@karim's review of Marvel's Wolverine
★★★
6/10. Unfortunately, the game feels pulled in different directions without an identity. Almost as if it was a weird concoction of other PlayStation games, the final product does not exceed the quality of its ingredients. While not a bad game, I would not call it a fun game despite moments of enjoyment. Let’s start with the good first. Great visuals and resolution. Game looks amazing and runs great on fidelity mode, but performance mode looks just as good in 60fps. Runs well in spite of a few negligible glitches. The cinematics were on par with what you’d usually expect from a Sony game or an MCU movie. Same goes for the music and sound design. Character development and voice acting are superb. These are the outstanding qualities of the game, but of course we would not expect anything less from a 1st party PlayStation game. Beyond that, there’s not anything super impressive. The gameplay loop is not super engaging. It’s a par for the course hack-n-slash with stealth and detective elements shoehorned in. Think of it as if your favorite hack-n-slash like DMC5 or Bayonetta was ordered to try to be like spider-man or ghost of tshushima but presented those gameplay elements in a less interesting way. Unfortunately I got bored very early on and found myself checking my phone way more often than I do when I’m usually enthralled in a game. Did they shoehorn other gameplay elements because they knew the slashing would get old quickly? The combat was overindulgent. The navigation systems have been a big point of contention. I will say, in theory, I like the idea of Wolverine using his scent to navigate. The game only does it when it’s relevant to the plot when Wolverine is sniffing something out, but the first act uses it way too much. Gets more tolerable in the rest of the game. As for the story, it seems serviceable? Kind of bland, but is the game trying to subvert expectations by having Essex and Team X instead of Prof X / Magneto and the X Men? Those characters and plot points share a lot of similarities but I can kind of see why they wanted to go in a different direction. The villains are so bland though. I got really bored of fighting the same Reaver grunts over and over again. The story picks up in the second act but doesn’t stick the landing in the end. Wolverine is one of my favorite heroes, but when an IP is used for a new game, I always like to divorce myself from the IP when assessing the game. If this game was a different IP, maybe about a generic militia, I think I would like this game even less. It doesn’t do anything new or particularly better than other Sony games or other games in its genre, which is very disappointing given how much I love Wolverine and the X Men.
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