Difficulty:

Easy

Time Spent:

10 Hours or Less

The Bottom Line:

"Mixed reactions"

Jericho have gotten moderately low ratings from gamespot, ign, and pc gamer. There are alot of pluses in Jericho that is worth mentioning for the value of this game that would make better then it sounds from the media. Great storyline idea would have made a great monster killer game only if the gameplay would have been better. This game is probably the most underappreicated game of the year.

You are Captain Devlin Ross, leader of supernatural strike force called Jericho. Cpt. Ross is able to jump from person to person with in the squad during gameplay. Each of the six remaining members of the squad have different weapons and abilities, for example one member is a reverend and have the ability to heal, while another having a sniper rifle with a Jedi ability of pushing back monsters, rocks, and walls. The storyline is based on you stopping the firstborn from escaping their prison. The firstborn are God's first creations before Man. God didnt approve of his the firstborn and panished them in another world. For the last 4,000 years the firstborn had a few escape attempts that often failed. Now they are doing it again and you are here to stop them.

Jericho battles remind me something from Painkiller. Throughout the entire game you will be hold up in a room or corridor fighting off monsters. Players will end up staying in one spot killing up to 20 monsters before moving on to the same thing. Within the battles you are able to switch from any character you want, you could snipe, mow down with a chain gun, or shoot them with an assault rifle. Just simpily holding down the space will give you the option of who you want to be within the fights.

Jericho is really a fantasy tactical shooter. The tactical part of the game is just like any other. You can command the squad by using the number keys or the wheel mouse to have them hold, move them to a spot you want, or have them hold. Its not really that hard, since the AI is pretty good in holding its own. Good enough not to worry about constantly. Mercury Steam decided to use Unreal Engine 3 in Jericho. While the engine in other games been proven solid in providing high frame rates and friendly for lower end systems, in Jericho it is no difference. Unreal Engine 3 have proven to have great graphics for this game, while staying right at 60 frames the whole time.

Music in the game isnt constantly playing in the background. Like Half-Life 2 the music will kick in only the big gun battles or boss fights. The music will turn off as soon as the battles end.

While this game have alot of promise and it is quite fun at first, at the end I will start wonder if there is more. Bigger levels and more types of monsters would have helped make this game satistying. The storyline is very interesting on paper, but the gameplay needs some more help. Only if this game had a little bit more work to add more substance it would have been much better.

Within the main menu, you have the option of unlocking cheats. To activate the cheats you have to call Codemasters using a 1-900 number costing $3 per minute. This is the number one thing I dislike about Jericho. Where every other game that have cheats are normally free, while Codemasters have the nerve to charge money.