First off, I gotta say that I'm biased AGAINST FPS games, and biased FOR Clive Barker's work, so maybe the two will cancel each other out... Maybe...
Clive Barker's Jericho is the second 'Clive Barker' game to see the light of release after the brilliant game, 'Undying', which unfortunately never became the hit it should have become.
The story is this: In the middle east a great sandstorm hurricane appears, engulfing the ruins of an ancient city. Prior to your arrival, a special ops team was sent in to investigate the phenomenon, but they disappeared (of course) and you have to go in and investigate (of course). The underlying plot is that before Adam and Eve, God had a failed creation known to ancient cultures as 'The Firstborn'. The firstborn was beautiful, but ugly; was neither man nor woman; neither mortal or immortal. Infact, God made his Firstborn too powerful and, like any good father, locked the kid away in the closet to never see the light of day. *SARCASM... Christ...* However, every 100 years or so the area where the Firstborn was locked away reopens as a gateway and absorbs a chunk of 'time and space'.
So, in other words, you're making your way through a figurative 'Russian Doll' of perverse time periods, encountering the armies who faught for and were absorbed into this layercake of Hell: Nazis, Romans, Sumerians, etc.
Your team is the Jericho Squadron, a 6-7 member team of black leather-clad Spec-Op 'Witches' who look like they were rejects for The Matrix. (Fair warning, there's a LOT of S&M in this game, which is not surprising since it's tagged with Clive Barker's name.)
Each character not only has their unique weapons of choice (sniper rifles, mini guns, etc) but also have their own magical powers (telekinesis, pyrokinesis, divine healing, reality hacking, etc). It sounds like an interesting concept, but the concept proves even cooler when you combine magic with machineguns. One character can gun down enemies in bullettime, another character can literally 'steer' her sniper rounds through multiple enemies, and another literally has the spirit of a fire-dragon living in his arm that he can let loose to kill enemies. The other characters are far less memorable, so I'm not going to bother trying to remember anything about them...
The atmosphere is dark, disturbing, and disgusting, which any Silent Hill fan could love. While it's not as haunting or chilling as other horror games (Undying, RE, Silent Hill, etc) it gets the job done in this action title. Whoever designed these twisted time periods should either be given high praise from the art community, or given a straight jacket.
I look bad ass... but I'm NOT IN THE GAME!
The gameplay (at first) was extremely interesting, I dig being able to switch between squad members, and the individual powers are a breath of fresh air in the FPS genre. Each member also has two button-assigned magic attacks. Prime example is the psychic sniper lesbian who can knock down walls and push enemies away with a telekinetic 'burst', and slow-motion steering her sniper shots through the heads of multiple enemies. Very cool. Character swapping is pretty effective since it can be done two ways: You hit a button and an easy-to-execute menu appears with the names of the Jericho members you can swap to instantly; or you aim your cross-hairs at a character and hit the 'swap' button. Easy cheesy. The only problem is remembering the names of the good characters and not picking one of the more useless characters by accident.
The boss battles are actually the highlight of the gameplay because they involve a little problem solving and character swapping to expose their weaknesses.
WARNING, THE FOLLOWING VIDEOS CONTAIN GRAPHIC VIOLENCE.
DO NOT WATCH AFTER EATING
DO NOT WATCH IF YOU ARE PREGNANT (IN WHICH CASE YOU ARE LIKELY EATING)
Roman Boss: Casus Vicus (aka 'Fat Bastard')
WWII Boss: Lichthammer
(Skip to about 1/2 through)
A common complaint I had with the gameplay, however, is that it can be very tedious at times. The gameplay is pretty standard for an FPS. Very run and gun against a legion of undead baddies while you run from Point A to Point B. The majority of Clive Barker's Jericho is paving a path of carnage through hordes of enemies that seem to have no end. However, this can be FPS bliss if you're a fan of 'run-and-gun' games like Painkiller. For everyone else, there are segments of Clive Barker's Jericho that break up some of those drawn out firefights. There are mini puzzle-solving segments throughout Clive Barker's Jericho where the player is required to climb cliffs, kill bosses, or survive a downward decent by correctly matching button sequences. The 'button matching' segments (ala God of War) were kind of frantic (too fast), but maybe it was supposed to add to the game's suspense? I don't know. Personally, I never had a problem surviving those quick-action sequences, but they did make a few of my friends' want to throw my controller against the wall.
The only GOOD button sequence section
The story is original (minus the cliche "hard-core marines killing demons to save the world" angle). The theme of going back through hellish-twists on time-periods within the city is pretty awesome in itself, and I like to monster designs, but the whole thing would honestly have been better executed with better voice-actors. Really, the voice acting made the whole game seem almost like a 'B-movie'. The characters are a real pain in the ass to listen to, to be honest. They seriously got their 'lines' from bad action movies. The things they say would make Arnold Schwarzenegger's ears bleed:
Minigun Carrying Mexican Dude possessed by Fire-Dragon spirit: "Hey Abby, what do you get when you cross a telekinetic lesbian with a brick wall?" *this is your cue to take control of the telekinetic lesbian sniper chick (no joke) and use your powers to knock down a wall in order to progress*
*you then knock down fore-said wall*
*you wait for Fire-Dragon Mexican Dude to deliver a punch line*
*no punch line*
(Do you sense how odd the Jericho team members are yet???)
Jericho SUFFERS in the Artificial Intelligence of all the other characters you are not playing as. You will often find yourself healing all of your party members as they get picked off by enemies because they don't take cover for shit. It's like they think they're in a Rambo movie and they stand out in the open, guns blazing, daring the enemies to kill them. Shit, it might as well be a bad action movie when you pair their 'invincibility complex' and the bad one-liners. So, for the majority of the game, you're spent resurrecting all your dead allies with the only other character who auto-heals: The pistol-slinging priest, whose name I don't remember, nor care about.
GAME TIP: NEVER EVER PLAY AS THE PRIEST. HE CAN HEAL, AND YOU CAN HEAL. IF YOU PLAY AS HIM, ONLY 1 MEMBER (YOU) CAN HEAL CHARACTERS. IN 10 SECONDS, YOU... WILL... ALL... DIE!
As far as graphics and sound: Graphics were nothing as fantastic say Ratchet and Clank Future:ToD or Bioshock, but they are not 'last-gen', either. My experience is that the graphics are around 'Half-Life 2' quality, and this is more noticeable on an HDTV. One thing that makes Jericho actually stand out is the enemy designs. Not only are they absolutely horrible to look at, they are equally as facinating.
I often wonder about Clive Barker's childhood...
The sound is pretty sweet if you have a surround sound setup to take advantage of the 'spooky noises' that greatly contribute to the game's fear-factor. If there is a soundtrack to the game, I honestly don't remember it.
Finally, you wanted to know whether or not Clive Barker's Jericho is scary. To be honest: No, Clive Barker's Jericho is not that scary when compared to the brilliant Silent Hill 2, or even Clive Barker's highly-praised predecessor: UNDYING. It is, however, genuinely creepy and thoroughly disturbing. While there's little that jumps out and goes 'boo!' for a cheap scare, there's always something horrific that you can't help but stare at. However, there were a couple of segments that did make me feel panicked, though I won't tell you where they happen: The first encounter with the massive Gladiator demon, and the fight against the Ghost Children (undead kids are always scary).
BAD JOKE OF THE DAY: "Horny bastard, isn't he?"
OVERALL
In MY OPINION, Clive Barker's Jericho is okay, maybe even 'good' in some aspects. The atmosphere of Clive Barker's Jericho is probably its biggest strength, gameplay second, then story third. The levels are well designed, and the mosters are even better. Character design is lacking. Gameplay concept is original and inventive, but not perfected. The story is a little cliche, but the overall concept is pretty good.
Overall, while it's not a blockbuster video game, it's still an interesting game that did well in presentation and with its own twist on the FPS genre. But anyways, that's my two cents. I'd honestly rent it if the demo didn't float your boat, because it didn't do the (whole) game justice. Unless you're a horror-game nut (like me), or a FPS-lover, a rental is probably your best bet.
Jericho has spectacular moments, but Clive Barker's successor to the brilliant 'Undying' falls short.
Graphics are on par with Half-Life 2. Not 'next-gen' but nothing bad. Lighting sucks in a lot of places. Character designs (especially monsters) are really cool.
Sound
6.0
Game does take some advantage of Surround Sound, but sounds are standard effects of bullets and guts. I can't remember any actual 'music' in the game.
Gameplay
6.0
Magic + Guns = Awesome. Button sequences = not so much awesome. Standard First-Person Shooter. Your allies always die too often. Boss fights are pretty wicked.
Story
5.0
The story is interesting, but Clive Barker's Jericho gets hit hard by poor character development and ... just poor characters.
Replay Value
4.0
There's hidden stuff you can unlock, like artwork, but one playthrough will probably be enough for most gamers. You can, however, go back to play the boss battles, which is good.
OVERALL
6.0
Worth a play. There's just not a lot that is 'amazing' in this game. A rental unless you're a real horror nut.
How can a game with telekenetic lesbien snipers in black skin tight leather
be bad?
oooooh...
Kenny Farino
16 Sep 2009, 18:55
"Worth a play. There's just not a lot that is 'amazing' in this game. A
rental unless you're a real horror nut."
THEN THIS IS THE GAME FOR ME. YAY!
Kenny Farino
01 Oct 2009, 19:43
Actually, the ultimate edition is found in GameStop for $10. Yay or nay?
LaughingMan
02 Oct 2009, 09:08
Not sure what is in the 'Ultimate Edition' but for $10 you cant really go
wrong.
But keep your eyes open for a copy of the PC game: "Clive Barker's
UNDYING". You'll be much more satisfied with it than Jericho.
Neuromancer99
16 Nov 2009, 00:35
I rented Jericho this weekend after seeing this review
Arghhh a black eye on horror gaming. The graphics are horrible so it is not
graphically disturbing. The writing is horrible and worse than grindhouse b
movie. Mixing guns and magic is cool but poorly executed outside of the
sniper lesbien you rave about. I give the game a 4/10.
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Clive Barker's Jericho Review
