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 (Ever wanted to play as [i] EVERY ETHNICITY AT ONCE?[/i])
[i]CLASSIC GAMING[/i]
Beyond Good & Evil
Developer: Ubisoft
Publisher: Ubisoft
Genre: Action-Adventure
Year: 2003
System: PS2/Xbox/Gamecube/PC
Ubisoft have always been known for a rather odd plethora of titles they both create and publish. Rayman, Assassin's Creed, Peter Jackson's King Kong, they're a company who rarely stay within one single definition via their almost insistent output upon the difficult-to-define action-adventure genre, used to cover a range of games they make of late.
One such game however flew under the radar of many gamers despite having been critically lauded for trying to be different. One game that just recently got rereleased in HD onto Xbox Live for only 800 Microsoft Points. So I bet you're wondering, is it worth buying? Lemme tell ya.
Story - Beyond Good & Evil takes place within a planet called Hillys, where a variety of creatures such as humans, anthropomorphic pigs, sharks, goats and cows all live together under the protection of the Alpha Sections, dutifully keeping them safe within a climate of fear from a terrible alien threat known as the Domz.
However, after one particularly fierce attack, a young professional photographer known as Jade soon becomes wrapped up within a conspiracy. Allying with an underground network in a desperate attempt to keep both her world and her orphanage safe from the Domz, Jade and her uncle Pey'j head deeper into a conspiracy that extends to beyond their own atmosphere.
 (The dude on the left is Pey'j. You will love him)
Gameplay - The game takes on a rather Zelda-like twist on things gameplay wise concerning both exploration and combat. Firstly there is the exploration of the world itself.
Jade can walk or run like anybody else as well as jump a little bit but nothing dramatic. The world of Hillys itself can be explored either on foot or through a vehicle such as the hovercraft which will essentially become your main transportation for around 3/4 of the game, traversing the world of Hillys and all its islands, as well as the main canal city.
The other big thing of the game is its focus on two things. Photography and stealth. For the most part, you'll be sneaking around places you shouldn't be in, avoiding a variety of laser traps, guards, robots and the local fauna, most of which can be dealt with either by your weapon or by the environment around you, such as smashing a robot into an electrical fence.
Photography is the other big thing of the game concerning two parts. Firstly the main game itself in collecting evidence of the conspiracy that ensnares Hillys into its web, the main reason why Jade is sneaking into various illicit facilities. It starts out with showing your skills as a photographer for wildlife, before you are soon recruited for something less innocent, but just as noble.
The other big thing involving photography is actually a sidequest that covers the entire game, assisting a census bureau in photographing every single plant and animal that exists on Hillys, with each completed roll of film netting you a reward. However, Jade is not only a photographer but also an ass-kicking practitioner of the Dai-Jo staff, able to defend herself from most enemies with a combo system even more simplistic than that of Starfox Adventures, as well as a charge-up attack that hurts enemies within her radius.
 (1/5th of the game however is just a frickin' bug hunt, man)
Combat in the game is pretty damn simple. The only real variety Jade can pull off in her moves, is if she's crowded by enemies (and you will be, regularly). As such, moving her in the direction of one enemy will make her keep attacking, essentially allowing you to string out an insanely long combo as long as enemies are encroaching upon you, or you can just play it safe and keep killing one after the other in a less cool style.
Jade also has two allies in the game who generally assist her with combat and progressing. In combat, both allies can occasionally attack, as well as use a Super Action whenever you ask, which is basically a ground slam that throws enemies into the air and allows Jade to Matrix-kick some motherfuckers right into the wall. Believe me, you'll be using that a lot. The camera is very good to you concerning combat most of the time with a simple lock-on feature that Jade does automatically, but concerning exploration....well, just don't expect perfection.
The allies are generally very reliable other than the fact they may not be as aggressive as you concerning battle. They are however helpful in helping you progress. They will go on switches when told to do so, they automatically assist you in pushing heavy objects, and they have their special actions such as boosting you to higher spots or breaking down doors.
Health also plays like Zelda in this game, except instead of Heart Containers you have PA-1s, which are basically sci-fi Heart Containers.
 (This screenshot alone is more playable than Kane & Lynch)
There are however two differences. One, you don't get one for defeating every boss, you find them lying around pretty much everywhere. Two, you can give them to your allies, allowing you to decide how big a life bar you or your allies should have. You heal yourself with either Starkos, a big cheese wedge which heals one heart, or K-Bups, a box of berries that heals you up completely.
The only real problem concerning having a big life bar, is that there is a certain enemy in areas, a laser turret. If you are spotted by guards and the place is on alert, you WILL be killed. And when you get killed, you will ALWAYS restart at the last checkpoint with only 4 Hearts full, regardless of how many PA-1s you have with you. At least checkpoints are actually pretty fair in this game.
Instead of getting Hearts from defeating bosses however, you obtain Pearls, which are pretty much the single most important item to have in the game. Pearls are the currency accepted by the Mammago Garage that allow you to upgrade your hovercraft, thereby allowing you to access new areas of the world to explore. Yes, even though there is an alien invasion happening right above their heads, they still want you to pay them pearls ILLEGALLY in order to upgrade your hovercraft.
But nevertheless, the upgrades are immensely helpful, ranging from jump kits to neutralizer cannons.
 (Also they're Rastafarians. Jah man)
The only other thing of note in the game are the various minigames and puzzles. A lot of the puzzles are simple but ingenious enough, even the unecessary ones such as finding ways to attract certain rare creatures out to photograph them. They're barely even puzzles in that sense and there will be few times you'll actually be stuck concerning them, other than maybe not knowing where to go in later dungeons.
The mini-games are actually pretty good for a game like this, and there are four kinds. Hovercraft races, guessing which cup the ball is under, a game of controlling peals, and the best one of all, air hockey.
Hovercraft races are barely a problem if you keep using the boost pads in the races and the cup-swapping game is a good memory teaser of which you only actually have to do once on the easiest level of difficulty. The pearl jam game can only be unlocked by finding all the pearls in the game and is a furiously difficult game that requires you to use BOTH analog sticks to control two pearls through a maze at the same time. If anything, it's a very distracting challenge.
Finally there's the air hockey game. I won't lie to you, it is one of the best fucking minigames ever in videogames. Air hockey alone is already damn fun, but the air hockey in this game isn't so much air hockey alone, it's more of a combination between air hockey and Crossfire. Seriously. All you have to do to win, is to move all of your pucks into the other opponent's side of the table, while pushing his own pucks back at him to keep your side of the table clear.
It is one hell of a fun game, so much so that the first time I played it, I wasted half an hour on it first time. I lost 500 credits but it was damn fun.
 (Seriously, I fucking love this game)
Graphics - For 2003, the graphics are incredibly smooth-looking, with a style very reminiscent of Rayman 2. The world of Hillys is certainly beautiful but not in your face about it with bloom or sunshine all up in your shit like "HEY BITCHES I'M BRIGHT AN' SHINY" but taking on a more humble radiance about itself. There is a wonderful mix between the realistic and the toonish that somehow blends together so well in Beyond Good & Evil.
There is also, like Zelda, no distinction of graphics between cutscene and in-game allowing a much smoother flow compared to what most other games at the time would do with rather awkward clearly graphically different transitions.
In HD, it only gets better. Character models have actually had no improvement upon them at all despite what the XBLA cover of the game looks like (thankfully because it looked kind of creepy). The only real improvement concerning the HD rerelease is a much faster framerate, which does wonders for the smoothened pacing of the game compared to the original ports which were somewhat slower. And if they looked good back then, then damn.
 (Everyone uses this screenshot. There's a reason why)
Music/Sound - Being Ubisoft, the voices are pretty damn splendid in all languages possible. There's rarely a voice that's truly annoying (except possibly for Secundo who has this weird-ass Esperanto thing going on that makes you wonder if he was meant to be a parody of something or not), and all of the characters through such voices become quite close to you for it. Localisations are of course Ubisoft's speciality and as such the dubbing across the major European languages is excellent.
The music is absolutely splendid with a wonderfully small variety of rock, tribal, folk and techno. Atmosphere is definitely given a boost with the music you get ranging from the spooky undergrounds of abandoned mineshafts, to the inner facilities of your enemies, to the local bar where you can play some goddamn air hockey. Battle music is also pretty bitchin' enough to keep you on your toes, and there's rarely a bad song anywhere in this game, never intrusive enough to keep you from your mission.
 (It may not be a large world, but it [i]feels[/i] like one)
All things considered however, this game is disappointingly shorter than you would normally expect such a grand-looking game to be, a game inspired by Zelda made by the French. But as such, you're only really going to get 12 hours out of this game. But it's a good 12 hours of a wonderfully unique story with a small but loveable cast and secrets to discover, all for only 800 points on XBox Live.
Think about it this way. Sonic 4 costs 1200 points and you get about 2 hours of gameplay. This game is only 800 points, for 12 hours of gameplay.
If you're really good, you might even get a sequel!
Fun and Innovation - 4
Replayability - 3
Gameplay - 3
Presentation - 4"Videogames are bad for you? That's what they said about rock 'n' roll." - Shigeru Miyamoto  Hail Slither, The Eternal Champion!
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