Ethan Thomas has seen better days. After experiencing a severe amount of trauma from the events that took place in the original Condemned: Criminal Origins he's a broken, battered man, reduced to drinking away his sorrows in a local bar. Once he hits the streets, however, he finds that his inner demons are once again eating away at him, possibly due to the return of a vicious serial killer. Talk about a rough day. Now, you can feel Ethan's pain with the release of Condemned 2: Bloodshot, a game that takes what worked in the original and adds a few key components to make it a worthy sequel.
Here's one of the goop monsters in Condemned 2. Attractive, no?
The key to making a horror-themed first-person shooter is a genuine amount of shocks, and Monolith, creators of the F.E.A.R. franchise and the upcoming Project Origin, know how to pile them on. A lot of the in-game characters are downright creepy, from ghouls that have no faces to weird, goopy black creatures that pop out of the ceiling and grab onto you. With the sequel, you'll rely on your fists at the beginning to defeat these enemies, and a good fighting system is in place. The game relies on a punching system using the triggers, and you can combine these presses to string together combo attacks. Furthermore, you can use items in the environment to your advantage, such as an electrical conduit or a gas pipe from the wall.
In addition, Monolith made the environments interactive. Say you finish up a fistfight with some lunatic in an abandoned hospital. He's on the verge of death, but it's time to deliver the fatal blow. You can put the guy in a headlock and take him to a number of items within the room to smash him against, such as a washing machine or a television. The ability to execute a bad guy on whatever item you choose is a splendid guilty pleasure, even if it's just a little bit twisted.
Condemned 2: Bloodshot still provides plenty of weaponry over the course of the game, such as a sub-gun with concentrated firepower or, our personal favorite, a crossbow that lets you plunge an arrow right into the heart of darkness. You won't find them at the beginning of the game, since the developers want you to get the hang of the game's fisticuff controls. However, you'll find lots of firepower in the later stages.
Visually, Bloodshot bests the original with deeper levels (with both indoor and outdoor environments), outstanding details (just wait until you see the goop-covered walls) and just the right amount of darkened colors. Some of the in-game enemies look better than others (the human freaks can't hold a candle to those goop monsters), but overall it's a splendid-looking game bound to give you nightmares. The sound is par for the course as well, including a heavy dose of atmospheric dialogue and music. The sound effects are also precise, right down to the noise of your fist plowing into an enemy's cheekbone.
Why bum-fight when you can bum-shoot?
However, Condemned 2: Bloodshot concludes sooner than expected. The single-player campaign is over in a matter of hours (it's only eleven missions long), and there aren't too many multiplayer options to choose from (although the ones here are pretty freaky). Circle of Death is acceptable, from the time we've had with it, but the Bloodshot Fight Club will probably only appeal to hardcore fanatics of the in-game fighting system.
Nevertheless, Condemned 2 is a worthwhile journey. The scary presentation and revamped gameplay will consume you, just like Sega's twisted TV campaign promises. The last thing you want to do is rob yourself of this scary experience by having lamps on. Turn off that light switch, hit the couch and get Bloodshot.
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