends up encouraging  you to mix up your moves a little during the opening stages. Attacks are a mix of button presses and motion controls – A alone is a standard jab, while combining it with analogue stick movements executes more powerful punches. Holding B and swinging the remote uses Jack’s chainsaw arm to dismember opponents. Grab an opponent by holding A and you can headbutt them with a swing of the nunchuk, or hurl them with a flick of the remote. There’s no block – instead, evasion is the best form of defence, Jack rolling out of harm’s way as you jerk the nunchuk back (don’t worry – it’s calibrated just about perfectly).

So far, so intuitive, then. But MadWorld’s camera and lock-on system let the side down. Minus a second analogue stick, Platinum has opted for an AI-guided third-person viewpoint, with the C button used to centre it behind Jack. It’s not the most elegant system, and it gets doubly confusing when you have to hold the same button to lock onto the nearest enemy – when you’re surrounded, you can sometimes find yourself attacking someone other than the foe you wanted to focus on. This is barely an issue in the early stages. Once you reach the castle level and beyond, it’s grounds for prosecution, as the more aggressive enemies can get an attack in without you getting a chance to dodge because you didn’t see it coming. Energy pills and extra lives aren’t uncommon, but when larger enemies with special attacks that can wipe out half your health bar (or even on occasion kill you outright) make an appearance, you’ll sometimes find yourself locating them via radar than by looking at the main display. In that sense it feels more like the loose brawling found in Sega’s Yakuza rather than the tight scraps of the developer’s idiosyncratic PS2 fighter God Hand.

Yet the camera’s capriciousness is all but forgotten in those spectacular moments where you’re meting out ultraviolence in ever more epic and elaborate ways, never more so than in the boss fights. Gargantuan guardians offer a stern test of both your twitch reflexes and your arm muscles, with as much time spent shaking, twisting or flicking the controllers as learning attack patterns and effecting well-timed dodges. The motion controls never feel incongruous, though, and add a thrilling physicality to these brilliant battles, while the visual feedback is never less than dazzling, the vicious finishers offering wholly satisfying reward for your efforts. It’s these moments - away from the occasionally repetitive toe-to-toes with generic enemies, and that sometimes infuriating camera – that will ensure MadWorld stays with you long after the credits have rolled. And with multiplayer minigames based on the score-chasing Bloodbath Challenges found during each level, and a Hard mode I’m admittedly a little scared to even start, there’s plenty to tempt you back for more. Particularly as you never really did find out how many points five spikes through the same enemy head was worth...

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