Rune Chaser Hands-On

TOKYO--One of the less popular games on Namco's stand at this year's Tokyo Game Show is the recently announced Rune Chaser--a mission-based driving game for the PlayStation 2. The trial version of the game on display features only three of the game's 50-plus missions and, since there was nobody else waiting to play it, we were able to check out all of them. The vehicles at our disposal, incidentally, included a saloon car known as the Sword, the 4x4 Blast, and a futuristic-looking sports car (straight out of Demolition Man) named the Inverse.

All three of missions were set in the generic-looking Prio City, which we were free to explore, provided we completed our objectives within a time limit. The first mission required us to transport a passenger to a specific location while evading attacks from black cars with the word "enemy" hovering above them in large letters, the second mission saw us turning the tables and attempting to ram an enemy vehicle off the road while being chased by the police, and the third mission was essentially just a race against an aggressive driver in a yellow sports car. None of the missions lasted for more than a few minutes.

Everything about Rune Chaser looked and felt a little dated, in all honesty--the car handling was simplistic, the corners were angular, the sound of two cars coming together sounded like two bags of chips colliding, and the only visual indication that any of the cars were damaged was thick black smoke coming out from under the hood. The game also lacked any sense of speed whatsoever, and even when we were using nitrous oxide to travel at over 150mph, the pace felt quite sedate.

No release date has been announced for Rune Chaser at this time, so hopefully it still has plenty of time left in development. We'll bring you more information on the game as soon as it becomes available.

For more updates, be sure to check GameSpot's coverage of Tokyo Game Show 2004.