Destroy All Humans! Big Willy Unleashed

Smutty, amusing and very playable. but Big Willy doesn't do anything new. [Issue#20, p.82]

It's hackneyed and aged, but GTA-style games are a rarity on Wii, so you could do worse. [Apr 2008, p.77]

While it may seem to be geared toward gamers who just enjoy mindless shooters -- and would therefore be enticed by the game's title -- it will likely be more appreciated by seasoned gamers who can appreciate the game for it's great sense of humor. But aside from that, the largest flaw with Big Willy Unleashed is that it's just not a very innovative game.

So the game play isn't new or innovative - in fact fans of the series will find it to be a little too similar to the first two to be truly 'new.' But the one liners - the one liners almost make up for it. At one point we were laughing so hard we missed the police shooting at us and died, having to 'start over.'

Still, the actual act of destroying humans works rather well with the newly implemented motion controls. [Apr 2008, p.88]

Big Willy Unleashed is an interesting title to play, but it lacks the longevity of other sandbox titles like it.

Destroy All Humans! was a good game, as was the sequel, but this third one completely misses the panache, personality and polish that made the previous outings so fun.

Rather than taking an average game and making it fun like it was intended, it took a decent game and turned it to crap.

Multiplayer is about as weak as the in-game humor.

In the end it comes off as too uneven; any time I started enjoying myself too much, the game would smack me down with another boring mission or irritating control issue.

Wanton destruction is still a lot of fun -- I just hope that future installments innovate instead of sticking squarely to the foundations set by the original game. And please, next time around, give us multiplayer that feels like more than an afterthought.

A product that still harnesses the charm and comedic value of the other games, but lacks the polish and reliability of its predecessors. The environments are far too simple, with even the original Destroy All Humans trumping its visuals, the world is glitchy, and the IR control is made difficult by an inconsistent frame rate.

Wreaking havoc in the UFO and Big Willy mech is a blast, and there are several genuinely laugh out loud funny parts. In the end, however, its flaws keep it from living up to the example set by its predecessors.

Big Willy Unleashed lacks the humor of earlier installments, leaving its shallow and rehashed gameplay to fend for itself.

The Wii controls are absolutely atrocious and players will have a hard time swinging the reticule around during the on-foot action. Even flying your saucer or taking control of the impressive Big Willy mech is a tad awkward.

Destroy All Humans! Big Willy Unleashed has its heart in the right place – if it weren’t for the haphazard control and the aggravation that stems from it, this would actually be a good entry for new players and fans because it is a relatively funny game and maintains the spirit and conventions of the past games.

Destroy All Humans! Big Willy Unleashed is not going to restore this franchise to its former glory.

It’s worth trying out but it’s hard to recommend it at full price.

Playing this clumsy, ill-conceived attempt at a sequel is not unlike watching a kid with a 180 IQ flipping burgers at the local fast food joint; it's painful to watch what it has become, especially given what you knew its capabilities.

Oozed originality on PS2 a few years back but now feels stale. Wii controls are weak. [May 2008, p.56]

The entire package, whether it's boring fetch missions or jokes that fall flat, feels uninspired and rushed. [May 2008, p.95]

Although Destroy All Humans: Big Willy Unleashed shows a lot of potential – the few areas it misses are so detrimental to the gameplay that you would be better off giving this one a pass.

Newcomers to the series will enjoy the mindless destruction and blowing up people indiscriminately - I'm just getting tired of retreading old ground. [Apr 2008, p.70]

While mildly amusing to begin with, Big Willy Unleashed ultimately falls flat. Pox might go as far as to say his Big Willy is limp, but we're just disappointed that yet another Destroy All Humans! game has woefully underused the excellent idea behind the game.

While there are some fun effects and animations with the weaponry (I admit I still laugh every time an anal probe victim runs away from me clutching their rears), the graphics are surprisingly blocky and crude, even for a Wii game.

With clumsy and downright awkward controls, repetitive missions and mind boggling "who's doing what?!" multiplayer, I can't help but recommend the original Destroy All Humans over this game.

Its brevity doesn’t merit the fifty dollars you’ll have to shell out for it. The missions are a simplistic mishmash of killing, transporting, and exploration.

It’s definitely got some control issues, and some of the tasks get repetitive and boring, but there is fun to be had in this game.

In the end, Destroy All Humans: Big Willy Unleashed is a fun idea with poor implementation and some of the un-funniest moments ever captured in a videogame.

It's inherited all the original game's problems—a major feat, since it's developed by a whole new company—and lost some of its charm in the process.

Avoid Destroy All Humans: Big Willy Unleashed at pretty much all costs.

Mission design feels particularly lazy this time round, Locomotive seemingly jotting down amusing cutscene scenarios before finding tenuous ways of tying ‘destroy this’ or ‘abduct that’ tasks to the constant stream of ooh-er references to ‘big willies’ and ‘meat’ in the dialogue. [May 2008, p.97]

The biggest problem with Destroy All Humans!: Big Willy Unleashed isn't the terrible camera, the lacklustre graphics or the uninspiring mission structure; it is purely the way that this isn't a proper Destroy All Humans! game. Yes, you do destroy some humans, but the most fun aspect of the first two games has not been used enough here.

Big Willy Unleashed isn't a bad game; it just feels extremely watered-down. Perhaps it's because all the real effort is being put into Crypto's upcoming PS3 debut, but this feels like a pale imitation of the other DAH titles.

Seriously, this is a game that came out of the oven half baked.

Awful, just awful. It's a dirty, cheap, slapped-together cash-in title that's not woth the round plastic disc it comes on. [Apr 2008, p.92]

This might not be a highlight to bow out on, but it might be time for series to be put out to pasture, at least for a bit. Revamp the combat system, spruce up the looks, and come back with a script that entertains without going for the cheap jokes, and maybe you'll have something worth playing.

Big Willy Unleashed is toss. The controls make playing the game feel like trying to do the washing-up with a pair of chopsticks, using clogs instead of rubber gloves. It looks revolting. The script is appalling.