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The game starts off with a video clip from the King Kong movie trailer to set the stage. We learn that Carl Denham (Jack Black) has plans to make next his film on-location at an exotic island. Of course, in classic Hollywood fashion, things go horribly wrong and the games starts off with you in the life boat making your way to shore. With the exception of the very first video clip, the rest of the game is done entirely in real-time with virtually all cutscenes being played through the first person perspective.

Sometimes the game looks like this…

...or this

.. but most of the time, it looks like this…

...and this!

At its core, the game is a first person shooter, but it plays more like a story-driven action-adventure game. Like the other first person shooter for the Xbox 360, Perfect Dark Zero, King Kong does not allow you to jump. The gameplay mechanics of King Kong bring in unique elements which make it its own game, and it some ways, its own genre. The very first thing you realize is that there is no HUD to distract the gamer. There's no targeting crosshair, no health bar, nor a number telling you how many bullets you have left. Unlike a game like Jurassic Park: Trespasser (which had no formal health bar either), it actually works in this game. Whenever you're injured, the screen turns dim and everything turns blurry red. The sounds of jungle suddenly get quiet and all you hear is the muffled screams of your team members, your racing heartheart, and your shallow breaths. If you're attacked again in this state, you'll die – if you can survive for a short while, you'll recover. In this disorienting state, it can be tough to find and hit whatever monster is going after you though. It generates real panic.

Since consoles FPS aren't intended to be precision shooters, King Kong gets away without offering any crosshairs. For weapons such as the pistol or shotgun, you just have to point in the right direction and hope that you hit your target. With each shot, you get some shrapnel or other visual cue to give you a sense of where the bullet is headed. This allows you to very easily make the micro-corrections to your aim. From the text description, it either sounds like it'd either be too tough or too easy, but that's definitely not the case. You still have to aim, but after a few levels of the system, you get the hang of it. Of course, certain weapons such as the sniper rifle allow you to use the scope.

Kong

Ubisoft Montpellier had the incredible epiphany that knowing the exact number of bullets you had wasn't that important. Do I really care if I have 50 bullets or 48 bullets? Not really. But the difference between 1 bullets versus 3 bullets is huge. In this game, you can press a button to hear your player give a verbal cue to how much ammo he has left. You might hear yourself saying that you have plenty of ammo left, or 2 magazines left, or even 4 bullets left. The system works very well.