Namco Bandai teaches a lesson in poor release timing with the recent launch of Inversion. Saber Interactive’s latest original IP quietly landed on store shelves earlier this month, right smack in the middle of E3, a time in the gaming year when most gamers briefly forget about current games to look forward to the gaming innovations and experiences of the future. For a game that’s been in development as long as Inversion (it was announced in 2009 and originally was planned to launch in 2010), it’s a shame its release came and went with such little attention, because despite some gaping flaws and a prevailing air of blandness, it pulls out some clever game design tricks that deserve commendation.

The story of Inversion begins in the near-future city of Vanguard, once a peaceful place now overrun by the Lutadore, a race of enemies armed with gravity-manipulating technology that rises up out of nowhere and begins slaughtering and enslaving the human population, adults and children alike. A pair of lame buddy cop wannabes heads the charge to overthrow this sudden threat, Davis Russel in the leading role as a father and husband who discovers his wife dead and his daughter kidnapped by the ruthless invaders, with his partner Leo Delgado riding shotgun on this post-apocalyptic sci-fi mission to save one little girl.

Not to diminish the years of hard work the writing and art teams put into the development process, but Inversion is an undeniable failure in storytelling and art direction. The bumbling narrative and total lack of a distinct artistic identity send this game crashing back to Earth on its head every time it seems poised to reach its gravity-defying ambitions. The plot is so full of holes and blundering twists, it’s tough to overlook unless you have some innate ability to forgive and forget. You never learn anything about the motivations behind why the Lutadore are attacking and rounding up children or the history behind what is inferred to be a long-running conflict between the Lutadore and an equally unexplained army of robots that start sprouting out of the ground. The driving force behind your participation never goes anywhere either until a last-second twist at the end attempts to do so in a slapdash way. The story and universe just never form a cohesive whole, not even enough to succeed at a B action movie standard.

Because of these faults, Inversion gets off to a rough start. Through the first couple chapters, I was almost ready to cast it aside as another in a long, endless line of bland, bare-minimum cover shooters. I always try my best to avoid making direct comparisons, but this game doesn’t even try to hide the fact that it’s borrowing from Gears of War in more ways than one, so it would be dishonest to overlook such a fact. Between the girthy character models, the weighted player movement and control feel, and even the look of the context-sensitive command prompts, it is clear Saber chose Epic’s footsteps to follow in. I don’t knock the game for being derivative – all games are in one way or another – but I do fault it for coming out of the gates so slow and safe.

Before long, however, Inversion breaks familiarity and lets loose with its own brand of cover-based warfare. Alongside the usual assortment of machine guns, rifles, laser blasters and flamethrowers, a device called the Gravlink powers the game’s dynamic, topsy-turvy action, granting its wearer the ability to command and weaponize the forces of gravity at will (as long as there’s enough juice in the ol’ battery pack).

The Gravlink has two modes: Low G and High G. In Low G mode, the device fires out bubbles that create small zero-gravity zones in the targeted area. Within these bubbles, all objects and enemies are temporarily forced into a state of suspended animation to be pelted with gun fire or manipulated to the player’s every whim. A complimentary tether allows you to latch onto hovering objects or beings to hurl as projectiles at other enemies or to break through obstacles, bringing back fond memories of Midway’s forgotten gem Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy. High G, on the other hand, raises the gravitational pull to crushing weights and, as a secondary ability, provides an energy shield to deflect incoming bullets.

The Gravlink gives the player a lot of freedom to approach set pieces in different ways. Firing a Low G blast into a pool of lava, for example, creates a molten globule that explodes into a ball of napalm when launched at the enemy. Similarly, floating barrels will sometimes leak gas, and when captured in a Low G bubble these gas balls become bombs (or you can always just fling the barrel itself). Alternating between the two, enemies can be launched into the air and then gruesomely combo-slammed back into the ground. Manipulating gravity also grants the ability to create new cover points on the fly, perhaps by tether-tugging a destroyed car to an advantageous position or by pulling down an overhanging cargo container. Certain Lutadore are armed with Gravlinks as well, though, so be aware that gravity isn’t yours to command alone. Hunkering down in one cover spot usually isn’t a smart idea, or else you too will be left dangling in the air without protection.

Inversion really starts to turn heads as the environments shift. While large chunks of the game keep the protagonist rooted to good ol’ terra firma, certain moments toss the rules of gravity out of the window and thrust you into some truly unorthodox firefights. Vector Shifts invert the battlefield completely, causing the sides of buildings to become the floor while you fire away at sideways or upside-down enemies attacking from other planes of gravity. Zero-gravity zones push the envelope even further, removing the player from their grounded position and transforming the area into a field of floating debris to use as cover pieces. These aerial battles get pretty crazy as you begin launching from cover point to cover point, blasting away at those Lutadore bastards in mid-flight before grabbing onto the next ledge. Saber Interactive beat 5TH Cell’s Hybrid to the punch, that’s for sure.

Multiplayer is another potential selling point, but sadly it has yet to materialize due to limited exposure and a dead player community. I’ve been sitting on this review for a couple weeks now hoping to get a glimpse at how the gravitational combat and flipped-around level design might alter the dynamics of competitive shooting, however to this day I have only been able to find a single deathmatch skirmish against one measly player. After tediously running around the map for a few minutes unable to spot my lone competitor, I quit out and haven’t been able to secure another match since. Campaign co-op isn’t fully implemented either. Random matchmaking lobbies and offline couch co-op are nowhere to be found; you’re only option is to invite or be invited to a Party, which is about as effective as the Wii Friend Code system unless you have a lot of people on your friends list who happen to own this game. AI Leo holds his own as your partner during solo play, but bringing a real friend or even some random player along for the ride surely would heighten the enjoyment.

It doesn’t happen enough, but when Inversion hits its stride, it is a very good game that breaks the laws of conventional third-person shooting in dynamic and innovative ways. Unfortunately, as a whole the experience is severely undermined by bland visuals and a general lack of artistic personality, a dull, go-nowhere storyline, and one of the more vapid casts of characters seen in recent video game history. If you don’t mind a sloppy, poorly written (and acted) narrative or already plan to skip through the cutscenes any way, Inversion’s brand of gravity-shifting action may just win you over before the 8-10 hour campaign runs its course.

Pros:
+ Gravlink brings fun, fresh ideas to the third-person shooter playing field
+ Adaptable cover and inverted, zero-gravity levels form dynamic set pieces

Cons:
– Story lacks explanation and is full of gaping plot holes and silly twists
– Thoroughly bland and nondescript art direction
– Co-op doesn’t support offline couch play or random matchmaking lobbies

Game Info:
Platform: Reviewed on Xbox 360, also available for PC and PS3
Publisher: Namco Bandai
Developer: Saber Interactive
Release Date: 6/5/2012
Genre: Third-Person Shooter
ESRB Rating: Mature
Players: 1 (2-12 online multiplayer, 2-player online co-op)
Source: Review copy provided by publisher

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Wanna know why movie games have such a dubious reputation? Because of crap like Battle: Los Angeles!

I started playing this supposed “AAA” downloadable FPS last night, little knowledge of the movie it’s linked to, but half expecting a fun ride. Saber Interactive developed the game after all, and they’d previously developed TimeShift, a solid sleeper FPS released around four years ago now.

But before I knew it, the game was over, and I was left wondering how a slapped together pile of trash like this ever made it to consumers. Konami, I love you. You make some of my favorite game franchises, from Metal Gear to Silent Hill to Castlevania. But asking gamers to pay any amount of money for this game should be a crime.

Like the film, Battle: Los Angeles, the game, thrusts players into the thick of an unspectacular alien invasion storyline. You join the ranks of an everyday military squad, and proceed to run and gun down the disheveled streets of LA, sending nondescript alien A-holes to meet their maker. You are armed with grenades, an M-16, and a sniper rifle, along with a rocket launcher at designated moments, and you charge forward almost as if on rails, stop to kill off scripted waves of the same aliens over and over again, then move on and repeat the process many times over.

Of course, the game never has a chance to grow into something grander and less formulaic because it starts and ends before you ever get the chance to settle in. I literally finished the game within an hour. On the hardest difficulty. While pausing periodically to jot down a few review notes (mostly about how terrible this game is!).

Normally I’m not one to harp on game length, but an hour! Come on, I’ve played demos longer than that. Shit, the process of writing and publishing this review has already taken me longer than actually playing through the game!

What’s really sad is that even at an hour long, everything about the game feels padded. Even while sprinting movement speed is glacially slow, the scripted shootouts often drag on and on with respawning aliens, and the boss battles against alien aircraft literally have you hiding in a corner until the craft stops to charge up its main attack, at which point you can hit it with a rocket or two until it enters ‘dodge everything’ mode again. The trophies/achievements for completing the game on different difficulties fail to stack as they typically do, so even if you play through the game on Hard the first time around, you don’t unlock any of the rewards tied to the lesser difficulties. If that’s not blatant padding, I don’t know what is!

Sadder still, even when you accomplish everything there is to accomplish – beating the campaign three times for all the trophies/achievements and unlocks – there’s only enough content to keep you busy for a couple hours. Once you’ve gone through the first time, subsequent replays go by in half an hour to 45 minutes tops, and none of the unlockable bonus videos or concept art are worth even that minimal amount of effort.

I would be a lot more forgiving if the actual gameplay was at least decent, but it isn’t. The controls are sluggish, the weapons sound and feel puny, the hit detection is poor and you get very little visual feedback to let you know whether or not you are hitting your target, the underdeveloped alien AI turns shootouts into glorified shooting galleries with little variation or challenge, there is a jump button when in fact there isn’t a single thing in the game you can actually jump over, and the sprinting mechanic gives you maybe five seconds of increased speed before your character slows to a crawl while recovering stamina. Seriously, did anyone test this game before releasing it?

But good news – Battle: Los Angeles at least looks the part of a blockbuster sci-fi action game…when textures finish loading in and your guns don’t vanish into thin air (yes, one time I came out of a cutscene and my character was holding an invisible gun!). Saber Interactive’s Saber 3D Engine definitely produces some impressive visual effects. A lot of detail has been crammed into the ravaged LA environments, cars and cover pieces realistically explode and shred apart, and scripted in-game sequences, like planes crashing and buildings crumbling down, do provide fleeting moments of cinematic intensity.

Battle: Los Angeles basically plays like the opening chapter of what was supposed to be a full game, but due to quality concerns continued development was scrapped to save money, leftover concept artwork was cobbled together into a cheap comic book story presentation, and the game was tossed out as a digital download just to recoup as much wasted development cost as possible. Please, whatever you do, do not contribute to such a product!

Pros:
+ Reasonably impressive graphics
+ A few exciting cinematic moments

Cons:
– Less than an hour long with lots of padding and little replay value
– Slow, clumsy controls
– Generic story presentation
– Gameplay lacks challenge and variation
– Weak guns and sound effects

Game Info:
Platform: Reviewed on PS3 via PSN download, also available on PC and Xbox Live Arcade for Xbox 360
Publisher: Konami
Developer: Saber Interactive
Release Date: PC/XBLA – 3/11/2011, PSN – 3/23/2011
Genre: FPS
ESRB Rating: Teen
Players: 1
Source: Review code provided by publisher

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