The Conduit

God damn it.

I was somewhat into the game as it continued to introduce new weapons and new enemies. But eventually it just got ... stupid. The seventh level ended with a gauntlet sequence I retried a jillion times, which really brought my attention to the shortcomings of the level design (it looks like a cover-based shooter, but there's no good way to take cover!), and the utter lunacy of how many enemy weapons can kill or almost-kill you in a single shot.

The eighth level started with more of that. And afterward, was made up of faceless rooms and halls that were definitely designed with Halo's endless corridors section in mind. In fact, between the sound effects, the shitty characters, the enemy types, and some of these level designs, I've become convinced that The Conduit is really just a homage to the first Halo. But worse.

The ninth, and final, level is another gauntlet. In the first room of this level, there are a dozen enemies, each of whom has more health and does more damage than you do. At this point I completely lost patience, and dropped it down to easy mode. Fucking hell - I just wanted to be done with it.

These late game frustrations completely obliterated the ambivalence I had for The Conduit earlier. Why didn't this campaign turn out better? It could have; it should have. All the pieces are here. It just needed competent design - or, to be fair, design in the final levels as competent as in the first few. Enemy gauntlets are a completely transparent attempt to conceal uninteresting environments and a lack of compelling mission goals. I admire High Voltage's tech prowess in getting this thing running, and the control flexibility is seriously impressive, but that's a far cry from having a fun game.

If you have the chance, play the first two levels (the second is the best) and just stop. It's fun to try, but the rest of the game isn't really worth it.

Also, The Conduit is the only Wii game I know of that doesn't pause when the remote turns off. I found this out the hard way.

Better than: Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard
Not as good as: Halo: Combat Evolved
The online multiplayer might be fun: but that's not why you have a Wii, is it?

Progress: Finished the campaign (Low difficulty for the last level)