Terminator Salvation PS3 Review

Vote: Thumbs Down or Thumbs Up Our Rating: 55%       Manufacturer: Atari

In some ways 2009 has been kind to the movie game genre. We've seen a number of blockbuster titles for some old and new movies and the majority have not been the stinkers of the past. Maybe studios are starting to learn that movie does not necessarily have to equal cash in. However, our opinion on this changed somewhat when we loaded Terminator Salvation by GRIN. Incidentally, this is GRIN's third game to ship in 2009; in fact the third to ship in the past four months and Terminator Salvation demonstrates why that may not have been a good idea. The idea behind it was not so bad, but the execution has been poor.

Terminator Salvation puts you once again in the role of John Conner, a human targeted by Skynet (for those who have been asleep for the last 20 or so years, Skynet is a computer based system gone sentient on the world). This isn't a surprise considering the Terminator universe, but this is the first indication of the complete lack of originality in this title. The storyline of the game revolves around saving some survivors, left for dead by the resistance fighters and how John and his cohorts proceed to rescue them. Cliché indeed and you will not want to play this game for the story. One added bonus for fans of the universe is that this game is not based on the movie and plays out two years before the current films storyline.

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery then Epic games should feel flattered, because Terminator Salvation really is Terminator: Gears of War edition. From the aspect as to how the action is viewed through to the actual combat which primarily consists of running from cover to cover shooting enemies, Terminator Salvation really is a carbon copy of the successful Gears of War franchise. However, with that said it should be pointed out that Terminator Salvation does not hit the mark anywhere near as much as the GOW games did.

Although up until this point we have been rather critical on the game, it is not a disaster. The fact is the first hour or so is enjoyable (until you realise that the gameplay continues to be A to B and shoot lots and lots of enemies). The controls and mechanics of the game work quite well with the biggest problem being that we have seen this type of action done before and much better. Had Terminator Salvation come up 4-5 years ago it probably would have been impressive, but in 2009 it just doesn't stack up. And although it is not compulsory for a game to have multiplayer, we really don't think that Terminator Salvation could have really hit the mark here either. The fact remains that if you are going to ship a five hour or less game it really should have some reason to replay or go online with.

The other disappointment with the game is the environments the action takes place in. There is no real variety and while the game does contain both night and day missions, generally there is nothing really interesting or flattering about the levels. The enemies also are fairly stock standard giving us a very 'packaged goods' feel to the game where the developers knew they had some tickboxes to hit, hit those and shipped the game. This one really suffered from coming out day and date with the movie we think.