RENT THIS, DO NOT BUY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The difference between Chaos Bleeds and the original Xbox Buffy game is perplexing. Some cool stuff added, but far too much taken away to the point of aggravation. I have a long list of gripes and here we go: The camera sucks. You will notice this right away and while you learn to manage it you will always be frustrated by it. The camera RENT THIS, DO NOT BUY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The difference between Chaos Bleeds and the original Xbox Buffy game is perplexing. Some cool stuff added, but far too much taken away to the point of aggravation. I have a long list of gripes and here we go: The camera sucks. You will notice this right away and while you learn to manage it you will always be frustrated by it. The camera CONSTANTLY gets stuck on walls, barriers, lamp posts, trees. You name it, the camera will snafu on it. You'll find yourself running in larger than normal circles when turning just to give the camera the 18 wheeler breadth it needs to maneuver around. The original Buffy camera was great, you could look all around (this camera won't let you look up), it never got stuck on things. I personally would rather have the camera clip through my character when I'm close to a wall than get pummeled to death by enemies I can't see because they've backed me into a corner. Two thumbs and two hairy hobbit toes down for this atrocity inflicted upon us poor wanna-Buffy-bes. The story sucks. They hodge podged a bunch of eps together trying to make the story affect all the characters personally by having each level big bad be that character's worst personal nightmare. While the story trick they used to do this wasn't half bad the delivery was weak in the extreme. Especially since after the first one or two you pretty much know exactly what's coming for the next character in the level queue. All the Buffy troupe would be dead. Every level you start with nothing. Buffy the VAMPIRE Slayer not once starts a level with a stake. So invariably you spend the first minute or so running around while being chased by vamps kicking at your heels just trying to find a pointy splinter to gank them with. That sucks and takes me completely out of any suspension of disbelief. Slayers and Slayerettes come prepared and not starting with even the most basic of weapons needed for the myriad of vamps you will face is cow dung. Run around puzzles plus repeated monster respawn equals frustration and desire to strangle game developers. I like puzzle games, I don't mind significant respawn in some games. But combining the two is frustration city. You constantly are running from area to area trying to figure something out or recover a mystic mojo rock that opens the way and the entire time monsters are spawning at each junction change. Sorry but that pisses me off. If I'm going to get into a good puzzle and have to run all over creation (as you often do in this game even when you know where you're going) I don't want to also be having my health widdled down after I pass spawn point after spawn point just trying to figure out where to go next. In the previous game it didn't feel like the bad guys came out of nowhere like they do in this one, and when you cleared an area you cleared an area. Which means you could then feel like you had the breather to figure things out if you needed to. Here, no such luck. You are under constant assault in this one and the puzzles are much more intricate and complex (and in many cases make absolutely no common sense because of it, I'd give examples but I don't want to give stuff away for you RENTERS out there). Video games ARE NOT movies. So you director-must-have-final-cut-don't-mess-with-my-vision-yo-yos get the hell out of the industry whose creations I love. I don't want to sit through FOUR (I count fox and fox interactive as two because they take so gorram long) company logos every time I put the disc in without being able to bypass them. Places where I should have more control I don't. Character selection for one. I know it doesn't fit into your "story" of the game to be able to play any character on any level but we already went over how great your "story" is. I want choice. I want to be able to use that all mighty redheaded goddess to mash monsters all the way through if I so choose. That way I can stay with and be invested in a character which is a huge thing this game missed. I believe most players and Buffy fans would agree we love to have a game where we can play almost all of the Buffy gang. However, I don't think I'll be alone in saying I want to choose what Slayer or Slayerette I am and stick with that character. And that's the big diff between video games and movies. Movies all the choices are made for us and we're just along for the ride. Video games we make our individual ride within the framework the game makers provide. Being constantly jerked around through six different characters didn't do it for me. Especially when I only get to play the most powerful one for one and a half missions out of twelve. The fighting system lost more than it gained. The one nice thing added to it was the quick draw stake button. However you gained this at the loss of the pausing inventory select system from the first game. So while you can instantly pull a stake without breaking the flow trying using any of your other items. You'll be sifting through the menus running in circles while the respawned vamps chase you the whole time. Also the block button has been moved to make it less convenient (at least on the old school Xbox controller). Now you have to reach for the little white button instead of just pulling the right trigger like in the good ole days. Also blocks stop everything but sweeps, they even stop throws which they didn't used to do. Which is good or bad depending on your POV. You have all the slayer moves right from the get go but many of them are gimped and less useful than in the previous game. For instance Buffy's matrix kick only goes off with up up kick. It used to go off based on the direction Buffy was facing meaning it might be down down kick or downright downright kick and based on facing you can get a matrix kick. Now basically you can only do this kick if you are heading straight at a bad guy who you obviously see running toward you and believe me, they always block. Next, the spin kick is somewhat easier to get off this time around but its range and power appear severely diminished. It used to be THE oh my god I'm in the shize and need to knock everybody the f back so I have a moment. Not anymore. Throws, once a wonderful multibadguy fight saver are also SEVERELY hampered. With a slant of the thumbstick you used to be able to direct which way you tossed those poor undead saps, hence chuck one bad guy into another or a bad guy off a cliff to his doom. Now when you grab someone you only ever throw them straight backwards. So again a once useful tool when surrounded now gimped into pointlessness. Additionally in the new Buffy game those crazy vamps seem to have hearts all over the place. I've staked them in the big toe and watched them dust. The old game you had to distinctly go for the upper body. Staking to a certain degree was a skill like anything else. Oh well, so much for that. The fighting system really plays so badly that despite appearances of using the same or similar engine I wonder if any of the developers even played the first game or playtested this one at all to figure if they were indeed making a worthy sequel. Too much to expect I guess with the series having drawn to a close. It does not save at checkpoints. You can only continue from a checkpoint within a level if you haven't turned the machine off. What can I say about that except wtf? Twice on my older xbox the disc glitched out on me in the boss fight and I had to replay the entire level. That sucks. It should save by checkpoint like just about every other console adventure game out there. If it's a cross platform compatibility or taking up memory space issue then you should at least have the choice on how you want to save. Again movie vs. video game mentality. I have to play through an entire level/episode rather than be able to go back and replay the one great fight/scene I want. There I've pissed and moaned so now I'll get to the few good things I have to say: Willow rocks. The Buffyverse made her the only season finale nemesis to quite roundly and resolutely kick the Slayer's skeletal petuutee from here to Kansas and the video game version of this Wicca-be-bad-ass is no different. First off, you never take damage, because of the wonderful shield spell that's like stoneskin on steroids. It never times out, only disappears due to damage taken (which is damage you didn't take). You also appear to regenerate mana at an insane rate while you have your shield up. Which is grand cause you have quite the arsenal to choose from. The not starting with a stake problem doesn't make a diff with her Willowness because she shoots fireballs. Two quick fireballs and goodbye vampy (fireballs can't be blocked by the way). Being chased by a vamp, no problemo, pop off a homing fireball and listen to him dust behind you. Surrounded and being pummeled, that's okay, either sonic blast them to knock them on their butts and then do a quick run and stake job or sunburst them if you have the mana and you don't even need to worry about the splinters. Bored of fighting the endlessly respawning groups of bad guys? Give your sexy Willow wink via a possession spell, watch them fight each other, then when all their hit points are low enough, send a homing fireball through the bunch. Willow gives death on a stick a whole new ballpark as she rightfully should. A character like her makes me really wish Unseen didn't get trashed in development. The end bosses while storywise kind of lame gameplay wise are pretty darn nifty. One great fight scenario involved pentagrams, a magic hat, and lots of dead bunnies. Wonderful bit right there (which I would replay a number of times if I didn't have to redo the whole level to get to it). The first game had a fair number of bad guys that were direct combat punch punch kill kill, in this one almost every bad guy has some trick you need to pull on it. Which again is both good and bad. Unfortunately the respawn problem is present in the boss fights as well so you'll often be running around trying to figure out what to do while not having enough time to think or look around with the mangled camera system due to respawning bad guys (have I beaten those dead horsed). So in conclusion I would say Chaos Bleeds is a deeply flawed creation that still manages to be both fun and frustrating to varying degrees. It affected me enough to write my first ever user review so that's got to say something. And with finality I say again, RENT, DON'T BUY!!!!!!!!! If you have comments, critiques or just want to say, "Sod off, you dog shaggin' berk!" then send them to: goatofdeath@DIESPAMDIE.usa.com… Expand
Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Chaos BleedsYour Score0 out of 10User Score
