I recently played the PSP version of Iron Man and while some of the features are impressive, it seems Sega forgot the most important aspect of any game: fun. That’s right, Iron Man for the PSP just isn’t all that fun to play. It seems, especially for the beginning missions, more like work. The main reason for that is the controls set up. There’s just too many things to do at the same time. The buttons are camera angles, Left and Right top buttons are flight (with different commands for hover, land & flight) and weapons fire (respectively), the up and down are weapons to choose from, left and right are power management (armor, propulsion & weapons). All in all, way too much to concentrate on in the middle of blowing things up. Plus the mapping leaves much to be desired. Basically, it’s follow the blip and watch the numbers decrease. Oh joy.
The cut scenes aren’t all that special, either, plus it needs more save points. You have to go through an entire mission to save, and if you fail just one objective after say completing six, it’s back to zero, boys and girls. Start all over again. So, what are the good points? It’s not a bad-looking game, the graphics are adequate (God Of War- Chains Of Olympus did it better though, so there is room for improvement). Speaking of God of War, even though it’s not entirely fair (but we gamers never truly are) that game, plus Final Fantasy VII - Crisis Core, set the bar and Iron Man doesn’t meet it at all. The lighting is sometimes muddy, the movement controls are clearly way too touch sensitive, and the upgrades are few and far between.
I understand it’s the hand-held version but when compared to two of the best PSP handheld games recently released, plus some of the sports games, it doesn’t come close and most importantly, it just isn’t as enjoyable as it should be. You should be blowing up tanks, helicopters, assorted villains with glee but instead you just breathe a sigh of relief that you got through the mission. No game should feel like work. Maybe Sega should’ve taken some lessons from Activision’s Marvel Ultimate Alliance - now that game respects the characters and most importantly, it’s just plain fun.
I will have a review of Iron Man on PS3 soon. Stay tuned.
