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VAMPIRE RAIN (X360)
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Publisher: AQ Interactive.
Developer: Artoon. Released: June 2007 (Europe). Genre: Stealth Adventure. Other versions: PS3. Posted 15th February 2022. By Tom Clare © 2022 |
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Vampire Rain is an odd experience. From the very beginning, it’s supremely frustrating and yet also strangely compelling. It’s also utterly relentless. If you’ve any designs on beating its 24-mission story, be prepared to die hundreds and hundreds of times. For those who relish a challenge, cutting through the heavily-patrolled streets and progressing through brute-force perseverance may yield its own rewards. Vampire Rain walks an uneasy tightrope, however, where erratic stealth, instant-deaths and awful checkpointing result in a fractious experience that just about keeps things together when its challenges are limited to a small scale. However, most gamers will have lost patience with it long before the end.
Artoon’s espionage title is a love letter to turn of the millennium stealth and action games. Central protagonist John Lloyd runs with the distinctive stooped gait of Solid Snake and dresses like Sam Fisher from Splinter Cell. There’s the humorous, maximum-ham dialogue synonymous with the period, whilst the music feels like it may at any moment burst into the Mission: Impossible theme. Unmistakably, VR’s dark cityscape is straight out of Grand Theft Auto III.
This will likely give you a headache: lots of red herring routes, lots of hidden enemies, lots of unfair deaths probably on the way.
No question then, its references point to the early sixth generation and it has to be said, the whole experience feels routed in the period. The menus are a litany of bulky, lime-green box-outs and chunky maps. The radar that details enemy positions is just a few shades short of a Konami lawsuit. Well, it would have been, had the cones of vision borne any resemblance to the nightwalkers’ field of view. Even the control scheme is a little strange. X draws Lloyd’s weapon, rather than the more conventional left trigger, which is instead reserved for swapping weapons. It’s possibly a nod to Metal Gear Solid 2 but feels ill-fitting alongside a twin-stick control scheme.
Every level is essentially a vampire obstacle course. There’s something distinctly old-school about it: each mission will inflict numerous restarts, as the player learns from painful experience the security-heavy patrol patterns and where to slip by unnoticed. Being spotted is tantamount to an instant game over and the nightwalkers have very, very keen senses. It’s little wonder then that the primary objective for most missions is simply reaching a specific point on the map.
Every level is essentially a vampire obstacle course. There’s something distinctly old-school about it: each mission will inflict numerous restarts, as the player learns from painful experience the security-heavy patrol patterns and where to slip by unnoticed. Being spotted is tantamount to an instant game over and the nightwalkers have very, very keen senses. It’s little wonder then that the primary objective for most missions is simply reaching a specific point on the map.
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Though patchy in places, there’s some quality to the visuals. Indeed, the graphics are probably the game’s strongest suit. Rain effects and squad character models look convincing and some of the larger playing spaces look impressive, at least at a distance. On the other hand, animations appear dated and clunky, the nightwalker models are naff and some of the bosses look absurd. Much of the environment design comes across as unadventurous and bland.
I often complain that open-world environments need more interactivity and platforming and credit where it’s due, Vampire Rain’s locations are more than mere window dressing. Finding a safe route demands the player keeps their wits about them, as routes often prove quite obscure or specific. You’ll need to keep an eye out for pipes and ladders that can lead to higher ground, gaps in fences that allow Lloyd to crawl through to new areas. He can shimmy across ledges, as well as zip-lines and climb all manner of boxes and containers. It makes the player take notice of the surroundings a lot more. In many instances, even the placement of parked vehicles can be crucial in providing cover from the nightwalker threat.
I often complain that open-world environments need more interactivity and platforming and credit where it’s due, Vampire Rain’s locations are more than mere window dressing. Finding a safe route demands the player keeps their wits about them, as routes often prove quite obscure or specific. You’ll need to keep an eye out for pipes and ladders that can lead to higher ground, gaps in fences that allow Lloyd to crawl through to new areas. He can shimmy across ledges, as well as zip-lines and climb all manner of boxes and containers. It makes the player take notice of the surroundings a lot more. In many instances, even the placement of parked vehicles can be crucial in providing cover from the nightwalker threat.
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The trouble is, whilst its platforming is quaintly absorbing, Vampire Rain is well and truly undone by broken stealth and lacklustre shooting. Enemies are incredibly twitchy and you’ll quickly lose count of the times you’ve died because a foe has turned around and instant-killed Lloyd when you’ve been trying to attempt a stealth takedown. The frustration is amplified by some exceptionally stingy checkpointing. You’ll likely spend three-quarters of the overall playtime retreading old ground.
The shooting is extremely irksome, not so much in terms of the mechanics of the blasting (which are acceptable if unspectacular), but because you’re regularly outfitted with a pistol and an assault rifle. In most games, this would be a solid starting point, but in Vampire Rain, it’s two entirely useless weapons. Even headshots won’t save Lloyd once he’s been spotted. To make matters worse, there are tantalising, brief spells when you’re kitted out with shotguns and sniper rifles, genuinely potent firearms for dispatching nightwalkers. These allow the game to flow so much better and it gives you hope, only for it to be dashed as they’re generally removed once more by the start of the next mission.
The shooting is extremely irksome, not so much in terms of the mechanics of the blasting (which are acceptable if unspectacular), but because you’re regularly outfitted with a pistol and an assault rifle. In most games, this would be a solid starting point, but in Vampire Rain, it’s two entirely useless weapons. Even headshots won’t save Lloyd once he’s been spotted. To make matters worse, there are tantalising, brief spells when you’re kitted out with shotguns and sniper rifles, genuinely potent firearms for dispatching nightwalkers. These allow the game to flow so much better and it gives you hope, only for it to be dashed as they’re generally removed once more by the start of the next mission.
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Avoiding the game entirely will save a lot of anguish, but then you’d be missing the hilarious cut-scenes. There are times when I wholeheartedly miss the days of suspect English translations and some of Vampire Rain’s lines (“I rigged her gun to explode!” and an amazingly funny “he was a good husband” epitaph delivered to an NPC no more than a second after killing them) will have you misty-eyed.
What won’t have you misty-eyed however is the increasingly tedious level design. As the game progresses, the linearity of solutions is ever more apparent. Considering its deceptively open surroundings and the unending conveyor belt of cheap deaths, this soon becomes incredibly wearisome. It can take an entire session just to finish one mission, meaning completing the myriad trials, tutorials and story levels will take forever. I don’t mean that in a good way. Kudos to anyone who has seen Vampire Rain through to completion and bonus points if you didn’t hate video gaming as a medium in the immediate aftermath.
What won’t have you misty-eyed however is the increasingly tedious level design. As the game progresses, the linearity of solutions is ever more apparent. Considering its deceptively open surroundings and the unending conveyor belt of cheap deaths, this soon becomes incredibly wearisome. It can take an entire session just to finish one mission, meaning completing the myriad trials, tutorials and story levels will take forever. I don’t mean that in a good way. Kudos to anyone who has seen Vampire Rain through to completion and bonus points if you didn’t hate video gaming as a medium in the immediate aftermath.
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VERDICT
"...whilst its platforming is quaintly absorbing, Vampire Rain is undone by broken stealth and lacklustre shooting. Brutally unforgiving and with terrible checkpointing, it's best avoided." OVERALL: 4/10 |