Oni

 [Review Score represents the overall quality of the game, not the PC port, just for clarity.]
 
Hello and Welcome. I see i got dibs on the Oni section when it comes to Reviews, so i'm not gonna squander this chance to talk about this fun game from the makers of a little-known game called 'HALO' [chants halo theme].
 
Oni came out in January 2001 (just incase the wiki page doesn't state it clearly enough). It is a 3rd person shooter/beat'em'up which is more than 'inspired' by certain anime, you be the judge (or don't be, doesn't matter). Basic premise is, you get over a dozen or so levels which each are about 15-20 minutes in length depending on difficulty. You basically just punch and kick people in the face and other vital parts of the body repeatedly until said person is not breathing anymore. Also, you can find guns and shoot people, but where's the fun in that?!
 
 So you are.......erm.....Konoko, or are you?, a special agent working for the TCTF (What it stands for, make it up yourself...Totally Cool Terrorism Fighters maybe?) And you are tasked with stopping criminals, which usually involves beating up alot of 
'red-eyed' bad guys who also want to fight you, but if they have a weapon, they won't shy away from being jerks and just being 
cheating scumbags.
 
So, because i can't really describe much about this game (and the story's not big up huge, although i guess there are alot of cutscene moments and diary entries and all that, i still love this game cause i get to suplex people), i'm just gonna break down the basic concept of the gameplay for the most part.
 

1. Beat up Bad People
2. Rescue Civilians to get cool stuff from them like ammo or health
3. Push switches or do clicky things with computer terminals to open doors and yadda yadda dingdong
4. Finish the level
5. Rinse & Repeat

 
 Now maybe you're thinking 'sounds fucking boring, i'm gonna go play Bioshock 7 now', and you wouldn't be wrong. This game has alot of issues in this day & age. Some of the moves' Animation Length just makes fights kinda silly and clunky, and for all the cool stuff you can do with moves, you probably won't even attempt to pull off any of that stuff if you're like me (i just punch and kick randomly till people do not exist anymore), and the gunplay is a bit basic and the aiming system's a bit weird.
 
But besides all that, if you can look past the issues of age that Oni shows, it's a fucking smashing game, and it would do my heart so much good if Bungie announced a Successor to this game in time for it's 10-year anniversary on Jan 28th 2011.
 
If you can Find the game, buy it. If you can 'Find it', do that aswell, you won't regret it (if you do, then i guess you aren't as cool a person as i thought you were).
 
 Some more technical things about the PC version though, as that's the version i'm reviewing:
 
Max resolution you can set in the options in 1024x768 32-bit (yes, it's kinda pathetic when you think about it, then again..that's my native resolution on my monitor :< ). The game also won't launch properly unless you apply an .exe fix to it. You can't change controls in-game, you have to do it from a readme file in the game folder, also, the menu is 640x480 natively, and it doesn't accomodate the bigger resolutions in the options (why they did that i do NOT know). 
 
Does the PC version have issues? Hell fucking yes it does. If you can't be arsed to try and way around all of it, i'd recommend you get the PS2 version instead.