The Conduit - Review

Written by Chad Grischow Monday, 29 June 2009 20:34

User Rating: / 2
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You can practically count the games that satisfy both hardcore and casual gamers on one hand.  Nintendo's waggle-happy Wii controls brought in casual gamers like nothing before, but has not quite caught on with the hardcore gamers that look at it as a nice gimmick to waste an hour with before heading back to their Xbox or PlayStation.  Nintendo seems unable, or unwilling, to shed that image of Wii as a casual gaming machine, but SEGA at least has gamers' backs.  Their new first-person-shooter, The Conduit aims to cast a wide net to please Wii's mass audience as well as the hardcore gamers that feel left out in the cold thus far. 

The game's plot has a familiar sci-fi action tilt to it, with a political twist.  You play as, ex-Secret Service Agent, Michael Ford, a new inductee into The Trust, a secret government organization, after saving The President's life.  The head of The Trust, John Adams, thrusts you into the middle of a mysterious outbreak and alien invasion in Washington D.C. to reclaim a lost piece of technology.  Immediately after recovering the tech, called the All-Seeing Eye, the plot twists in expected ways to reveal that The Trust may not be what they seem.  You fight your way through countless aliens, known as Drudge, and government suits to uncover the truth in an attempt to save the country.  The story works, despite familiar first-person-shooter clichés and some cheesy voice acting. 

There is a decent arsenal of weapons to choose from, with a maximum of two in your possession at a time.  Fallen enemies leave behind their weapons, never leaving you far from a new weapon or some ammunition for what you are carrying.  There is also some variety to the grenades in the game, with the radiation grenade working excellently against Drudge enemies all too happy to run right into the swirling mass of red death.  With the All-Seeing Eye being a major plot point, you carry it with you throughout the campaign, comes in handy for disarming the slick invisible mines.  Outside of unlocking the organic locks on doors, by hacking into the hidden light nodes in the room, the best use for the ASE is finding the boatload of collectable items strewn throughout each level.  It only becomes a chore when you have enemies to deal with in the middle of attempting to deactivate mines in your path, since you must equip it instead of a weapon. 

There is some nice enemy design and variety to the game, especially in the tiny rolling suicide-bomber Drudge that jump toward you to explode.  They could vary the government agent appearances a bit more, but they do a nice job given the hardware limitations.  The game is one of the better looking graphically on the system.  The split between air and ground enemies keeps you on your toes, and the need to destroy Conduit gates and egg pods to stop the flow of enemies makes it tough to clear rooms from the outside of them.  The lack of a map can make navigating some of the building interiors frustrating, but you can generally see where to go based on the 'glowing' doors ahead of you or where the enemies are coming from. 

Console gamers used to playing first-person-shooters with a traditional two-stick controller will have a slight learning curve for moving your character's field of vision with the Wii-mote, but it is definitely worth it.  The gameplay is fantastic with the use of the Wii-mote as your aiming mechanism and your Nunchuk to control your movement.  You can auto-lock on enemies with the Z button on the Nunchuk, but the game still requires you to aim at the enemies to hit them; making it possible to lock on to one enemy, but shoot at another.  The aiming is very forgiving in the single-player campaign mode, allowing you to hit them without having the reticule directly on their body, but does force true aiming for headshots.  Thankfully, the online portion of the game has a stricter aiming system.  Scopes, on weapons that have them, are used by quickly hitting 'down' on the d-pad on the Wii-mote; which is helpful when clearing larger rooms. 

The best way The Conduit caters to both the hardcore and casual gamers is by allowing an amazing amount of control over the game's settings.  There are five difficulty settings to the game, which you can change up or down at any point without penalty.  This is a blessing to casual gamers, but there are some balancing issues that will cause even veteran players to lower the difficulty.  The game is overall fairly easy, but there are segments with multiple enemy portals clumped together that will completely kick your butt, only to be followed by much easier sections again where you will want to crank things back up a few notches. 

Aside from the difficulty, the game also gives you complete control to how the Wii-mote and, required, Nunchuk handle.  From the movement speed to the look and thrust sensitivity, the game does an excellent job of providing you with the necessary options to prevent first-person newcomers from getting seasick.  The game also allows you to control the size of the all-important 'dead zone window'; which is the point at which the screen will not move when the Wii-mote pointer crosses.  If you find yourself getting stuck turning corners, this is the place to start tinkering.  You can also completely adjust the on-screen HUD, moving or removing items as you see fit.  The only issue with the control settings is that hardcore gamers will likely need to ratchet the speed upwards from the default settings to feel comfortable, but they are also the ones more likely to find the settings on their own.  There are so many controls to tinker with, it may be too much for the casual gamer to grasp.  It may have been wise to include an option for pre-set gameplay settings based on your experience-level, but the default controls should work fine for those new to the genre. 

The biggest draw to the hardcore gamer will be the online component.  There are three main modes to play with several rules variations to each, with a maximum of twelve players.  We have heard reports of some lag in larger matches, but experienced very few issues even in full matches with players utilizing the Wii-speak functionality.  We do have a slight issue with the length of time it takes to find and start a match, taking thirty-seconds to a minute to authenticate each player in the match before firing up the game.  The modes are standard at this point, with free-for-all and team-based death matches accompanying Team Objective; their version of 'capture the flag'.  The different rule sets and seven maps is where the multiplayer gets its legs, with modes like 'Three Strikes', where each player only has three lives, 'Bounty Hunter', with one certain target assigned to each player, and 'ASE Football', where the player holding the ASE longest wins, each adding its own unique wrinkle to the matches.  The online is smooth and addictive, thanks to the online rank system fuelled by earned experience points.  Anyone still holding out on buying a Wii until a great online shooter comes out can head to the store now. 

The Conduit is never going to match the prowess of Halo 3 or Killzone 2, but it does not have to.  It is the perfect first-person-shooter for Wii, serving as both a great introduction to the genre for casual gamers and well-done online multiplayer game for the hardcore.   

8.5/10