Reign of Fire (PS2)

The fiery premise of man versus dragon is lost in this movie-to-game license.

By Douglass C. Perry

US, October 23, 2002 - For a publisher looking for movie licenses, Reign of Fire is theoretically a perfect choice. It's got everything: A clear battle between two distinct foes -- brutally fierce, fire-breathing dragons, and a rag-tag group of post-apocalypse military rednecks angry, desperate and armed with enough fire-power to make a difference. But despite the Mad Max hints of outlaw tragic madness, the movie Reign of Fire went down in flames.

Which isn't the case with the game by the same name, BAM's second big movie-based game (the first being Driven). Reign of Fire is filled with every evolutionary phase of dragons you can imagine, and you get to fight them all. And then, later you get to fight as the dragons. Which all sounds good and fun. But Reign of Fire is a difficult game to recommend, since the development team never really crystallized the finer aspects of the gameplay, and as a result, players find themselves trapped in a series of military missions neither inspiring nr fun. Tedious and laborious, yes, but fun? That's arguable, at best.

Gameplay
Having finished playing Reign of Fire, I've re-checked my preview of the same game (from July 25), in which I had written rather glowingly about it. The feeling of playing as a dragon was really thrilling then (which was the focus of my preview), and it still is now. But the big change in my feeling toward this game comes down to execution. Nearly every aspect of the final version of Reign of Fire is delivered without a feeling of finished, polished exciting gameplay. Where I saw potential before, I now see missed opportunities, where I saw possibilities in the vehicular combat, I now see an unpolished combat system.

The premise has huge potential, in fact the concept is loaded, but the game's execution never really hits top gear, and it never really delivers the visceral impulse to freely play 'til the late night hours. It's not a total loss of a game, but Reign of Fire is neither great nor miserable. It's just a tick above average.

Following the theme from the movie, players start as part of a remaining human community, struggling to stay alive as a powerful breed of dragon grows rampant across the earth, feeding on humans in their quick ascension up the food chain. The Englishman Quinn and his followers have captured a castle in which they find a certain level of comfort and protection, and the American Van Zan and his military brigade of dragon killers have joined up with Quinn's people, but with a slightly different purpose. The game follows a thin outline of the movie at best, focusing instead on the straight up defense of their lands and offense movement against dragon attacks and upon their lair, respectively.

Reign of Fire plays like a lot of console-based military games, with objective-based missions and a recognizable tricks of the trade, such as a giving players variety of vehicles, scenarios, and numerous dragon types with which to fight. With nine human levels and nine entirely different dragon levels, Reign of Fire seems like a relatively large game, too. But starting with the training mission and moving into convoy, rescue, and collection missions, players find their main concern is not strategizing how to beat a level, it's getting to grips with the controls.

There are two controls setups, one for face buttons (simple) and the other for two analogs (advanced). In the human missions (using advanced controls), players use the left analog controller to move forward or backward, while the right analog aims the turret on the vehicle and also steers. This is an interesting, often confusing, sometimes frustrating mechanic, and it's at the very crux of the game. It functions like a first-person shooter in theory, and mimics Halo's vehicle controls, but it doesn't work as well. Or at the very least, it's a long learning curve to get to a level of comfort. On the flip side, the game isn't on rails, and it gives you full 3D views of the wide-open terrain, so you have nearly complete control. But with a mechanic such as this, which gives you such freedom, it has to be very tight, smooth and easy to use, and this isn't. It's a chore.

Given four vehicles -- dune buggies, fire trucks, pick-ups and tanks -- players roam the plain, fire-torn landscapes in search of dragons to kill. When the mechanic works best is when the vehicles move slower and more deliberately. The tank works best because it's slow enough to enable you to keep a focused line of fire on the constantly moving dragons, but as the vehicles decrease in size, the more difficult they become to control. While I truly enjoyed the freedom of movement, I cannot say, however, that I love this aiming system. Tracking faster flying dragons is challenging and if you're stuck in a flock of them -- and you haven't grown very accustomed to the controls yet -- you're in for a frustrating time.

It's really the dragons that are most interesting in this game. All the while you are defending or chasing dragons, they're circling and firing at you. They appear in several forms, not just the two I mentioned in my preview. The smallest of them are called Jackals, and they are wingless little creatures resembling Raptors. Apparently, as the dragons grow in size, they evolve from land-based creatures to massive winged beasts, which doesn't make too much sense because there are larger land-based dragons than some of the flying ones. The second land-based character is a massive, fledgling, fire-breathing dragon that quickly crawls around and exhumes deadly fire on you. There is a small, quick airborne dragon as well as a massive, monster vulture attacker as well. You will find variations on all of them as you progress through the game, and all are well modeled and textured.

But what it really comes down to is control and mission design. The game's controls aren't titillating, and depending on your patience level, they could very well be hateful. I felt that a slightly more interesting set of weapons, guided missiles, and a better tracking system would have assisted this aspect of the game greatly. I could throw some arguably painful camera issues in to boot, which there are, but I'll leave it that. And as for the level design, it's strict, by the book stuff: Rescue, defend, attack, repair, you know the drill. It just feels uninspired. It's also interesting to note that since I've been playing so many games in which there are various ways to beat a level, these kinds of recipe-style missions feel incredibly limited and restrictive.

On the other hand, the dragon levels are more fun to play. They control relatively well, with a bit of a learning curve, and they revolve around destroying a whole lot of stuff. Dragons deliver straight lines of fire for closer range attacks or they spout out long-distance fireball attacks. Dragons can also pick up human vehicles, which is a blast! They pick them up and drop them, a tactic around which a few levels are built. The dragon levels are undoubtedly more fun, yet still not explosively great -- just moderately good entertainment.

Reign of Fire makes adequate use of movie materials. It's a mixed bag of good expected stuff and missing stuff. For instance, while Matthew McConaughey's likeness and voice aren't available, the game features the likeness of Christian Bale is (he played the role of the leader of the UK forces in the movie). There are DVD-style extras, too, such as cutscenes from the movie, extra footage, and interviews with the director and footage showing the making of the movie.

Graphics
On the one hand, Reign of Fire shows visual promise, while on the other, it's incredibly stripped down and dull. Using grim, apocalyptic landscapes savaged by fire and destruction, the environments show essentially large polygonal stretches of land, with few details to cover them. The human structures are much more detailed, especially the military barracks, castle remains, and the vehicles themselves. The texture palettes generally show earthen colors revolving around the colors brown and tan, and the special effects, for the most part, are also spare.

The dragon models and textures, however, are excellent looking. The animations are nearly perfectly implemented. They don't move quickly, but they flow smoothly and with a captivating, unearthly grace. It's just cool watching the dragons move and to see them up close.

The fire particle effects are also great. The special effect isn't the best fire in the world, but the blazing stuff appears in various forms, from small patches on the ground to giant walls of it. Also, streaming from the dragons' mouths in either jet form or in fireball form, the fire looks even better. The dragons' fireballs rumble the Earth with varying degrees of impact, too.

Sound
For the most part, Reign of Fire neither offends nor excites with its sound qualities. The human voices, no matter how loud you adjust them (effects, music and voices can equally be adjusted in options), are low, as if badly mixed or produced into the game.

The sound effects are adequate, though several of the sampled effects are used ones. I don't know how many times I have heard the special effect, used here to simulate a dragon casting down a spray of fire, in a movie or TV show. The music, however, does have a lingering affect, and I enjoyed the energetic, soaring score it was given.

Closing Comments
Reign of Fire is one of those games I wanted to like more than I did. I truly believe that all sorts of cool dragon games could be made, but that few have really nailed it. The closest one, to me, was Drakan: The Ancients' Gates, which was more of an action-adventure game that included a dragon.

Bam's game is unfortunate in a couple of ways. First, the movie didn't light up the box offices, which means that most people are going to think that the game is just like the movie. And while I find it hard to entirely dispute that, if you can bear through the human missions, you may very well enjoy the dragon missions. But the linear missions, oftentimes frustrating controls and general dreariness of the gameplay, which makes it all feel more like chore than entertainment, may prevent you from that entirely.

In the end, Reign of Fire is a very, very average game, with a few little gems that just barely lift it from the norm.

5.0 Presentation
Average delivery. Better than decent load times, OK, menus, not incredibly high production value movie clips.

6.5 Graphics
While the dragon models and textures are excellent, the rest of the game isn't so visually impressive.

5.0 Sound
Megh. Not great, not horrible, just there.

6.0 Gameplay
Pretty good dragon levels, pretty mediocre human levels (which you have to play to get to the dragon levels).

6.5 Lasting Appeal
Eighteen levels, and pretty interesting dragon ones at that. But I don't foresee playing this game more than once.