Salutations, traveler of The Internets! Welcome to William's Bloody Hell, so named after our founder, Sir Bloody William.
He is seen in the likeness above in a rare, 19th century woodcut. This
image was rumoured to have been
commissioned after a bout of unpleasantness
in the White Chapel district of London. Do enjoy your stay and peruse our many, varied offerings, much of which cannot be found elsewhere!
:: Rise to Honor ::
by Thunderdude
I love a good action movie, even
if it's a little hokey at times. Jet Li has come a long way from China where he
was one of the biggest box office stars to become one of biggest action movie
stars here. You can expect certain things in a Jet Li movie: lot's of good kung
fu action, at least a little wire work and Jet Li pretty much playing the same
stoic heroic character. Rise to Honor is a Playstation 2 game created to
be like an interactive movie. Jet Li voices the the character and the movements
of Kit Yun, Hong Kong undercover detective. Kit has infiltrated a crime family
that he had some personal ties to from his deceased father.
At the beginning of the game you start out as a bodyguard for the big boss
Chiang. As Kit you go to San Francisco to seek out Chiang's daughter. I won't
reveal the nuts and bolts of the story, although it's not exactly the most
spectacular one, but it's cool. I like the fact that they're speaking Chinese in
china and English in America, with subtitles where needed. I always find it
annoying when a movie takes place in a certain country and everyone's speaking
English for no other reason than to appease American audiences.
The movie scenes are digital animation that looks pretty decent. It looks like
Jet Li, although the eyes look a little big (hehe, just like Japanese
animation). The movie scenes are pretty cool, although I kinda wished I woulda
been the one controlling the scene or completing the action on a few occasions.
The game play is kind of unique for this type of action game. You control using
the left analogue stick and you fight using the right analogue stick, pointing
it repeatedly in whatever direction necessary. You don't choose the moves. You
pretty much perform the same Eagle Claw Kung Fu moves Jet Li is famous for. Not
a button masher, but a paddle wacker (chuckle). The triangle and circle buttons
just show info for your screen. The R1 button is to block and the L1 button
combined with R1 works to use counter moves when someone is attacking. I had to
use that feature a lot considering the bad guys like to attack more than one at
a time. You get sticks and other minor weapons on occasion throughout the game,
too. You also have an adrenaline meter that when reaching the high point makes
you do more aggressive attacks for a short period. One other thing is you can
fight using Chiang's daughter to help you in the hand to hand when you two are
together.
The other two kinds of play besides the hand to hand stuff are the gun play and
the sneaky stuff. The gun play consists of hiding and shooting. You point the
right analogue at your chosen opponent(s) and press the R2 button to shoot. Like
an action movie you never seem to run out of bullets. You can also use the L2
button to aim at other objects that'll hurt the bad guys. The sneaky stuff is
you not getting caught by dudes with flashlights. Hide here, jump there, sneak
up, kill or knock out one at a time.
I had a lot of fun with this game. This would be an awesome Jet Li movie. As a
video game it's rather simple and short. Upon beating the game some cool
features came up. You can play the game now dressed as either his character from
"Once Upon a time in China" or "Fist of Legend" (which is my all time favorite
kung fu flick). You also get a featurette on the making of the game with Jet Li
and creator interviews.
Overall a lot of fun, if your a Jet Li fan. If your not a Jet Li fan, it won't
be as much fun. I really liked it, but there was more I wish I coulda done with
the fighting and especially some of the movie scenes. B- ......at best, but
that's 'cause I'm a Jet Li fan.
