X-Men: a review

If you've ever played a video game, you probably at least know of this one. You may not have played it, but you know it. Let me prove it.

Yeah. That line that everyone makes fun of? That's from this! And in this XBLA release, nothing has changed. The game's still coated in Engrish, virtually mindless, and incredibly fun with friends. But is it worth $10? Debatable.

First of all, it's a beat-em-up. Just about every beat-em-up has a few things in common: endless baddies, shallow gameplay, and multiplayer that saves the game. The last part is the kicker. Unless you're playing River City Ransom (which is basically the best beat-em-up there has ever been), you need other players to make it fun. Xmen initially seems to have this handled by making the legendary 6 player coop a reality online. Shooting off mutant powers with 5 people online sounds fun, until you realize that Xmen is a game that was fun because of the social aspect. You're better off playing locally and enjoying the silliness that way, even if you can only play 4 player local.

For the few of you who don't know how the game works, you punch loads of baddies in various locations until the game ends. That's it. To shake it up, every character (who otherwise controls the same) has a mutant power that lets them kill loads of dudes and do loads of damage to bosses. You get more mutant power uses as the game goes on, or when you die. This leads to another problem with the game. Infinite continues with no penalty means infinite mutant powers, which means it's impossible to lose. The arcade-y fun of the original is reduced by a lot when you don't have to risk another quarter every three lives. 

This doesn't mean it's a bad game, not by a long shot. It just means that you've got to have company to enjoy it. It's a solid party game, but nothing else. If you've got friends that enjoy games like this, you've got a solid night's worth of entertainment here. Whether or not that's worth $10 is up to you. Personally, I've had a bit of buyer's remorse. Don't let nostalgia goggles make this an impulse buy.

Sorry for the short review, there's just not much to say about something this simple and, well, short.