Friday 28 July 2017

Killzone 2 Review - Welcome to Helgan.


By Sam Coles:

Killzone is a franchise that has believe or not been around for over a decade with the last instalment being released on PlayStation 4 back in 2013 as a launch title. Fans have always unanimously said that Killzone 2 is the best in the series and have to agree despite some of the issues I have with this game. For an eight year old game that was released on the PS3 it still holds up very well with good and satisfying gunplay and visuals that still look really good. It truly shows what the PS3 is capable of. Should you pick it up today? Yes and I’m going to tell you why you should buy a PS3 for this game.

Killzone 2 takes place straight after the events of the first game and the ISA take the fight to the heart of Helgan where they are trying to push the forces of the Helgast back that are under the command of General Radec. You play as Seth who is under constant stress from the war efforts as his comrades are disobeying orders as some of his fellow soldiers have a habit of killing high value targets they need alive. The story is very engaging with good voice acting from all the cast and Radec has the most diabolical voice he is an excellent villain.

What I like about this game when it comes to the gameplay it doesn’t mess around as it throws you straight into the action, so there are no patronising tutorials where they teach you to aim down sights etc. No instead it throws into a loud and bloody warzone where people are constantly dying around you; the atmosphere is fantastic Guerrilla Games have nailed the sense of being in a warzone with the dirt kicking up from bullet impact to the explosions.

The gameplay is your standard first person shooter from the time but it does take a while to get use to as the controls are vastly different compared to other games on the market. You go through levels killing Helgast soldiers with different weapons which are your standard pistol, shotgun and assault rifle variety. The game has a cover system where you can crouch behind cover then pop out and shoot at enemies; this can be a nuisance sometimes as enemies can still hit you in cover as you tend to bend your knees slightly so it’s not the most effective crouching system.

I do like the feel of the controls in this game because it has weight to them, you really feel as if you’re dragging your feet through mud in some sections as you’re being shot at from every angle. The only thing I don’t like about the controls are the forced six axis motion control quick time events who came up with the notion of turning a valve by twisting the controller needs to pull the shrapnel out their nose.

The game looks amazing and that is saying a lot because this game came out all the way back in 2009, a lot of games from that period don’t usually age well however Killzone still has a lot of detail that I can happily look at today. The character models of the Helgast look fantastic with their glowing eyes in the distance that almost strikes fear into you as you see the coming dangers.

There is one major thing I hated about this game and that is the final encounter with Radec. The reason why I hate this encounter is that there is a huge difficulty spike, checkpoints are far and few and the fact that he has soldiers backing him up makes it very frustrating. It’s an unfortunate end to an otherwise great game.


Killzone 2 is an excellent shooter for the PlayStation 3 and is a must play if you haven’t played it pick it up it’s ridiculously cheap these days I picked up my copy for £1. 

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