The Club (PS3) Demo Impressions
When The Club finally hits retail shelves for PS3, 360 and PC sometime this February, don’t be surprised to see review scores all over the scale. A demo for The Club hit the UK PSN last Thursday and after playing through it more than a few times, I’m still unsure about my initial impressions.
With the limited amount of information available in the demo, I believe The Club will play out in what can be described as a Manhunt meets Twisted Metal, fight to survive 3rd Person shooter. The beginning cinematic portrays deadly modern-age warriors being captured and forced to compete in a obstacle course-based killing contest for either money or their lives. All the while the storyline, or what I could make out of a storyline, doesn’t feel very original and sometimes feels downright campy, at best.
Thankfully, the action is as intense as it should be. As I mentioned earlier, the game controls in an over-the-shoulder 3rd Person fashion. You’re awarded by the speed and style of your killing through the assigned “obstacle course” with combos adding up the faster you can repeatedly eliminate enemies on your way. It might sound hair-raising and exciting, which the demo is, at least for a moment.
Unfortunately, unless additional maps offer much more variety than the demo’s, “Federal Prison” (the voice-over called it a Federal Prison but all the written signs in the game called it, “State Prison.” Little slip up, Bizarre.) I can easily see the gameplay becoming a tedious and repetitive restart fest similar to what you get from a Burning Lap in the Burnout series.
A good example are breakable skull targets that can be shot as you scream through a level. These targets count towards your overall score as well as keep your kill multiplier rolling. These targets, to me, are very reminiscent of the multiplier pickups that were removed from each home console Burnout sequel since Burnout 3. Multipliers were removed from Burnout’s Crash Mode because they turned the mode into a repetitive race for the multiplier instead of a race for the best crash. Someone could easily have the best, most damaging and fantastic wreck but if they missed the 3x multiplier, they missed the Gold Medal. I can easily see these targets having the same effect on The Club.
It’s too early to tell but from what I see so far, I’m very skeptical if the The Club will deserve my visit. We’ll find out in early February if a big Sega budget and big guns can turn this one into a winner.
I’d love to hear from other UK PSN owners impressions. I expect them to be all over the place.
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