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Platform Filters:   All Platforms  Xbox   GameCube   PlayStation 2   PC   Game Boy Advance   Site Sections:   Updates  News   Games   Publishers   Developers   Reviews   Previews   Release Dates   Editorials   Glossary   Contact Us		Review:       6th October 2004: .hack//Outbreak  Time is running out, the infection of The World is progressing and Orca is dying and only you can save him. Posted by Chris Snook - PlayStation 2 - UK and Europe .hack//Outbreak is an unusual game. It is the third in a sequence of four games, all interlinked linearly and yet all are part of a larger picture. There is a whole .hack project, an interlinked web of anime series and the games, each of which slip in and out of the other. Outbreak continues the storyline, laid out in the first two titles, Infection and Mutation. You play the part of Kite, a player in 'The World' a Virtual Reality Massive Online Role-Playing Game that is the most successful in the history of such games. With The World as the backdrop things begin to turn sinister as players, fall into unexplained coma like states, one of which is Orca - the player who introduced Kite to The World. As befits being a faux MMPRPG, Outbreak is huge, there is a whole world (small 'W') behind the story arc, with hints and dribbles of information given to you. There is a timeline that runs from 2003 until the present game year, 2010, packed with incidents such as cyber-terrorism (acts of such carry the death penalty), new transport systems, the rise of Altimit - the perfect OS (which incidentally needs patching from time to time) and other things that add to the background and feel of the game. It is believable and can hold clues. As the third game in a series, it is both possible to transfer data from the second game and by extension the first, bringing you to wherever you ended last time. Also added for those who somehow have begun playing at this point there is a nice cinematic sequence that shows the defeat of the boss at the end of the Mutation and then starts you off with apparently applicable skills levels and items for where you should be - a great way to avoid being underpowered at this point. Almost like a /level command in a real MMPOG. And that is the achievement of Outbreak. It feels and acts as if you really are online, including passing you into the Altimit OS, where you can check mails and news (which for those starting at this point provides all the useful information required to get going and acts as a tutorial), or if you want you can then start up The World and go online. To be greeted by a login screen to the 'game' itself - complete with in game boards, another source of information to be read and digested. Length is not a problem, starting cold it took an hour or so to completely read and understand the information given. Once you log in and play things begin to advance. Play is slick and the controls crisp. Whilst at first it is almost alien to play that kind of game minus a keyboard/mouse combo, slowly they begin to make sense and soon you find that you have more fine control than with a PC. Combat is effectively a freeform version of the later Final Fantasy games but with the character freely moving, dodging attacks and delivering their replies of magic, skills or just avoiding the large hammer that is about to cause major head trauma. AI is intelligent and responds nicely, both friendly and enemy alike, you can believe that your party are other human beings at the end of a fibre channel connection. There are quests to complete, dungeons to explore and areas to just wander around imposing your own brand of mayhem on. Transport is by warping from play areas called fields to a 'root town' portal gate and vice versa. Again believable for the setting which is built up and slotted together as if it is what it is. Very, very welcome. Visually things are spot on, corruption of the graphics created by the spread of a virus that is creeping through The World, there are flickers, data corruption and artefacts to be seen, a disturbing clash of the Matrix and the code-base behind it, surreal and deadly. Animation is smooth and for once the camera is unobtrusive. Backdrops seem to hold echo's of other games with different styles for different server's Root Town's, one in a frozen waste and one sitting in the clouds. Audio complements the visuals, boots make footfalls, when the screen frizzes there is a shash sound combat crunches as you would expect. There are also aural clues to events and the music is quiet when it needs to be but evident, very much so when required, but rarely obtrusive. Speech is fluid and very anime in style, in keeping with the graphics on screen, there are one or two clipping errors but nothing dramatically serious. With the vast scope offered by the premise of a simulated Massive Multiplayer Game means that there is a fair bit to look for, go over and to keep people wanting to continue. This is despite the implicit flaw in the underpinnings of Outbreak, that is you have played at least one - preferably both of the predecessor titles and have a grasp of what is happening. Someone picking this one up on the spur of the moment is going to find that there is a steep learning curve to follow. Even after two weeks of play the surface has barely been scratched in terms of progressing the plot. Overall .hack//Outbreak is a fine game with great ideas and a vision for how the world wide network of the future could be, along with the games that could be out there. Everything works well and holds together as a whole, let down solely by being part of a tight group of games, released in sequence, requiring understanding of that which has gone before. Chris Snook             Latest Images:		Review Scores:    Graphics:   Sound:   Gameplay:   Length:   Overall: Click here for our Review Score Guidelines.  Review Summary:  Wonderful mimic of the current crop of Massive Multi-Player Online Games, with slick controls, a tight story with enough asides to keep people busy for a while. Flawed solely by being part of a series that requires knowledge of prior games to be easily picked up. New players will find it hard to make headway at first.  Related Games:  .hack//Outbreak for PlayStation 2  6  Screenshots  1  Review Click here for All Game Information.
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