Spawn

Imitation the sincerest form of flattery? Pah, not for Capcom, when everyone else imitates the slick style Devil May Cry. Take Namco's Spawn for example...

	Version Xbox, PS2, GameCube	Developer Namco	Publisher Namco	Genre Action

By Joseph Jackson

At first, the thought of another Spawn game didn't sit too well with some gamers as we remembered the lackluster outing of Capcom's Spawn game in arcades and on Dreamcast a few years ago. Spawn: In the Demon's Hand was visually a great game, but the FPS gameplay was mediocre beyond belief.

This time, Namco is having a crack at the Spawn franchise. We went in with no real expectations and came away with the positive feeling that there might just be hope for Spawn.

Namco has seen fit to borrow elements from Capcom's top-notch Devil May Cry. Gone are the first-person shooting gameplay elements, one look at Namco's Spawn and you could swear you're watching the Capcom classic, as Spawn runs from room to room in third person view with double guns in hand, blasting away at the legions of powerful enemies headed his way.

Some very strange events start occurring in Central Park where a powerful weapon of celestial design has opened a gateway to hell, allowing demons to force their way into the human realm. The Angels, who have no intention of closing the gateway, plan to sacrifice humanity and Spawn in order to destroy Hell. Their grand plan being to use Spawn's Necroplasm to power this mysterious weapon. Just goes to show you that even angels can be punks to! It's up to Spawn to save the Earth!

With gameplay and storyline elements contributed by Todd McFarlane, the action that takes place in the chaotic world of Spawn will span across 7 areas with over 30 levels filled with interactive and destructible environments to explore.

As Spawn battles enemies from both heaven and hell he'll be able to combine his attacks and use his arsenal of guns, Axe, Agony, and Hell Powers to dish out a divine or hellish beating to those foolish enough to take him on.

From the early build we played the game controlled quite well, maintaining fast paced action and plenty of it to keep players on their toes. Each of the rooms we ventured through contained plenty of destructible objects, allowing Spawn to go berserk with his axe, smashing almost everything in sight like a violent drunk.

Auto-Targeting is another plus as the game has a well implemented one that locks onto each enemy as they approach Spawn to beg him for a beating. After destroying an enemy, the auto targeting quickly locks onto the next one in line, making the shooting aspects of the game more of a convenience than the chore it could have been with manual aiming. Fortunately Spawn is still mobile while blasting away at the enemies, allowing him to continuously pump lead into a powerful enemy boss while avoiding attacks and retreating to safer fighting grounds.

The enemies throughout the game are a fast and aggressive bunch. Spawn will be attacked by legless corpses crawling for some action, demonic looking goat creatures from hell, and a large, mechanical crab-like monster you'll need to pummel into seafood platter just to name a few of the enemies Spawn will encounter.

Overall, the whole gothic presentation of Spawn was pretty cool but we still can't shake the Devil May Cry "RIP-OFF" voice that keeps shouting in our ears. And despite the solid control and gameplay elements, the action did seem to get rather repetitive after a while.

Graphically, Spawn looked great for work in progress. Although the visuals as well as the gameplay could use a slight touch-up in a few areas, even in their early state they were impressive.

Spawn himself looked pretty good and was looking quite buff. Whoever modeled Spawn deserves a raise as Spawn was a very well-modeled, textured and animated, lean-mean-killing-machine. His suit almost looked alive thanks to the great texture work that went into it, and with all the spikes, chains, and other little details that made up Spawn's model, he looked like a Heavy Metal freak with a Dante (Devil May Cry) complex.

The detailed 3D environments were beautifully rendered as well, filled with solid textures and plenty of destructible objects that exhibited some nice physics and lighting effects after being destroyed. Other cool little details throughout the demo were of bullet shells falling to the ground from Spawn's guns, accompanied by the appropriate sound effects as he emptied his ammo into the enemies throughout the game.

The framerate, even throughout some of the intense moments, remained locked and silky smooth the whole time. The camera was very well behaved as well, allowing players to see far ahead of them and a good portion of each room without obstructing their view like plenty of other games out there do with their shoddy camera work.

However, Spawn's visuals were often a bit too plain looking and didn't really convey the type of atmosphere or settings that would go with such an epic storyline. We expected more chaotic settings as opposed to the quiet and clean, conventional look that it had. The lighting effects need to set a darker tone to the environments.

Shadow and lighting effects, storms and fog would also enhance the visuals. There's a chance things will look better in the later levels so we'll give Namco the benefit of the doubt and anxiously await some more developed code.

If Namco add some variety to the gameplay, maybe some puzzle solving, then they could certainly have a winner on their hands. Spawn is set for a Q4 2003 release for the Gamecube, PS2 and Xbox. Stay tuned for our review.