At first glance, the $20 price tag (1600 Microsoft Points) combined with the stock/repetitive brawler gameplay seems like something that would send Watchmen’s Rorschach into a growling, gritted-teeth rant on the state of gaming. He may have a point, but in comparison to the hastily rushed $60 movie tie-in titles you normally see in stores, Watchmen is actually a value. The End Is Nigh occurs well before the events of the film, with the Keene Act not yet passed. Nite Owl and Rorschach overhear a police bulletin regarding a power outage at Sing Sing prison, and make their way there to investigate what turns out to be a breakout. The duo plows their way through six levels leading to a final battle with Underboss, atop a still-in-construction sky rise. The story is decent enough, including an 'ending' provides plenty of room for continuation; as Warner Bros is setting this up as a two-part series, with the second half likely coinciding with the film's DVD release. The Xbox Live Arcade game's coolest moments come in the slick between-level animated comic book panels, delivering the exposition the game itself is not too interested in exploring.
The game plays as a traditional button-mashing beat 'em up. You cannot help but get the feeling that the game is really just another rush-job, where they slapped the Watchmen skin on a solid brawler engine. That may be, but the game plays well enough to nearly earn its elevated price point. You begin by selecting either Nite Owl or Rorschach, or both if you have a local friend to pair up with in co-op mode. The two playable characters add a decent amount of replay value, but they do not play differently enough from each other to warrant a return trip for anyone other than achievement whores or Watchmen fanboys. The controls and combos are exceedingly simple, with two buttons for the light and heavy attacks and a third for grabs. There is also a counter-attack modifier to reverse your fortunes when in a bind, but all the attacks get stale after the first few times you see them. For some reason, Nite Owl seems to pull off the counter-attacks more frequently than Rorschach.
The game throws a handful of enemies at you with every small chunk of real estate you move through, with increasing numbers and frequency as the game goes on. Along the way, each character has their own combo and skill upgrade cards to find, unlocking additional moves and abilities. Combos wisely require a bit of timing, with each subsequent button in a combo needing to be hit as the previous attack lands on the opponent, adding the slightest bit of skill to the equation. The system works well enough, but the game never makes you do more than mash through a group of enemies, flip a switch, and repeat the process until you trigger the next pre-level comic panel. The frustratingly high amount of repetition and low amount of thought required to get through the game is mind numbing. The gameplay is brutally violent, with some nice finishing moves to break up the action. The finishing moves send enemy teeth flying in a flurry of elbows and nut-shots, in stylish slow-mo fashion. Unfortunately, they are a bit too easy to accomplish with a single-button press, displayed over their heads when enemies are near death.
The easiest way to get enemies to their end is the use of the charge or rush attacks, depending on which of the characters you play as. Each of the characters have a health meter that refills over time, and a charge or rush attack meter that fills based on the amount of damage you do to enemies. The meter controls your ability to use the charge and rush attacks, sprinting at enemies to knock them over. It is especially useful in later levels, when you can use the special attacks to knock over large groups of enemies at once. Most times, the enemies stand up ready for a finishing move; taking much of the difficulty out of the game. It is a decent idea marred by the simplicity of the control scheme. The four to five hours the game lasts is about right for a download title, but the achievement daring you to complete it in under an hour and a half proves that those looking to blast through it in a hurry certainly can. The Xbox Live Arcade game does offer same-system co-op play, but sorely misses a big opportunity for replay value by excluding online co-op.
The game may not be perfect, but many of its ills would be easier to overlook with friends online. The A.I. is solid, both in terms of your computer-controlled partner and the enemies. It is not the smartest game around, but the enemies and your partner are at least aggressive enough towards each other to prevent it from turning into something where you are excessively ganged up on. In the looks department, Watchmen is easily one of the best looking games to hit the Live Arcade, but it is not without its issues. While the characters and environments look fantastic, they are just as repetitive as the gameplay. Each level only features two or three enemy types, and throws them at you relentlessly as if there is a cloning machine at the end of the level spitting them out. The game environments are just as bad, with many levels that feel as though you are walking through the same two rooms in a circle for nearly an hour. The prison level is the biggest offender, with each cellblock an exact replica of the next, but the rest of the game delivers plenty of overly similar looking environments too.
In battle, the dark, gritty environments and some awkward camera angles can make it tough to see exactly what is happening, and the limited number of finishing moves leaves you bored of them after the first couple of levels. It will be interesting to see what they do with the sequel, because repetition aside, it is a gorgeous looking game. On the audio side of the coin the game delivers a solid score and some very good voice work that suffers from the same repetition bug that hampers the rest of the game; repeating one-liners several times each level. Watchmen is certainly not the worst offender in the ‘bad movie-game’ department, but it is still disappointing. The shallow gameplay combined with the hefty XBLA price tag are a tough combination to ignore, but if you leave the theater wanting more, you could do worse.
