Activision’s attempt at revitalizing the crowd that fondly remembers the Nintendo 64 classic with Goldeneye 007: Reloaded is misguided, unnecessary even. No amount of high definition textures can save Goldeneye from feeling like a dated game, first-person shooters have moved away from singular-goaled level structure for bombastic, setpiece-moment trips where the objective tends to be weighted on the survival side as goals are removed and replaced dynamically. That said, Goldeneye provides a competent campaign that sparks moments of nostalgia, albeit frequently frustrates with tedious enemy encounters in between. But on the other side of things, what would have hopefully been the root of the most flashbacks to youth, the multiplayer, is rough and nearly unacceptable, at least from what I’ve played of it.
Goldeneye’s campaign both looks fine and plays fine, but that’s about as far as it goes. Each mission has a primary goal and an optional secondary goal, most of them requiring small tasks to be done multiple times, think “find seven pieces of intel” or “destroy all the servers in the server room.” Completing them is quite easy. Most of the stuff is nestled along the largely linear path taken throughout each level. Traversing the environments isn’t much fun either. But then again, not many other first-person shooters do it better. Points will be marked on the map, leading the way to spawn enemies. Not long after playing, a trigger-enemies-run-back-behind-cover routine will be the primary tool for the easiest progression. Thankfully enemies will never endlessly respawn. Most encounters leave room for the choice between a stealthy approach using strictly the silenced pistol or a rather loud approach using everything else at Bond’s disposal.
Stealth isn’t particularly difficult, enemy AI is dumb enough to stand in-place while taking multiple shots to the body without alerting anyone. A few levels feel more suited for the silent-types, like a jungle level that is littered with hackable turrets just waiting to mow down the idiots who put them there. The only time it feels necessary in other scenarios is to make dealing with larger groups much easier.
Once the realization of how generous the snap targeting is and how weak (and dumb) the enemies are, there is no hesitation to wildly pull the left trigger during hectic situations, quickly eradicating any threat, while little, of dying.
Goldeneye’s plot is largely the same as the originals, only slightly altered for modern weaponry and new gameplay. A Daniel Craig-played James Bond is trying to do the usual stopping of very evil guys doing very evil things. In this case, interrupting a series of nuclear weapons called “Goldeneye.” Along the way many things will explode, in what seemingly is a “me-too” ode to Call of Duty; many men will be shot (mostly on foot) and during a horrendous tank sequence too.
Also included is a Mi6 Ops mode, over 40 different single-player challenges that give a rating based on efficiency. Each map has customization enemy health, accuracy and the like, but none of these help to make the lack of other players entertaining. Only offering a few varying objectives like protecting consoles or murdering waves of enemies they are a lonesome Horde Mode, a desolate multiplayer match devoid of any sort of interesting strategy.
Looking back at the Nintendo 64 game, the true allure back then was its multiplayer, this time around though, it is a mess. Speaking from about an hour of play, I can tell you it’s a nightmare trying to find anyone playing, at first I would be quick to blame the recent release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, but I’ve talked with someone who has already reviewed the game and they reported the same issues. Simply getting to the matchmaking screen was plagued with consistent network errors that I’m almost certain are not on my end. With all the issues I had while attempting to review the multiplayer I only got to play a small amount of time, thus I don’t feel I can put much of a judgement on it. When I did get into a match and the lag wasn’t unbearable, it played very similarly to Call of Duty post-Modern Warfare: lots of sprinting, hit markers and larger open maps. Like the Nintendo 64 days, Goldeneye 007: Reloaded has zero weapon progression, it’s all customizable once the ability to create a loadout is available. It’s hard to say whether that’s a bad thing or not considering it’s a remake, but it certainly doesn’t offer the game any lasting power.
If true nostalgia is desired a four-player split-screen mode including all the classic characters is offered along with full customization of the match’s attributes like health, ammo, and of course, paintball mode (although I’m not sure why it’s not always on). The standard deathmatch, team deathmatch and other team-based objective modes are available, including the lauded Goldeneye mode where players fight over a golden gun that kills everyone in one shot.
Goldeneye 007: Reloaded suffers from an extreme case of identity crisis, it doesn’t know who to please and when. The campaign tries to ape the emergent feel of the bigger games on the market, while attempting to stay true to the feel of the original, but neither effort ends up pushing it far enough to succeed. The multiplayer seems to do the same things and ends up with the same disappointing outcome — not to mention the terrible swaths of network errors and lag. We’ve come to a point where Goldeneye has been superceded by Call of Duty, only lacking the James Bond allure, if that still exists. Despite being an acceptable modern remake, Goldeneye 007: Reloaded is proof that we should leave some classics untouched.
This review is based on a copy of the game provided to SideQuesting by the publisher.
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