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Headhunter Preview

Mark Simons

00/12/0000

Possibly the last swan-song for the dreamcast. A rival to Solid Snake ???

Headhunter has been a rather mysterious title, first making an appearance at E3 2000. Little was known about the game, other than it looked very cool indeed. Quite how cool this game looked only became apparent in the recently released screenshots, which showed that Swedish developers Amuze really know how to use the Dreamcast. Now in one fell swoop Headhunter has gone from a cool looking but mysterious game to being hailed as the Dreamcastâs answer to Metal Gear Solid 2, and from what we know this is probably the best comparison to draw at the moment.

The hero of Headhunter, Jack Wade, is firmly rooted in the badass school of heroes, he rides a motorbike, wears sunglasses all of the time and looks extremely cool in a flack jacket sporting a gun. Set in the near future where the American government is cracking down on indecency and general unsavoury nature of society by having very strong censorship laws and media control. For some reason this totalitarian style government hires in its law enforcement, which seems a bit odd but it does allow you to be a government hired mercenary, which of course affords you more opportunity for doing things your way. Although of course your first duty is to yourself, and that means getting the job done, whatever the cost so you can get your cash, because of course nothing else matters to a man like Jack Wade, or could we see a different side of Jack emerge throughout the story? Who knows?

So far Headhunter resembles Metal Gear Solid most closely in the action and stealth sections of the game. The same sort of sneaking and shooting style of game seems to be the order of the day here, although it does look like there could be more examining of the environments to find clues, although this is just speculation. These sections of the game look stunning, characters are detailed and the locations are vast and decorated with some lovely texture works. The scale of the outdoor sections as well as the impressive rain and shadow effects show that weâve not seen everything the Dreamcast can do just yet.

Going hand-in-hand with the main part of the game there is also a very cool looking motorbike area to the game. Jack has the ability to roam the cities he works in on his bike, the scale here is very impressive and the cities are of course populated by civilians and criminals alike. Quite how this section of the game fits in with the distinctly different style of the action and stealth sections remains to be seen. Although it would be cool to ride across the city to the docks and then hop off the bike and embark on an infiltration mission, although whether this can be done in the game is not actually known at this stage.

Interestingly the game will have an online multi-player mode although this is an eight-player motorbike race rather than a deathmatch, which we feel like Deus Ex, would take away from the style, technique and seriousness of the one-player game. Another interesting feature is to use the VMU to act as a pager for Jack so you can receive messages relating to the mission or other issues as you play.

Headhunter is fast shaping up to be one of the years best Dreamcast titles and although it is not likely to get the mainstream attention of some high profile titles on other formats, it could well be a gem of a game that will delight Dreamcast owners. Quite when we will be able to get a hands-on with the game is not known as the release date is the end of this year, but it seems safe to assume that some sort of appearance at E3 will happen.