Monday, October 30, 2006

Justice League Heroes

I beat Justice League Heroes on PS2 yesterday. It only took me about a week on the regular setting. If I had been more dedicated, I could have beaten it in a weekend. I had been looking forward to this game's release for a long time, but I know not to get my hopes up about comicbook-based games.

This game is reasonably fun, but way too easy. There are some hard parts, but they are more tedious and boring than hard. It's a birds-eye dungeon-style game. You get to enhance your team's abilities and make stronger heroes. The good thing is that there is a continuous play feature that allows you to start the game over again using the same team from your completed game. I like this. Now I can get my money's worth. So I am now about a third of the way through the game on difficult mode, and I get to try out some characters I didn't have time to use the first time around.

The characters are Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern (John Stewart), Flash, Martian Manhunter and Zatanna. Then there are some unlockable characters that you can buy: Aquaman, Green Arrow, Huntress(?!), Hawkgirl, Hal Jordan and Kyle Rayner. I haven't unlocked the last two yet, but I've heard that there is no difference between them and John Stewart. Apparantly they even use the same voice. That's crap.

The voice acting is mostly good. Superman's voice is great. Batman's sounds a little sleepy and bored. Martian Manhunter's voice is ok, but he says things that make him sound like a robot. That's a Manhunter pet peeve of mine. ("I can't use my powers at this intensity indefinitely"). Like, he's a Martian. He isn't Data. Zatanna's voice is grating. It's very valley girl. And they all repeat annoying catch phrases a million times throughout the game. I had to hit mute a few times to keep myself sane (Although I could listen to Batman say "Just...give me a second to...catch my breath" all day).

You always play with two heroes on every level. Sometimes you get to choose which heroes to play with, but usually it's decided for you. If you get to choose, I recommend having Zatanna as one of them and letting the computer play as her. She has the ability to heal her teammates, and that's useful. She also has a pretty vicious fireball attack that she throws around.

For the most part, Wonder Woman is the best because she's very powerful and she has those awesome wristbands that deflect bullets. You can deflect bullets and lasers in any direction, and that's fun. Her lasso also gives you a lot of long-range attacks. Superman, as you can imagine, is pretty useful too. Basically you can't go wrong if you choose those two for any level. (Though it is annoying that everything hurts Superman. I guess it wouldn't be very challenging otherwise).

Superman says "ass" at one point in the game (as in, he's going to kick some), and I think that's awesome.

I really liked the Batman Begins game. It was both fun and stunning to look at. Considering that games based on movies usually suck, it's especially impressive. This game is not as fun as Batman Begins. There are way too many points in the game where you have to do something boring and repetitive for a really long time to beat an enemy. The whole game leads up to fighting Darkseid. You get to choose 8 team members for this, but use two at a time. As each member dies, they get replaced with another until you beat Darkseid, or kill all 8 heroes. I beat Darkseid with my first two heroes. I didn't even have to dip into the reserves. That just seems way too easy for a final boss.

But, overall, I can think of worse ways to spend an afternoon than controlling the Justice League. And this certainly isn't bad as far as superhero-based video games go. I do like that I can keep playing the game over and over again on more difficult settings while building up my team. I didn't even get to use Aquaman or Hawkgirl at all the first time around.

Thumbs up! If you need any advice on how to beat something in this game, lemme know. I got pretty frustrated at a couple of points.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Having speculated on this game a couple of times in the past (August 2005 and May 2006), I do have a couple of questions: Does Valley-Girl Zatanna speak backwards? And does she mind-wipe any of her opponents (or teammates)?

rachelle said...

Zatanna does speak backwards when she casts spells. And when she does, her voice is much deeper and less annoying. She should talk like that all the time.
She actually manages to go a few hours without mindwiping anyone. It's not one of her powers in this game. J'onn has an attack that's sort of like a mind-wipe. Most of his attacks involve the brain.

Anonymous said...

What happens after you beat Darkseid?

Anonymous said...

I have always like New Game + as a feature in a game, but I can't ever bring myself buy this one. Marvel Ultimate Alliance is awesome and allows up to four characters to play with at one time, and you get to choose which four at all times! Alsohas New Game +. Maybe one day, I'll buy this game!

Tempted to check out Batman Begins, thanks for the suggestion!

You have such a great website!

Anonymous said...

If u think the game is easy, try the superhero difficulty...

Anonymous said...

Is it true that if you end up the game in the spuerhero difficulty you can unlock Supergirl and Black Canary?

Viagra said...

I played this game in Co-op with my best friend and we had a great time. yes it is kind of easy and when you get used to the controls and make a good team it is easier but still i made a good impression on both of us.

buy cialis said...

A video game?? that's wonderful,I really like the Justice league heroes, my favorite one is superman, I have read all the comics about them!