Wolverine offers slick action and impressive visuals, but still fails to stand out from the crowd.
Perhaps the most impressive thing about Wolverine is that it really makes the most of its rating. For being such a major part of the character when it comes to Wolverine's claws we're used to seeing the punches pulled in how that's presented. Not so here. Limbs go flying, people get eviscerated, and all round a mess is made. It may sound gratuitous but it lets you believe this a guy with razor sharp adamantium claws. I'm not quite so sold on the regeneration damage, it seems a bit OTT and played for gore factor, but what the hey: at least it telegraphs when you are in trouble.
However as I played some, issues start to creep up on me. They were minor at first but started to be a problem. First is the pacing, the action is nicely spread but the game itself is in five hefty chapters, most of which lack any punctuation or natural break points. Another problem is the RPG like advancement aspect. You get some points to spend and apparently you have more health as you level up and gain experience. The trouble is that upgrading your abilities rarely makes a noticeable difference and the details of your stats are hidden away from you. Is +5 health good? How much health do I have? While I'm sure these stats do make a noticeable difference over the long term any individual gain is always so low it starts to feel like busy work.
And then there's the plot. The first three of the five chapters seem to try to avoid telling the plot of the movie. The first two focus on the escape from Alkali Lake, the third chapter is an aside that puts you up against a familiar menace in the X-Men mythos, but is only tenuously connected to the film. Then the last two chapters go back to following the plot of the film. It was a bad plot in the film, in the game it's a bad rendition of a bad plot. We are of course spared the secret Origins of Logan's leather jacket, but it's still not great. The bits where it diverges are clearly the high points.
Tragically even Wolverine's claws are a bit of a liability in the end. They are the only weapon in the game and while you do have a decent variety of combos the action does get quite repetitive.
Despite these problems, this is still a good game. The real problem is that it does nothing to stand out from the pack. Writing this review now, we have Bayonetta just out, which is a whole lot better and Darksiders with a similar though more adventurey experience but also I would say on net better. We have Dante's Inferno and God of War 3 on the horizon and both looking quite promising. Looking back Devil May Cry 4 and Ninja Gaiden 2 (and Sigma variants). It's a crowded market place with plenty of other options.
Still Wolverine remains an enjoyable if quickly forgettable game.