Difficulty:

Hard

Time Spent:

10 Hours or Less

The Bottom Line:

"Almost, but not quite"

Having just played and enjoyed The Saboteur, which was far from a perfect game, I was excited to try its release-date cousin, Velvet Assassin. Unfortunately, I simply found out the difference between a good game and a poor one, when so many things are similar.

Velvet Assassin has the right elements of a great game -- good game atmosphere, attention to detail in creating an immersive game world, and a decent set of characters and plot. Unfrotunately, the game's bizarre and clunky game mechanics spoil the good bits.

VA focuses on stealth gameplay -- running and gunning will get you killed quickly. Each level is well broken up with checkpoints, which is good, because the levels themselves don't offer much outside of a very specific, linear way to complete each level, so while you figure out exactly what the game wants you to do, you will die... often...

The good:
* Likeable protagonist and some interesting characters. Voice overs are well done.
* Good, if not cutting edge, graphics. Environments look good and immerse you in the game world. Some objects (plants, some scenery items) are two dimensional, and look more like DOOM than a modern 3d game, though...
* When the stealth works, it's satisfying.

The not-so-good:
* Horrid controls... the protagonist handles a knife like a sledgehammer in hand-to-hand combat, and guns don't have a good feel to them -- they all feel about the same. You have to turn attack mode on and off to attack or just move, and can find yourself stumbling with the keyboard just to fight. It all feels clunky.
* Buggy stealth combines with strange enemy AI to make the game frustrating. An enemy will find a downed cohort, and zone in on your location immediately even though there are a half dozen places he could've looked. The protagonist is also pretty fragile, so you are killed quickly when discovered, so mistakes are punishing and send you back to the checkpoint. When hiding, one pixel can be the difference between being hidden or not.

Overall, the good elements of the game are just good, the bad elements are really show stoppers. If you want a fun WWII era stealth action adventure, play Saboteur instead.