Xena: Warrior Princess
An evil sorceress, in her plot to destroy the gods,
needs to sacrifice a mortal queen - and decides that Gabrielle will do, since
the bard is also the Queen of the Amazons. Xena must fight her way through
numerous obstacles to challenge the might of the sorceress and defeat her - the
world, and Gabrielle's life, depend on her success.
(Electronic Arts, 1999)
Xena is a natural property for a video
game, and indeed, there have already been games on earlier platforms such as the
SNES that explored the Xenaverse. But this multi-level, first-person fighting
game is the first to attempt to match the scope of the television series,
offering individual "episodes" to fight your way through en route to
the final goal.
I got this game for my fianceè, who happens to be a Xena fan, and to
be honest, she's spent more time playing the Xena game than I have, and
could probably tell you more about it. But what time I have spent
playing it has told me that the game is sometimes difficult to control, though
there are about a couple of dozen very impressive moves that one can
trigger.
Where I get so frustrated with Xena is literally a matter of
perspective. The game is played out from a strange kind of
Steadicam-hovering-somewhere-behind-Xena perspective, and the movement can
become quite distracting, almost dizzying at times, a problem shared with the
Star Wars Episode I game.
Another question many die-hard fans will have is: is Xena the game
true to Xena the series? Yes, it is, with the possible exception of casting
Gabrielle in the role of a defenseless gadfly who needs to be rescued. More and
more, especially during the present season during which Lucy Lawless has been
pregnant, Renee O'Connor's character has already met her butt-kicking quota for
the entire year. Then again, perhaps this game could be excused by placing its
events somewhere in the first or second season of the show, in which Gabrielle
wasn't quite so adept at defending herself. Another gripe I have is Xena's
figure - this is supposed to be Lucy Lawless, not Kate Moss. The dimensions of
the character are way off: no waist, big breasts, you figure it out.
Though Ms. Lawless (a.k.a. Mrs. Tapert) has quite a large fan following based on
her appearance and her costume alone, I doubt anyone would think that this
pixellated Xena looks very much like her at all. She also swings her entire
body to and fro very uncharacteristically when preparing to throw the chakram.
The music and voice work - though obviously not Lucy and Renee's voices, nor
Kevin Smith's in Ares' brief cameo in the game - are fairly true to the show,
and the game even takes that trademark Raimi-style camera work into account:
when you throw Xena's chakram, your perspective suddenly changes to immediately
behind the spinning weapon for the duration of its flight. Certain battle moves
will also trigger samples of Xena's famous "yi-yi-yi-yi!" battle cry.
There's also one area in a fishing village where a shark is strung up. Try
hitting it with your sword a few times and watch as surfboards and other objects
are coughed up. There's no question that there was at least one fan of the
Raimi school of filmmaking involved in this game's development...
Two quarters - worth playing, but could use some more work.
