Scarface Member Review for the PS2

"Say hello to my little friend!" That line is unforgettable in the Scarface movie, but what if Tony actually lived to say it again? In this game, which takes place at the end of the movie, Tony lives on and he loses everything that made him famous. Now he needs to reclaim his lost glory to take on Sosa, the man who double crossed him.

Most of the missions involve Tony buying out property to expand his empire, which is pretty much most of the main game sadly. To take over an area, you have to buy out each property, then take out the thugs in a storehouse to claim it for you large stash of drugs. Of course you need money and one of the main ways to make money is calling up Felix for leads on suppliers that will let you obtain large quantiles of drugs to sell to the drug dealers in the streets or to your fronts. You have to take over all of Miami to get to the end of the game. As you build up your reputation, you can buy more exotics, better weapons and cars, etc.

Driving is pretty simple and each type of car handles differently. However, the game does not take advantage of the pressure sensitive feature, so simply hitting the gas or brakes will make you do one or the other hard. Shooting is also simple. While shooting, you can lock on to targets and while doing so, you can aim at different body parts for either a quicker death or to slow the enemy down. Tony can lean against walls and pop out the edges to fire a few rounds, but it is rare you will need to do this.

The main feature of the game is balls. When Tony kills an enemy, he gains balls. Taunting them also gains balls and taunting drivers after ramming them gains balls too. Even talking to random strangers gives you balls! Once your balls are full, you can go into rage mode, where Tony cannot be hurt, has infinite ammo, and regains health for each enemy he kills. This lasts for a few seconds.

Now here is where the game starts to tumble. First, simply having your gun visible will attract cops and if the cops get really pissed off, they will try to kill you, which then you must escape the cops. Do so and you live, but then the cop heat increases. If the cops get extremely pissed after that, you are literally screwed with no way of saving yourself. Gangs will also be pissed when you kill them obviously, but they really get annoyed when you do distribution runs. During the runs, at random, one of your fronts will be under attack. The problem is the front under attack is too random. Nothing is more annoying than seeing a front being attacked while you are all the way on the other side of Miami with no way of saving the front in time. You'll be constantly paying money to keep gang and cop heat low.

Gangs themselves are unbalanced in terms of power. Frankly, they are as powerful as Tony. Nothing is worse when you are doing good in a mission, only for a gang member to instantly kill you with a grenade or a chainsaw. Not to mention that it's always a million of them against you. You can have your henchman as backup, but you're always stuck with just one.

The civilians and drivers are dumber here than in other games of the same genre. When you crash into them, instead of at least pulling over, they just sit there, getting in your way. When you're crossing the street on foot, most of the drivers must be blind because they love to run over Tony without slowing down at all. Tony refuses to kill innocent people no matter how much you try to make him. Even punching them or shooting rockets at their feet won't kill them. What makes it worse is if Tony is caught in a firefight and an innocent bystander is in the line of fire, Tony's refusal to shoot them may cost you. To top it off, Tony cannot survive falling from heights, even small ones. Tony is not even safe in the water since if you stay in it too long, he gets eaten by a shark.

All in all, Scarface is a good game, but a game that could have been. With glaring flaws, major annoyances, and missions that seem repetitive, it's game that's only worth a rental.