Haze Review - A missed opportunity.

By Sam Coles:

Haze is a first person shooter that was released for the PS3 exclusively back in 2007 and it had somewhat of a troubled development cycle as it was meant to be a multi-platform game but one thing lead to another to make it a PlayStation exclusive. The game was dubbed a Halo killer because before Call of Duty was really popular games tried to out-do Halo with mixed results. Developed by Free Radical who are most famous for the Timesplitters series which you would think you’re in good hands right? Well yes and no, mostly no.

Haze takes place in a sci-fi setting where you are part of a private military group who are bunch of idiots and act like dude bros. Trust me you’ll thank the volume button on your remote control as the voice acting in this game is absolutely abysmal. It’s a shame because the concept is very interesting as the mercenaries inject something in their system called honey, what this does is that it increases their adrenalin and blinds them from the horrors of war. This could have been a dark and twisted story, but due to the horrible writing and acting it never lives up to the potential which is a damn shame.

The game is a first person shooter where you travel through level by level killing anything that gets in your way. The unique selling point is the honey which when injected it will warp your mind and highlight enemies on screen, but take too much of it you then will overdose and won’t be able to do anything for a short period. This is a cool idea but you only utilise it for the first hour and half the game and then you never use it again as you defect from the mercenary group and join the resistance. There are vehicle sections but they do not control very well and the vehicles damage easily and you’ll end up dead on the side of the road with a couple of grenade explosions so it’s padding at its finest. The shooting isn’t bad it’s fast and fluid and you don’t have to aim down the sight as it has the fast pace shooting of the Timesplitters series.

The game visually is ugly it looks drab and horrible and considering games like Halo and Call of Duty 4 came out the same year with excellent visuals is jarring. The game looks like a PS2 game up-scaled to HD with blurry character models and boring and grey environments. However there is one good looking level in the game and that is the intro level that is set in a jungle with lush foliage that sways in the wind, but after that it just looks abysmal and this is a PS3 exclusive.

Haze is a missed opportunity but is it the worst game ever? No it’s not, however it’s not a good game either, it had some interesting elements but due to the poor dialogue and writing and questionable gameplay it lets it down. Give it a go if you’re curious I picked up my copy for £1 so it’s not going to break the bank.