Welcome back to the planets of Helghan and Vekta that has caused
millions of causalities between the Interplanetary Strategic
Alliance (ISA) and the dreaded Helghast. However in this
instalment of the game, you play a ruthless mercenary named
Arran Danner, working for both sides of the war in order to rake
in the cash. However on one fateful day, you soon discover that
something may severely change the future and whether it's for
good or bad, only time will tell.
Welcome back to Killzone and this time, PlayStation Vita owners
can experience one of the best damn first person shooters to be
released on this console, including every other portable device.
Developers Guerrilla Games have really thought outside the box
in their current game and have successfully managed to use the
PS Vita features to its advantage from touch screen navigation
and even in-game voice chat.
Killzone Mercenary features a very strong campaign mode and
although it is a little clichéd and over the top at times, it
successfully bridges the various Killzone games and creates a
thoroughly entertaining experience. What I enjoyed about the
gameplay was the ability to fight both the ISA and the Helghast
and the carefully scripted missions and objectives that worked
flawlessly on the PS Vita.
Before starting the game, players can customise their loadouts
and chop and change between various armours, weapons (primary
and secondary). My favourite weapon in the entire game was the
shotgun which literally smashed by opponents into whatever never
world was the afterlife for the both the ISA and the Helghast.
In terms of single-player, the player has access to a variety of
contracts that need to be completed, each with a set number of
objectives and lots of combat thrown in for good measures. The
game is also quite violent and gory!
I also enjoyed some of the epic endings of missions where
you literally obliterate the enemy and then just vanish like a
ghost at the end. It's classic Killzone at its best. Fans of the
series will be pleased with the Valor cards that score the
player on how well they completed set objectives, kills and missions.
Of course, money is the key to success in Killzone Mercenary and
depending on your skill set, you can make quite a large amount
of cash that can then be used to purchase a variety of weapons
and Vanguards. Vanguards are similar to the special bonuses that
your characters had access to in Call of Duty where you can
unleash a devastating attack on your enemy from just a tap of
the screen.
As mentioned, Guerrilla Games have really fine tuned the gaming
mechanics on the PS Vita and really transcends the first person
shooter to an almost PlayStation 3 experience in relation to how
smooth the controls are. It also helps that the PS Vita has a
large screen which really makes the combat quite close and
personal at times. Another new instalment in the PS Vita version
are the deadly melee attacks that is triggered by a variety of
swipes from your screen which also triggers some brutal
finishing manoeuvres.
Apart from single player, Killzone Mercenary features a very
competent online experience with three gaming modes that include
Mercenary Warfare, Guerrilla Warfare and Warzone. Mercenary
Warfare is pure chaos as ever gamer attempts to score the most
money for the win. Guerrilla Warfare is classic team deathmatch
and the team to get 40 kills within the allocated 10 minutes of
time wins. Lastly, we have Warzone that requires the players to
complete a set number of objectives that have been broken down
into several character classes. Warzone is easily my favourite
mode as it requires more strategy than just gun-ho valour.
Graphics/Sound
Graphically, Killzone Mercenary is one of the best looking games
on the PS Vita with some great attention to detail. The
character models, textures, backgrounds and special effects are
almost to die for on this portable console. The graphics are
very reminiscent of the PlayStation3 version and there are no
complaints at all, even the frame rate is quite acceptable.
Sound effects, music and voice acting is equally as good and
really enhance the overall gameplay.
Final Level?
Killzone Mercenary is definitely the game that the PlayStation
Vita needed and boasts the best first person shooter
experience on a portable system. From exceptional graphics,
almost flawless gameplay, Killzone Mercenary just gets better
and better which each play as there's always something to find
while you are playing.
It's definitely a title that the
gaming
community will embrace!
