Bionic Commando (2009)

Here's a sampling of the protagonist's catchphrases.

• "Chew on that!"
• "Hole in one!"
• "I'll send ya' the bill later!"

Each of these phrases - and more, including a wolf howl - can be triggered when you kill someone, regardless of how they were killed. (The last one is my favorite.)

So there have been two main developments in my last three hours of playing Bionic Commando:

• The story has become more retarded. There was a cutscene somewhere in the 30-40% range, where ... you know, I don't feel like I can appropriately describe it. The game's writing is just fucking awful.
• The gameplay has become more challenging, and hence, generally, more fun. It was one thing when I was just blithely swinging around and zip-lining into guys; but now that enemies are putting up more of a fight (killer robots!!), and I'm getting more moves, the game is actually starting to make a case for itself.

The exception to this last point is that some of the new difficulty I'm encountering is, well, stupid. Nathan will die if he stays underwater or in radiation clouds for more than a few seconds - so if you fall in head-deep water, and there isn't a grapple point nearby, you're toast. Meanwhile, the radiation clouds are damn near invisible sometimes, especially when they're above you, because they're the same color as the sky.

Of course, unexpected deaths are made more bothersome by the sometimes infuriating placement (or lack thereof) of checkpoints. There was one 10-15 minute segment I had to near-fully replay three times over.

At this point though, I'm comfortable saying that the pure fun of being a bionic commando is making up for the game's other shortcomings. Not that it's great, but, at least something more than mediocre.

Progress: 52%