 [Larger view] | No One Lives Forever 2: A Spy in Harm's Way
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Average user rating:  | |
| Not quite as good as the original | |
| This is a pretty good sequel to the first No One Lives Forever, though it lacks the cohesiveness of the first and just isn't as funny and original. Plus, some of the levels are overly long and the skill system is a little strange and annoying. Still, it's a great game [even if I can't get it to run on my latest system.] | |
| A nice action game | |
| This game is pure action. You will need to follow the "Intelligence" tips and shooting with accuracy. No puzzles, but if you love to be a spy, this is your game.
You can select three resolutions, according your video card. The game runs OK in a ATI Radeon 7500, and you can play a super spy, hard, normal or easy mode game. About mature content, don't worry, it's only about blood and some realistics murders. | |
| Just short of exceptional | |
| No One Lives Forever 2 both surpasses and falls short of its predecessor’s high standards. Bad things first: The game is simply too short. If you are acquainted with this genre you will see the credits rolling after no more than 10-15 hours - NOLF 1 offered more than 10 additional hours of effective game duration. The level design and extravagancy of the visited locations is by far inferior to those of the original NOLF. While I still treasure memories of places like the alpine fortress or the space station from the first part, I doubt that anybody will sit agape in front of his/her screen looking at sometimes hideously uninspired locations like e.g. the green-brown desolation of an average midwest village in Ohio. Urgh. Often it simply lacks the joy of colors that oozed out of every pixel in NOLF 1. But then again they throw sights at you like U.N.I.T.Y.‘s headquarters and you can’t help to love this game. And love it I do.
One reason were the superb gags...oh my, the GAGS! Sometimes I sat in front of my screen and burst out laughing (My personal favourite: the villain with the inadequate villain’s laugh – unforgettable!). The sense of humour is more mature and subtle than in the first part, though that was already on a very high level. Absolutely conducive to it is undoubtedly NOLF 2‘s first-rate cast of voice actors. But even reading all the small pieces of intelligence that you pick up on the way you can‘t help a smirk when NOLF 2‘s writers take a swing at everything Cold War, naturally taking advantage of all kinds of clichés about Russians and Americans that you can think of. Storywise NOLF 2 is as close to high Hollywood standards as you can get at the moment (end ’04) which is not a bad thing at all. Finally, I absolutely want to recommend this game. Like Part 1 it is an original, even though it is likely that most of the players will have forgotten much if not all of it once they are through. Considering the numerous improvements that Monolith has made in relation to its predecessor and which I did not mention here (skill system, stunning facial motion capturing, to name only a few) one shudders at the thought of how great a more than likely sequel could be. |
