The Energon Pub

[Shadowman]

A while back, they released a game based off of Watchmen, set in 1975. Well, now they've released a sequel, and I've decided to give a review of both parts of Watchmen: The End is Nigh.

The gameplay is fairly simple; as either Rorschach or Nite-Owl, you get some good ol' fashion arcade beat-'em-up gameplay. Attacks are executed as either a quick attack, or a strong attack. By timing your hits, you can execute a combo move. In essence, while you CAN button mash, it's far easier and more effective to time your hits. The game also remembers the last few hits of you combo; the last few hits of one move act as the first few hits of another, allowing you to string them together quite nicely.

The graphics are quite beautiful, actually. The lighting is really nice, everything is very detailed, and if you get a close-up of Rorschach's face, you can see the shapes constantly moving, which is a great touch. Cutscenes are shown primarily though 2D art, similar to the comics and the animated comic, though it actually looks less impressive than the actual in-game graphics.

The games themselves are...short, actually. Part 1 only contains six missions, and part 2 only a measly 3. Combined, however, this creates a 9 mission beat-'em-up, and for a combined price of $35. Considering Ghostbusters only had 7 missions (About the same length) and I paid $60 for that, I'd say this is a pretty good deal.

Though, let's be fair to Ghostbusters here; Watchmen doesn't have much to differentiate combat. Watchmen only has about six enemies, (Small, medium, and large, and small, medium, and large with weapons) and they can all be beaten on the "Punch/kick them until they don't get up" method. There are, however, three bosses, which are actually quite fun. Without spoiling anything, the final boss in Part 2 is great for co-op. WITH spoiling anything:

It's whoever you aren't playing as; if you're playing Rorschach, the final boss is Nite-Owl, and vice versa. If you're on co-op, the final boss is the guy sitting next to you. Actually very similar to Lego Star Wars. Afterwords, you're given Rorschach vs. Nite-Owl mode.

And there's another thing worth mentioning; everyone except Rorschach and Nite-Owl are downgraded to damn near cameos. The Comedian makes a cameo in both games (Yet is never mentioned by name), Silk Spectre and Dr. Manhattan both make a brief appearance, (Though Manhattan's symbol is the autosave icon) and Ozymandias is only mentioned in passing, though the Veidt Industries logo appears in several areas.

So, the pros and cons:

+Fantastic for co-op
+Beating a gang within an inch of their life (And often further) is oddly satisfying
+Pretty good level/price ratio when you combine both games
+Great graphics
+Dr. Manhattan's brief appearance, he stays covered up.

-Very repetitive gameplay
-The individual games are pretty short
-Where is everyone else?!
-Enemies can actually take you down pretty quick if you let them gang up on you.

So for the price, I don't know if I can really recommend it. If you happen to really like Watchmen, and perhaps you have a friend who really likes Watchmen, sure, get it. Otherwise, try them demo, play it a few times, then decide for yourself.