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The Getaway - Extensive Review Review
Chris Leyton
05/12/2002
We put the big title from SCEE under close scrutiny...
Costing a reported £5million and taking the last three years to develop (including a cross-over from the PSOne), The Getaway has a lot of pressure on its shoulders to succeed when itās released in Europe on December 11th.
The first murmurings of the title came over two years ago, when the promise of epic production values akin to Hollywoodās finest coupled with innovative gameplay features and a fully-blown recreation of London, did much to spark everyoneās interest. This was a time before Grand Theft Auto and the recently released Vice City, a time when the game promised a glimpse to the true next-generation of videogames.
So has it succeeded? In most respects yes, The Getaway offers a tightly scripted cinematic experience that eclipses everything that has come before it; but unfortunately because of this and because of the lengthy development, games have simply advanced and the effect isnāt as overwhelming as the hype may have suggested.
The game is heavily based on the story; in fact at times The Getaway does feel like youāre taking place in the latest Guy Ritchie gangster flick. The story places you in control of Mark Hammond, an ex-crim who has recently served five years in jail for his work in the Soho based Collinsā gang. Deciding that a life of crime isnāt for him Mark returns to his wife and child, which is where the games introduction picks up. Leaving the house, members of a rival gang grab hold of Markās wife and kid, accidentally shooting his wife in the proceedings and speeding off with their child, desperately leaving Mark clutching his dying wife whilst vowing to rescue their child.
As far as story descriptions go thatās where Iāll finish, as describing the events would ruin the main appeal of the game; suffice to say Mark is blackmailed into performing a number of jobs around London in order to get his kid back, whilst the Flying Squad are on your trail for the suspected murder of your wife.
Half way through the game a rogue police member named Frank Carter will make himself known in the games story; after completing the first 12 missions youāll swap over to Frank and play as him through the game. This level of scripting is rarely seen in a videogame, itās almost Tarintino, as you encounter both sides of the coin, which certainly adds a unique dimension to the game that pulls you through the experience.
Anyone who has followed our previous coverage on this title will know that itās not a game for children; within the first hour of gameplay youāll have seen Mark beaten and bruised twice, a member of the Chinese Triad gang tied up and brutally beaten and the profanity counter rising to the hundreds. Although itās likely to outrage anyone who still holds the idea that videogames are for children and shouldnāt contain such violent images; the dialogue and scripting does half the job of creating the illusion, The Getaway is more like a movie then a videogame.
Itās thanks to the amazing cut-scenes that the game has such high production standards; characters look and move so convincingly, whilst the attention to detail is quite frankly ludicrous; smoke from cigars disperses realistically, bottles behind a bar all faithfully resemble the famous brands such as Stella Artois and Fosters, and thanks to some clever camera work the scenes do have that movie feel.
One of our biggest complaints is the obtrusive loading times that take place between cut-scenes and in-game action; to be fair weāre not too annoyed by loading times, but for a game that prides itself on itās cinematic nature, loading times almost cripple the illusion. If the game could merge seamlessly from cut-scene to in-game (as it suggests it will in the game) this would have been revolutionary, the Holy Grail of the videogames industry ā“ the Interactive Movie ā“ as it stands itās merely an action game with outstanding cut-scenes.
The actual game requires you to undertake a variety of āsuicide missionsā for one of the most notorious gangsters in London. This basically revolves around getting in a car, driving to the location and undertaking the mission.
The driving sections are brilliantly executed, thanks to a number of reasons.
For starters each of the 50+ licensed vehicles handle excellently and sufficiently different to one another, you only need to swap from a TVR to a Transit van to notice the attention Team SoHo have spent on each car. The cars have been geared to accentuate slides around corners in typical cop-chase action, it takes a little while to get used to, but soon youāll be handbraking around corners, whilst the cops career off the road into an oncoming double-decker bus, fantastic!
Itās also to do with the magnificent feat in recreating London that Team SoHo have performed; civilian traffic obeys the correct driving laws, big roads have the same congestion troubles that plague Londoners, whilst studying an A-Z reveals the staggering accuracy that Team SoHo have achieved. Not only are the typical London landmarks here such as Big Ben and Buckingham Palace, but also every shop from Tie Rack to McDonalds is here, where they should be and looking like they should. Itās this level of attention to detail that provides The Getaway strongest pull, although previous games have tried (Project Gotham Racing, MSR) no other game quite looks as authentic as The Getaway; they should be using this to teach black-cab drivers!
Taking the level of detail to new dimensions are the voices of secondary characters, as youād imagine hundreds of these populate the streets of London, but unlike GTA3 and Vice City their voice samples are all relevant to whatās going on; so when you drive off after crashing into a car, youāll see a bloke get out and scream āhey, wait I need your detailsā, whilst the CBās on policemen provide helpful information on their knowledge of your position, āMark Hammond last seen driving a Blue Saxo through Kings Crossā, the amount of speech in this game is unbelievable and again helps to immerse the player in the illusion that this is a living, breathing recreation of London.
Once youāve got to the location, youāll typically have to switch into action mode and usually dispose of anything that moves; some missions try to place importance on stealth but unfortunately the execution isnāt as good as it could have been. The controls during these sections are a mixed bag; both characters have a range of moves but nothing that we havenāt already seen before. Using the two right shoulder buttons, you can switch between auto and manual targeting; we had no real problems with this and found the auto-targeting to be swift and responsive, it takes too long to move when youāre in manual targeting but itās nothing to worry about as most of the action requires you to use auto targeting.
Both characters can crouch up against the wall, allowing them to whip around the corner and unload their weapons, or rather cunningly just put the tip of the weapon around to shoot without the risk of being shot, but at the cost of reduced accuracy. You can also roll, which allows the characters to roll into a sneak position, but unfortunately the execution of this is rather hit-and-miss. Other features include the ability to duck behind a small object and use it for cove using a similar technique to crouching against a wall, and grabbing hold of characters to use them as human shields.
To be honest the shooting aspect of the controls work well but moving the characters can provide problems and highlights the fact that thereās nothing new here, whilst the stealth sections draw attention to the stilted nature of the controls and the problems that these bring; the end result is that stealth missions and particularly a level when youāve got to dodge between laser-beams are more frustrating then they should be.
The strongest feature of these sections are once again the scripted events that lend a cinematic feel; blowing up barrels to destroy walkways or blowing walls up in a crack-whore house in the East End lends that big-budget feel, whilst getting stuck in a rival gang warzone ranks as one of those unforgettable videogame moments. But unfortunately thereās not enough variation in the mission objectives and the game does begin to get slightly monotonous after youāve done essentially the same thing over and over again: Drive to Point A ā“ Perform Mission Objective ā“ Drive to Point B; I know it was never meant to be a rival to GTA3 or Vice City, however the open-ended gameplay of these titles have shown the future of gaming and it would have been nice to see some of those elements in The Getaway.
Because of the games strict pacing and linearity, youāll rarely get to see the true extent of the painstaking detail that Team SoHo have implemented in creating London, youāre always in a rush to get to the location and hardly ever get to explore the town on foot. This is perhaps a good idea as there is very little areas of interest beyond the faithful recreation, we found ourselves wishing Team SoHo had stretched the boundaries and lamented the lack on interactivity in London; the London Eye (Ferris Wheel) is there, so why canāt you get on board and take people out from a prime position, why wasnāt the Underground system implemented, why, why, why???
Despite all the hype and our lofty expectations, The Getaway game design is rooted in pure guns blaring, old-school game design; it would have been fantastic if the developers could have stretched the genre slightly forward, for example during heated gun fights in a trendy London restaurant, why canāt you chuck tables over to use as cover?
Although they look spectacular and feature some great elements, the in-door locations feel very stilted and feature very little interactivity; coupled with the lack of innovation in Markās abilities and youāve got a good action game, but not quite the next-gen title that we were hoping for.
To heighten the cinematic nature of the game, Team SoHo decided to remove all icons and interfaces from the screen; this was an excellent decision and whilst thereās a few issues it does ultimately work. For starters to navigate your way through town your cars blinkers will flash to show which direction you should be heading, this has the adverse effect that a damaged car with no blinkers will be as helpful in directions as a Tourist whoās forgotten his A-Z! Regrettably there is no option to look behind when youāre driving, this would have been particularly handy, as once the cops and rival gangs get on your trail they are very hard to shake off as they aggressively pursue you, often taking innocent civilians out in the process, who said English coppers were soft?
As youāll notice there is no health icon, instead increasingly bigger patches of blood appear on Mark as youāre getting shot, whilst his walking and aiming take on a severe knock when heās not feeling too great. To top up his health youāve simply to stand alongside a wall and Mark will take a breathe and begin to replenish his health, great idea and thankfully the process has been speeded up from the preview build, but it does have the effect of stopping the flow of the game, as you stand there for what seems to be an eternity for Mark to top up his health, why couldnāt you just pop into shops to buy an energy drink or something!
A lot has already been said about the visuals, they are quite frankly amazing; to get the sheer scope of London onto the PS2 in this amount of detail is beyond us. To be fair the visuals take into account the speed at which you whiz through the game, when youāre hurtling down a street and 60MPH everything looks remarkable believable, itās only when you get out onto foot that you realise textures lack definition and are actually quite rough; certainly nowhere near to the high resolution renders that SCEE first released at the games announcement. However the illusion works because youāll hardly ever be on foot; unfortunately slowdown occasionally appears, but to be honest it doesnāt affect the game and is a big improvement on the previous times weāve seen the game in action.
The in-door locations up the ante and focus on detail; SCEE recently released a selection of pictures comparing the in-game locations to their real-life versions; the effect is striking and quite frankly scary.
Topping everything off is a musical score that just exudes that epic quality, perfectly setting the tone during cut-scenes and even the in-game action. Weāve already commented on the sheer amount of voice samples in this game (it is ludicrous) and special note must be paid to the quality of the dialogue and voice-acting, games that have put emphasis on naughty words in the past usually grate within 15 minutes, we still laugh every time we hear Mark call someone a āfu*cking muppetā (very English phrase) before blasting them with a shotgun.
