Killzone 3 Review
You will once again find yourself facing off against the Helghast. This game literally starts where the second game left off. You have killed the man in power, but now you have to see your men safely back. The problem is that nothing is easy, and you'll have to fight your way across a portion of the planet to try to escape. The strange thing is that there is something behind the scenes going on that could possibly destroy everyone.
Graphically this game shows off what the PlayStation 3 can do. The character models and the levels all look amazing in high definition. The cut scenes are also very well do, graphically. This game definitely has a limited palette of colors for the areas you're going to have to traverse, but it definitely doesn't cause the game to go stale. In fact the lack of a wide variety of colors just adds to the "It's War" effect.
The sounds of the game for the most part basically fit what they are used for, the majority of which is for weaponry and explosions. The voice acting was very well done, and I have to say that there were a couple of characters who I had to look up afterwards because I knew the voice but I just couldn't place it.
The controls for the game will take almost the entire single player play-through to understand. They don't feel completely natural. There's also the arbitrary stick to cover mechanic. When I'm sneaking down a road in the crouch position if I hit a wall I'm not looking to stick to it, but I do. Then there are times were I want to stick to a wall or cover and when I move around I find I've just exposed my entire character instead of leaning out.
The single player version of the game isn't incredible long, but there's enough action to make it exciting as you try to get through the game. You'll get to mess around with several different weapons, sniper rifle, bolt gun, rocket launcher, machine gun, etc. There is plenty variety to keep you happy. Now for the part where I tell you what is wrong with the game. Sadly there were quite a few things that got to me in the game. The biggest one is if you play the game for a good amount of time, say 2+ hours straight, you'll start to see that the cut scenes and the audio track slowly go out of sync worse and worse. It was a bit unnerving to have an important scene and not have what is suppose to be a very well polished game not act correctly during a portion where all the attention is on that scene, seeing that you do not have to push any buttons during them. Another issue I have with the game is the reckless abandonment of the laws of physics. If I shoot someone in the torso or the head, while they stand near a railing or edge, their bodies can't possibly fall forward over the railing or edge, its not physically possible. There's also the accuracy factor. This might just be a randomly generated percentage behind the scenes but when someone is aiming at an enemy's chest there's very little chance that the bullets aren't going to hit somewhere, and magically the game decided that sometimes it was a complete miss. This could also be a collision box issue. Finally the checkpoint system. It's nice to have something like this so that if you mess up you can go almost right back to where you were. The problem is that sometimes it puts you immediately in an areas where you're fighting, which if you're not paying close attention you'll be restarting again. Finally the buddy system. There are several parts of the game where you'll have other characters near you that can heal you, and you can do the same for them. The problem is that the pathfinding in this game is broken. I can't tell you how many times I've died and heard, "I can't get to you", at the same time I can see that the character speaking is standing 6 feet away from me.
Anyways if you're looking to continue the story, then of course by all means pick up this game and continue the war. If you're looking for a well polished First Person Shooter, you might not want this one to be your first choice. There's potential here, but there's enough problems that you'd probably be better off playing something else. This game gets a 6.5 out of 10.
