Goldeneye (Wii) Review

Goldeneye Wii is what Activision and Eurocom are dubbing a “Re-imagined” version of the Nintendo 64 game and Pierce Brosnan movie of the same name. The title replace Brosnan as everyone’s favorite secret agent with his current day counterpart Daniel Craig. The Bond role isn’t the only one recasted in this modern day FPS, but how does it all hold up 13 years later?

What We Like:

  • This is something we talked about with Blood Stone, but this game also does a magnificent job of capturing the “feel” of being Bond. There seems to be a greater emphasis on trying to use your head and take down a room of baddies without alerting the others than just running in guns ablaze. Not only does the game focus on this, but you are generally treated to some pretty cool takedown moves.
  • Alec’s expanded role in the prologue/intro of the game. You get a better understanding of the relationship between him and Bond, and I feel it works better than what the original movie did.
  • The environments are probably some of the best looking and diverse we’ve seen on the Wii. You will of course start at the famous Dam which is caught in a terrible rainstorm now, you will traverse to Valentin’s nightclub and even drive a tank through St. Petersburg, all of these environments offer some interesting touches and genuinely look nice.
  • The storyline, while I have my qualms with it (and get to it in a second), it does a nice job of shaking things up by either adding scenarios (like the Nightclub) or re-arranging the order of sequence.
  • Pacing, an issue I had with Blood Stone is remedy here, I believe by having the structure of a movie to work through. The game mixes it up with a ton of variety like the escape from the facility, the tank chase and the final mission which can be a little annoying to some.
  • Harder difficulties are more than just enemies with better aim as there are more objectives to complete, and instead of failing a mission knocks you down a level if finish a mission without completing all the tasks.
  • Multiplayer (both offline and online) offers a wide array of options. With online having some interesting modes in Black Box and Goldeneye, the latter of which probably would have been better served with some form of communication between you and your teammates. Offline offers a variety of modifiers to spice up the normal game and there’s enough that you are hopeful to find a combination you love.
  • The music while subtle for the most part is nice and subtle especially when going between stealth, alert guards and full on fire fight.
  • The remixed theme song, while I’m not madly in love with the new version, I do dig the awesome opening graphic they got for it.

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What we Didn’t Like:

  • Most of the secondary characters really get the shaft in the game, for the most part it is understandable since this game never really leaves Bond’s point of view, but some will be disappointed by Natalya’s much smaller role, Xenia isn’t even close to being as sexualized and Boris isn’t even in the game.
  • Some wonky detection issues, at times, it seems like some guards just get alerted to your presence so much easier than others no matter how careful you are.
  • Some forced dialog exchanges, for the most part they stay true to the movie, but it just falls flat. The best example would be the, “For England, James” which is stated at the beginning and end of the game and both of those just seem like they were forced in because of how important they were to the movie. Doesn’t seem to have any real emotion behind them.
  • The boss “fights” while intense were pretty much just extended QTEs which aren’t that enjoyable.
  • The multiplayer should have been combined, why can’t there be modifiers online? And why are modes like Black Box and Goldeneye offered offline?

If you can’t figure it out, I really dug Goldeneye Wii, I can’t really compare it to the N64 version as I’m not the biggest fan of it, I didn’t pour dozens of hours into it. That said, I think it does the movie justice and stands as the finest FPS on the Wii. Comes with our highest recommendations.

Recommendation: Buy

Earl Rufus

The owner of this little chunk of the internet. Enjoys having a good time and being rather snarky!

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