What a strange trajectory the Watchmen property has taken, to begin as the (not a, the) groundbreaking and thought-provoking comic series of the 80s and end up here, as it will, in an episodic brawling game based on a movie with one of the most tortured development cycles in history. How did we get here? Where even are we?
Watchmen: The End is Nigh, or rather the small amount of it I got to sample, didn’t seem to have the answer. It comes on the fully modernized digital distribution system, yet feels like it comes from another time. Several other times, actually—the simply animated comic panel cutscenes, which were vetted by original series artist and co-creator Dave Gibbons, bring the feel of 80s comic design and contrast well with the slick in-game graphics. The split-screen local multiplayer is a blast from the recent past. Both are welcome.
Other parts are less inviting. In this build the controls were rather floaty, a sense of imprecision exacerbated by a pre-loaded combo system that made reaction feel sluggish in tense situations. Gameplay was simple to the point of anachronism.
Maybe that is the point—retro-styled gaming has worked on Xbox Live Arcade, over and over again, for years. Maybe the game is supposed to feel old in places, dog-eared, like a graphic novel from 1987. I guess what I’m saying is, I don’t know what the point is. I could come up with arguments as to why showing Rorschach and Nite Owl in their good old days, as this game does, is a good idea (showing who these characters wanted to be in their flapper days provides strong contrast to who they proved to be when everything went bad). I could try to explain why putting these characters in an old-school brawler makes sense (that they were based on characters from an earlier era and are now themselves characters from an earlier era, and games like The Warriors showed that putting such iconic classic characters into a likewise classic-feeling game style has a curious synergy). I don’t think these are terrible arguments, but for some reason I remain unconvinced.
The game, in its full form, could well provide its own reasons for its existence. Just the fact that Watchmen: The End is Nigh is a multiplatform episodic game with retail-level production values despite being digitally distributed makes it, at the very least, a market pioneer. And it could, priced properly, make for an evening of goofy fun with a buddy. But it’s an odd duck, and no one would blame you if you stayed cautious around it.
Note: This hands-on preview was conducted at an event hosted and with conditions controlled by the publisher.
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