Time Crisis 2 Review


For Arcade

Rating: Good
   If you're looking for fast-paced shooting action and nothing more, Time 
Crisis 2 won't disappoint.  As the latest light-gun shooter from Namco, 
Time Crisis 2 has quite a reputation to live up to.  The original Time 
Crisis revolutionized light-gun shooters with its innovative foot pedal.  
Pushing down and releasing the pedal made you duck for cover or jump out to
fire at the enemy.  This added a whole new element of strategy to light-gun
shooters, which normally don't require much thought to play.
   So what does Time Crisis 2 do differently than its predacessor?  The 
major new gameplay feature is the two-player mode in which two players can 
team up to try to beat the game.  You can actually see the other player on 
the screen and may even shoot him if you don't aim carefully.  You can't 
get shot when you're ducking for cover, so technically you could stay down 
there as long as you want if it weren't for the 40-second timer which runs 
out if you don't kill anything.  However, at the end of a level, it's very 
clear who's been doing the dirty work when one player has a score of 50,000
and the other player has a score of 10,000 (being the coward that I am, I'm
usually the player with 10,000).  The addition of a partner to play the 
game with also adds many strategic elements.  For example, the bosses can 
only fire at one of you at a time, so the best time to shoot the bosses is 
when their attention is on your partner.
   Since the Time Crisis 2 arcade machine is actually one giant screen 
split in half, two players can also play individually at the same time in 
their own single-player game.  And even in the single-player mode, you have
a partner (even if it is a computer-controlled one), although he doesn't 
seem to do much except divide the enemy's attention so you can get some 
free shots in.
   It's been a while since Time Crisis and its foot pedal originally 
debuted in arcades, but the foot pedal is still a nice feature that adds a 
lot to the game.  If five enemies pop up at once in another shooting game, 
you usually have no choice but to take them out one a time, all the while 
being wide open to enemy fire and having to manually re-load by shooting 
the light-gun off-screen. But through the use of Time Crisis 2's foot pedal,
you can shoot an enemy, duck down behind cover, re-load, and pop back up 
when the time is right.  You have the freedom to play with as fast or slow 
a pace as you wish, but only to a point. Going too fast will kill you in no
time, and going too slow will cause the timer to expire.
   Elsewhere, the graphics are solid with no jagged edges in sight.  The 
story line is typical fare for light-gun shooters, with a cheesy dialogue 
and some poorly done English voice-overs.  Also, like most shooters, the 
game gets old after a while.  After the quick rush of lots and lots of 
action being thrown at you at once in a short amount of time, there is 
little motivation to play through the game again after you've already 
beaten it more than one or two times.
   But hey, it's a light-shooter.  What did you expect?  It's not going to 
keep you playing for months, but as far as light-gun shooters go, Time 
Crisis 2 is about as good as it gets.

Back To Reviews






/118">

© 2001 ivan@mastergamer.com