John Woo Presents Stranglehold

Stranglehold isn't innovative by many standards at all. Let's get that out of the way. It's a 3rd person shooter 'bout a cop in Hong Kong takin out oodles and oodles of baddies. Original? Not so much. It's certainly been done to death in the movies, and it's all been done before in video games. However, much in the way that Watson and Crick did when they unlocked the final mysteries behind DNA, John Woo and Midway have managed to stand on the shoulders of giants in innovation and have built something that is neither movie nor videogame but a very entertaining hybrid of the two; and it's own crazy, stylish way...is entirely new after all. To boot, it is an absolute joy to play also! In short it is like living through a really good action movie.

If you're unfamiliar, the gist of the game is based as a sequel to John Woo's classic action film: Hardboiled with Chow Yun Fat as Inspector Tequila. He returns in this game to reprise his role with stellar voice acting,and yes all the voice acting is great, but the plot isn't where the game shines. I mean c'mon, how good can an action movie really be? No, the beauty of Stranglehold is in it's simple yet refined sense of style. Jown Woo worked on the game as creative producer, and the game was in a near 3yr development cycle and it shows. The graphics are typically gorgeous, and every sensory enticement that one can imagine is executed with skill, care and love for the games and movies. Character animations are of particular note: in many cases I could swear it -was- a movie I was watching. Everyone looks and moves great.

Now onto the technical jargin. Particle effects are amazing and more in line with a chaotic reaction demanded of a game with so dynamic and engine. The game engine allows for freestyle expression of carnage emphasized by Tequila's ability not only to interact with but use to his advantage everything in his environment. See a chandelier, leap and swing from one balcont to the other. Let go, spin around shoot the cor and drop the chandelier onto enemies below. See that drink cart? Dive onto it and roll across the room shooting twelve enemies in slow mo. Friggin sweet. A constantly refilling bullet-time meter allows you to rack up energy for what comes next, the T-bomb.

Ahh, the glorious -tequila bomb gauge- No, no. It is neither a questionable beverage in Tiajuana, nor is it a bad combo platter at the local taqueria. It's your characters special attack meter. As you fill it you can pull off precision "sniper" slo mo shots that follow the bullet in flight all the way to the bad guy who eats it. And yes they react dynamically depending on where you shoot them. Get him in the hand and he freaks out dropping his gun and crying. Get him in the head and typical head shot animation ensues. I was impressed when you hit him in the shoulder it spin him around in the air, or if you should tag the family jewels he will grab for them, and collapse like you would expect. It's awesome. There is also a barrage attack where you move a lot faster blasting away at uber speed without using up your ammo, and a spin attack that I can only describe as being very similar to the "death blossom" attack in the movie: The Last Starfighter. If you got that reference you got 500 uber-geek points. The attack does what it says: spin around getting a single kill shot on everyone in range. There's also a slo mo bullet dodging standoff mini-game and your typical shoot em up action. Finally there are the environmental kills. Blast a sign above a baddie, it falls and sends him back to hell. Pretty cool.

The game controls are tight and relatively intuitive. Takes bout a half-hr to get acclimated, and then your off to kill like Inspector Tequila himself. Oops, I mean to enforce the laws of Hong Kong and Chicago.

As I said before, Stranglehold really is like living an action film. Give this game two hours of your time, and you'll be sold on it for the duration.

Online--- As to the multiplayer, it has some balance issues, and cheat opportunities that have never been properly patched, but the maps are fun, particularly if you can find an opponent who also has the DLC maps you dropped 15$ on. there are some connection issues which inexplicably rear their head from time to time, causing rank match forfeiture. that's the largest issue with the online component tho. Midway did a surprisingly good job balancing what could have been grossly overpowered tequila bomb attacks on the competitive side.

All told, this isn't a waste of money and has more than enough content to keep you entertained for quite some time.