Slave Zero - PC Review

Bondage and zeros have nothing whatsoever to do with this game.

The megalopolis S1-9 is a massive city, stretching 5 miles into the sky and producing enough toxic waste to ruin all of Asia. You are a member of the rebel Guardians. You are joined with a Slave armor (Slave Zero), basically a massive robot you control with your mind, as though it was your body (read: feels and moves just like a first-person shooter). With this 12-story robot, you stomp around the city, ascending higher and higher into its reaches, smashing your robotic opponents and wreaking mayhem. Your objective: Remove the evil Sovkahn from power in S1-9 by any means necessary. Even if half the city is destroyed while you do it.

That is Slave Zero in a nutshell. Its design is simple, its action is repetitive but satisfying, and its experience is quasi-original and invigorating. First-person shooters are a dime-a-dozen, but Slave Zero is a little different. Doom, Shogo: MAD, and almost any arcade shooter you can think of may come to mind, but in the end the only thing that actually makes you think you've already played Slave Zero are old Transformer and Macross cartoons.

Slave Zero is essentially a pure action romp. Not a moment goes by when you are not shooting something. To keep this from getting dull, the level design offers a constant stream of new challenges and a parade of arcade-style bosses to vary things as much as possible.

The gameplay does have a few twists. For instance, you can only carry one energy weapon, one machine gun, and one missile launcher at a time, which tailors the action to whatever stage you are currently playing. Furthermore, the environment is highly interactive. Cars driving down the streets may be picked up and thrown like makeshift rockets. Pedestrians can be grabbed and used as "paint" bombs. Even buildings can be smashed and their support beams used to whack things. It may not be particularly involved, but it does keep things interesting enough to hold your attention.

Slave Zero uses the proprietary Ecstasy engine to create some extremely appealing visuals. S1-9 is convincingly portrayed as an endless world of towering skyscrapers, toxic rivers, industrial plants, sewer systems, stratospheric highways, Anime inspired architecture, and near gridlock traffic. All the usual accoutrements (colored lighting, over-the-top special effects, adept texturing) create a palpable environment that, thanks especially to the interactivity, feels solidly real.

The animation and modeling of the enemy units (also distinctly Japanese) is impressive, though Slave Zero himself really takes the prize. Although a first-person perspective is offered, players will be spending all their time in third-person simply because of how good Slave Zero looks. Whether leaping down from above while showering a barrage of bullets and missiles, swinging himself onto a ledge, or deftly outmaneuvering a boss' attacks, Slave Zero moves with a grace and power unusual in a computer game. Naturally, it takes a powerful machine to run it all, but this is one fine looking game.

The sound is sufficiently hard hitting for the style of gameplay, and the sound of Slave Zero's battle cry is a particularly good reason to splurge on a subwoofer. The music fits the bill admirably, serving up some energetic and non-cookie-cutter techno that complements the graphical atmosphere nicely.

One serious problem does exist, though. In the retail version, there isn't any multiplayer, and although a patch was later released, it's limited to deathmatch with a measly 4 players. A straight-up action title like Slave Zero lends itself intuitively to multiplayer madness and it is a great pity that such an important part of the game was so utterly ignored. The multiplayer maps were all completed and included with the game, but the actual multiplayer mode was left out, possibly in the rush to release the product.

All of this, along with a good, solid feel to the control, makes for a truly satisfying action experience, even without multiplayer. Slave Zero, while not really like any other game you've played, feels like an old friend, and it's remarkably easy to get into, casual and relaxing to play - like any good low-maintenance action game should be.