Saturday, October 2, 1999

G-Police 2 - Weapons of Justice
Runs on: PlayStation
Category: Action
Players: 1
Developer: Psygnosis
Distributor: Sony
Price: $79.95
Classification: G8
Rating: Three stars

The future for humanity is not bright, if we are to believe most game developers. The new millennium is not the hoped-for Age of Aquarius with free love and mung beans for all, but a war-torn, anarchic time when giant corporations ride roughshod over individual liberties. Space travel in sleek transport seems the only consolation.

G-Police 2 employs that perennial dark-techno future storyline, communicated through impressive computer-animated scenes. The plot's a little confusing, though, and none-too compelling - all you need to know is you're flying a futuristic hover fighter on increasingly dangerous missions to take out the various bad guys.

The original G-Police evidently sold well enough to warrant a sequel, even though the controls were extremely touchy and there were many gameplay and graphics flaws. G-Police 2 fixes up most problems but the fiddly controls remain. It takes persistence to master the Havoc gunship, and then G-Police 2 gives you the added challenge of controlling a Raptor robot and deep-space fighter.

However, there are some excellent weapons and with 35 missions, it will keep action fans tied up for some time. It's definitely a case of try before you buy, though - G-Police 2 is just as likely to frustrate as entertain.

Endgame: An improvement over the first game but the fiddly controls and repetitive nature of the gameplay and graphics won't attract much more than the hardcore. - Stuart Clarke

Stuart Clarke reviews PC games on a Compaq Presario 4830: Pentium II 266MHz 64Mb. Games performance can be affected by computer speed.