Beam
Breakers is one of the most pleasant surprises I have gotten all year.
The graphics are simply stunning and really draw you into the game. The
gameplay in Beam Breakers is a futuristic representation of the
"criminal in a huge city" genre that has become en vogue lately. Youll
fight rival gangs, destroy competing businesses, and run from the cops
in 57 missions that are definitely reminiscent of the Grand Theft Auto
and Driver series. This time, however, the vehicles of choice are hover
cars. It is pretty clear that Beam Breakers isnt the most original
game, but it is still a fun game that is worth checking out if youre
into racing or pretending youre in the mob.
Beam Breakers takes place in a futuristic New York City that has been
renamed Neo York City (Neo York means future New York and City means
city). The city is broken up into five different sections such as
Chinatown and Little Italy. Each section of the city is fairly large and
is filled with thousands of other hover cars that make up layer upon
layer of traffic.
There
are several modes in Beam Breakers, but some are better than others.
Missions involve doing everything from delivering pizzas to stealing
other hovercraft. Championship is a straight racing mode and is probably
the most fun of all of the modes in Beam Breakers. Survival mode pits
you against the police of Neo York and you have to try and survive as
long as possible. To put it simply, this mode sucks because it doesnt
really have a point and the police are tenacious bastards and beat you
down rather quickly. Observation mode allows you to explore each section
of the city without worrying about the police or dealing with a time
limit. There is also a multiplayer mode available.
You start the Mission mode out as a pizza delivery boy and eventually
you work your way up to missions that are or higher priority to your
crime boss. The pizza missions are simple affairs that require you to
shoot pizzas into big glowing icons and arent ever too difficult. In
Theft missions, it is your job to locate and steal a car from a rival
gang. It isnt anything like in GTA where you can enter and exit
vehicles at will, however, and instead consists of simply reaching a
certain area and then getting into the new car automatically.
Destruction missions require you to destroy restaurants and small cafes.
Chasing missions are all out hover car combat where you have to chase
down and destroy a rival gang member. At the end of each section of the
game, you get to race through the skyways of Neo York. Throughout the
Mission mode, you will unlock new cars and other goodies such as new
navigation systems or improved turbo units that go a long way in helping
you win races. Overall, the mission mode is a lot of fun, but because
there are only a handful of different mission types, the game can become
repetitive. Some of the missions are made difficult due to strict time
limits, but overall the game isnt too hard.
The
Championship mode is a simple racing circuit that pretty much rocks.
When you begin, you have to join one of five gangs and then race under
their colors in races to determine who is the dominant force in Neo York
City. The races themselves occur right in the thick of traffic and
avoiding the hundreds of oncoming vehicles while at the same time making
sure you hit every checkpoint is pretty exciting. The path the race
follows glows bright green, which makes the races a lot easier to
follow, but you can also turn the path off entirely or just have it show
up in the corners. The races are a great addition to Beam Breakers, and
along with the Mission mode, make up a game that has quite a bit to
offer. The other modes are a bit of a disappointment, but Championship
and Mission are worth checking out Beam Breakers for.
Controlling your vehicle is possible with the keyboard, but I prefer
a gamepad. The cars exist in a 3-D world and the amount of vertical
space available for you to play around in is pretty impressive. The cars
handle pretty much how you would expect a hover car to, which is sort of
floaty, but you never feel like you arent in control. The cars are very
responsive and a heck of a lot of fun to drive, to be perfectly honest.
The game handles like a dream.
Graphically,
Beam Breakers is gorgeous. The cars you get to play with are nicely
detailed, and even the thousands (and I mean thousands) of cars that
make up the endless lines of traffic have a surprising amount of detail
as well. When you plow your vehicle into the traffic, the other cars
will actually make an effort to swerve around you in a fairly convincing
manner. The city is also very detailed. Sure, a lot of the buildings
look alike, but there are little billboards and signs covering
everything and even little texture maps pasted on some of the windows to
represent the building interiors. There are little cafes and public
areas dotting the landscape as well as tiny little people running around
pretty much everywhere. The sunshine is bright and almost blinding at
points and the traffic in the nighttime levels looks like brilliantly
lit up flowing rivers of light. There is also rain in certain levels and
even that manages to impress. The frame rate remains constant all the
way through--an amazing feat considering just how much stuff is going on
all at once. The system requirements are very reasonable as well. Beam
Breakers is a surprisingly detailed game and it looks marvelous.
The sound, on the other hand, is just plain bad. The music is typical
"futuristic music", i.e. techno raver BS. There arent really that many
sound effects and the sounds you would expect in a busy city are almost
nonexistent. Cars honk and your hover car has a simple engine noise, and
thats about it. The voice acting in the missions is equally horrible.
Why oh why can a game look so good but sound this bad?
Overall, Beam Breakers is a fun racing game with some interesting
missions thrown in for those of us who want a peek into the future of
crime videogames. The cars control extremely well and it is simply a joy
to cruise around the different districts of Neo York City. The graphics
are awesome and surprisingly detailed. Some modes arent as fun as
others, and the online multiplayer leaves something to be desired, but
Beam Breakers is still worth checking out.