Gameplay

Button mashing

Not having to turn on Focus is probably a good thing, too, since it’s so poorly realized. Control in the game is a little tricky even at the best of times, thanks to an overly frisky camera that likes to show the back of your head more than the people shooting at it. But the screen-blurring effects that occur when you turn on the ability to run up walls and slow bullets to spinning streams of air turn your character into an automaton. The one saving grace is that all of your groovy kung-fu moves are automatic. You don’t need to really know what you’re doing, as long as you can hammer the mouse buttons with some sort of rhythm.

Product placement

Come on baby, light my fire

Cops under cover

Still, this means that you can’t think tactically, or try moves more complex than running up the side of a wall. While everything does slow down in Focus mode, you appear to be in multiple places at the same time, and the camera can’t handle this. It jerks all over the place, inducing first frustration, then nausea, and finally “Who the hell cares?” as you give up and click the punch and kick buttons as fast as possible while pushing the mouse all over the place.

Reloaded

These atrocious controls make me somewhat glad that there is no challenge here. Master the game’s click-fu and you just have to run from Point A to Point B in every level, watch the cutscenes, and wait for the inevitable end teaser for The Matrix Reloaded. There’s an inevitability about your progression in this game that mimics a flim spooling to the end of its reel. And that’s hardly a positive here, unless you’re a Matrix geek who wants to get to the end as quickly as possible just to see how the game’s plot points tie in with those featured in the movie.

Hide and shoot

It's no GTA III

GTO cruisin'

Aside from the single-player missions, there isn’t anything here of import. There is no multiplayer mode, no cooperative option, no way to modify or change anything with a groovy editor. The only accessory worth even a glance is Hacking, a feature you can call up after you start your explorations into the Matrix and have a save game to load. But even this is more style than substance. Click on it and you’re presented with a command-line interface where you can type in all sorts of console-style code gobbledygook to add weapons to certain levels and unlock secrets about the making of the game and movie series. Even if you were the sort of person to care about such things, you’d have a hard time seeing the point here. First of all, the game is so easy that you won’t need to hack any of the levels. Second, all of the other crap will undoubtedly be on the special edition DVD by Christmas. Besides, isn’t this sort of thing best left to another media format? This is supposed to be a game, right?