Beyond Good & Evil Review

Who wouldn't enjoy diving from rooftop to rooftop avoiding explosions?

Let’s get this straight out of the way… I adore Beyond Good & Evil. Michel Ancel, creator of Rayman has surpassed himself in a truly beautiful action RPG experience. The cinematic game begins with a brief introduction to the world around which (literally at one point) the game takes place and introduces our lead character: Jade. Immediately you are thrown into an action sequence that forces you to defend your homely lighthouse, from an attack of the Domz (an alien race) that both explains the controls and grabs your attention by the scruff of the neck.

Jade, we learn, is a freelance journalist primarily relying on photography to earn a source of income. Snapping pictures becomes a rather major part of the game when you get invited to report for a paper known as the IRIS Network, a rebel faction that believe the Alpha Sections (a group of government supported protectors) are in league with the Domz. Objectives mainly focus around snapping pictures that incriminate, inform or prove certain points and a scientist contacts you very early on to offer credits for pictures of every life form on the planet Hillys.

To every RPG is given a story…

Being spotted in the stealthy bits isn't the end of the world, but I recommend hiding until the guards give up.

Not only is the background world impressive, but the story is completely immersive with important plot events neatly breaking up gameplay and a few twists thrown in there for good measure. Overall, the story is fantastic, built upon investigating a completely new world that feels as magical and involving at the end of the story as when you first meet the inhabitants.

Jade is rarely alone on her quests, with two companions that help her at specific points during the story and which can be controlled using a very simplistic action button method that never gives too much away about what must be done, yet feels natural when you’ve worked out how a certain type of puzzle can be solved. Pey’J is your half-pig half-human looking uncle, who adopted you as a child, living with you in the lighthouse. Double-H (maybe it was the crap names that put people off? – ed.) is another IRIS reporter who must be saved from the clutches of his captors.

How much fun is taking pictures?

A stunning interactive sequence whereby you must escape with the Alpha-Sections' precious pearls.

Naturally, collecting pictures is only a part of the game, although it does control a lot of the plot (even changing the world as more Anti-Alpha Sections reports are written by you and more Hillyans join the cause protesting in the streets). Using your handy Dai-Jo staff and Gyrodisk thrower, killing enemies and often cleverly dispatching bosses takes up a certain amount of your investigation, although stealthily avoiding cleverer foes is another challenge for much of the game. Fortunately, unlike many stealth oriented games currently circulating your local stores, being spotted rarely means that you’ve failed as you can pick off enemies one by one if needs be.

Alpha Section guards have bright green gas canisters on their back (a weak spot) that when kicked, hit or shot begin leaking and blind the guards. Another forceful attack while they’re in this state and they’ll be killed, although friendly guards can repair each other’s canisters, so certain tactics may invite shooting an enemy in the back, running in for a quick kill and then hiding from the guards until they resume their previous attack pattern, one man down. Remaining hidden however is another viable option for any pacifists or people who feel up to the challenge.

Jade’s wheels

Uncle Pey'J (pronounced Page) proves his worth countless times throughout the game with his wrench.

Transport in Hillys, for Jade at least, takes the form of a rather fun little hovercraft that happens to be able to shoot. This allows you to travel around the world, across the beautiful waters, as well as fight off an attack from the Domz that generally involves a segmented snake like creature skimming around the water trying to destroy as much as possible (you for instance).

If that still isn’t enough, you can choose to race your hovercraft, upgrade it to be able to jump over certain barriers or even fly and break out into space. This is all done by spending Pearls, an illegally traded rare item that you can gain by defeating bosses, finding hidden treasure or completing rolls of film full of Hillys’ inhabitants for your scientist friend.

Nothing’s real when you’re looking through a camera

These creatures can disorientate you with their screams, often requiring your ally to help you out.

On a completely new world, realism is certainly not the kind of graphical style you’re looking for, but Beyond Good & Evil manages to keep a very respectable level of detail (especially for the PS2). The world itself looks great, especially with the water effects, as mentioned earlier. Characters emote well within cinematics at moments of drama and power, and while the lip sync isn’t great, the detail of the characters themselves, coupled with the beautiful effects that bring the world to life make Hillys a wonder to explore. Infact, the entire game is cinematic, with the (dubious) choice to have it entirely in an obligatory widescreen format as you can see from the screenshots.

In order to properly link the cinematics to the action, at certain points the game will slow down, Matrix-style, allowing you to defeat the final few monsters in a battle in a graceful flurry of moves. This is never done better than in one scene that is a true stand moment for the game: Jade is caught trying to infiltrate an Alpha Sections base and has to run away in a mammoth chase scene that mimics the best action movies. Structures collapse around you as you dive over rooftops, just avoiding the oncoming fire, never stopping to catch your breath. Glass shatters, dust is blown around and I still won’t delete the save game from just before it happened, because I want to be able to replay it at any time.

‘That’ scene…

Domz creatures abduct innocent Hillians in these hostile living cages. It's an excuse for Jade to strike a pose.

Naturally, the sound effects are fitting and never detract from the visuals and while the voice acting is very well performed, adding to the characterisation, the soundtrack of the game is one of the best I’ve heard in a very long time. Whether it’s the Asian sounding melodies or the dramatic orchestral cinematic tracks that compliment the action like the score from a movie. I’ve consistently been impressed and hope Ubisoft considers releasing a soundtrack CD. Perhaps they’ll follow suit with the recently released The Hobbit and put the entire thing up for download on the website, but that may be a bit much to ask for.

Beyond Good & Evil’s main website is fortunately more than just a marketing tool as every new save game you create you’ll be given an ‘Internet Code’ that you can input on a special DarkRoom area of the site. This code records how many pearls you’ve collected, photos taken and generally how well you’re doing in the game. After registering and typing in the code, you are given a ranking of how you compare to other gamers who’ve done the same. Eventually, once you’ve shown a certain level of skill in the game, entering the code will allow you access to an online mission that once completed gives you a code to use at a certain point in the game to gain extra features. It seems like so much thought has been put into extras.

It’s all good…

Ooo! A new creature in the back of this shot for me to add to my photo album! I'm guessing that killing this thing first will probably be the best plan.

If anything, the whole Internet link and heavily integrated storyline proves what you will realise when you play through; there seems to be no filler. Most games artificially expand their running time by adding in sections that serve no real purpose other than to lengthen the game, but even though the main quest will take a first timer a little over ten hours there is no filler, so it feels like time well spent.

If you’re looking to spend your money on something immersive, that totally brings you into it’s own world and action RPGs don’t scare you (fear not, the only real character enhancement is adding new abilities and increasing your health gauge) then Beyond Good & Evil comes highly recommended. If you’ve still got some ‘Christmas money’ left, then get it, otherwise you’ll be passing on one of the richest experiences on the PS2.