Monday, August 22, 2005

Where in the Hell is My War of the Monsters 2?

I was browsing the EB Games website and 1UP.com to see when We Love Katamari was being released. I came across a couple positive reviews for the upcoming Hulk: Ultimate Destruction. The review at 1UP referenced the game War of the Monsters for PS2. This made we wonder where in the hell is my War of the Monsters 2?

At its basic level this game is a fighting game. You choose to be one of ten monsters ranging from a King Kong to a Voltron to a Mars Attack Alien. You then beat the crap out of the other monster(s) not just with your fists, combos, or special moves but with everything around you. Everything in each level is destructible and can be used as a weapon.
The antennas on the building can be used to beat on or impale your opponent. Pummel them with an I-beam. Pick up a tanker trunk and you have a nice grenade. If you’re good enough you can even time the collapse of a building so it lands flat on your opponent. Each level also has certain disaster you can cause. See that UFO on the horizon? Hit it with some debris and it will start a tidal wave that will wipe out your opponents. You can cause a volcano to erupt and an earthquake. You fight in levels that represent DC, Tokyo, airport, Las Vegas, Maui, and so on. Even the presentation that pokes fun at old sci-fi films is well done.

This game though isn’t perfect which made me have high hopes for the sequel. The multi-player was limited to just two players. You could add two other CPU monsters, but only you and one friend could play at once. The main reason was because of the innovative multi-player camera. When you and your friend are not fighting each other the screen splits with a camera following each player. When you do eventually go monster toe to monster toe the cameras merge into one screen. Great idea, but obviously this makes playing with more than two players impossible. I had hope that eventually there would be a solution, so you could share the gleeful carnage with more friends. Online play would be the obvious solution, with co-op online being the perfect solution. Alas, this apparently is not going to happen. I’ve begun to think that I failed this game. Did I not tell enough people how great this game is? Am I responsible? Perhaps because it came out during the numerous crappy Godzilla games it got lost in the shuffle. So, this is what I’m recommending. Go buy this sucker used, or new, if you don’t like the “used” tag. Maybe if enough people buy it up now, we can still get a sequel on the next gen consoles. This game came out in early 2003! There should be a sequel by now.

My old roommate Jiff and I played this non-stop when I first bought it. And he’s not even into video games. Jiff, Tim, and I would swap out with the loser for hours straight. This is the perfect party game. Fun will be had by all.

A video game side note: I picked up the new Madden the other day. Looking through the extras I came across a demo for the new Burnout game. I haven't gone back to Madden since. In race crashbreakers + jumps + ricocheting cars = Me giddy.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

But Bobby... you already poop on moving trains. Exhibit A: last week's accident on the Metro coming back from Hollywood and Highland.

--Tim

MOL Junior said...

that's funny i have an old roommate named jiff who used to play madden 94 with me non-stop. once he nearly broke his toe kicking it into a chair when i beat him with a last minute field goal. what is up!

Mandingooo said...

Incog Inc. should DEFIANTLY make WotM 2!