Enter the Matrix (2003)

Enter the Matrix was a very ambitious game, a very ambitious idea, but because they rushed the development and had to cut corners, we got a game that's sadly mediocre to bad.

WOAH

• The combat is well made, the characters do the moves you see in the movies and it makes you feel just as powerful as they are in the movie. You can switch guns to melee real quick, combine guns with grabs for instant kills, bullet time changes your moveset, you can press certain directions mid-combo to change it, etc.
• The Agents are scary. They really made them feel like machines of death that nothing can stop; they will dodge your bullets, they will counter all of your moves, you can only run or make them die to stage hazards. They even made Virus Smith terrifying, because he can one-shot you. You aren't Neo, you are just a random redpill, the average, you are not special.
• The plot ties extremely well with the movies, it even explains some of the events that weren't explained in the sequels, like the black box, the machines' plan, the keys, etc.
• The game has a lot of clever extras. If you go to the hacking menu, you can unlock the hidden stuff in the game; infinite ammo, a versus mode that's very rough, etc. Really clever, I wish many games did this.
• Niobe and Ghost have different levels, I recommend to play the game twice so you get the full experience. They may share some, but not everything is the same.

BULLSHIT

• Niobe and Ghost fight almost the same, Niobe has a few more moves but there's almost no difference between the two.
• The weapons feel the same, they fire at the same speed, they have recycled animations (Glitchy ones even, you might see a character pick up a weapon wrong) and do the same damage, the only difference is ammo count. The only weapons that feel different are the zap gun and the explosives.
• The game lacks animations for several actions so they get reused, for example, if you do the bullet time and shoot using a shotgun... they use the same animation as if you were firing a pistol.
• The driving levels are stupidly hard as Ghost. Niobe's AI (She's driving the car) can get you killed with no fault of your own, or get stuck in certain areas if she diverts from a certain path; you might be forced to reset the level several times.

Conclusion

Enter the Matrix... I honestly feel bad for this game, the plot is interesting, the combat is well done, but everything else feels so unpolished, so unfinished, so poor.

Chances are, if you are considering this, you are like me, a bit of a historian and a fan of the matrix, and maybe even the watchowskis. You've probably seen the antimatrix but didn't play this for whatever reason. This game was released and actively produced by watchowskis (it shows in the game) to tie some things together and be a kind of promo or something. That sounds so cool right? Well, TBH, this game is unnecessary to play. It is however, somewhat interesting in it's own way in that it's just so... odd.

First off, the first thing I noticed was this gimmick: Live action video cutscenes (it reminded me of Command Conquer 95. Yes, almost like the watchowski version of those videos) It actually is a pretty cool way to superimpose things and keep story going by telling it to you in the background cinematics. (very much in similiar way C&C95 did) It will at times also superimpose VG/CG modelled/rendered scenes with a bit more effects than what the native game engine can shore up to. All this is a bit of dazzle bit there are a few things that I found interesting about this gimmick.

First of all, in the very beginning, the CG/VG scenes seem to be a metaphor for the matrix itself. The FMV clips take place in the real world (but later in the game this is not consistent, and it begins to blur things together) When it does show the CG/VG scenes, you see the maps getting rendered before you and models loaded into the game. IT all looks like some HORRENDOUS machinima video but the gimmick is to express the fact this is the 'matrix' I digged it.

Another interesting gimmick is the 'hack' mode. A dos like terminal in which you slowly explore each directory looking for lcues and picking up information to slowly unlock things, like easter eggs, and cheats. This was rather well done, but a bit short. I haven't quite seen a hacking sim like this and really liked the approach taken. It also ties in well with the movies and some of the easter eggs of their day. IMO this was hands down the best executed 'original idea' in the game as there isn't anything quite like it and it fits right in.

Everything else in this game is pretty substandard lackluster and maybe even a bit shameless. The ending for instance is a trailer for the third movie.

The technicals of this game are atrocious bad for it's time. The cutscenes aren't timed right. The lips sync is way off. I am not joking when i said HORRENDOUS machinima. This might have been a bug for me, as I have seen videos on youtube that aren't like mine.

The story in this goes through some strange direcitons. The last mission doesnt add anything to the story of the game or the movie that I can surmise to. It does however feel really cool and feels more like Max Payne than anything...

Yes Max Payne resounds trhoughout this game. The controls are actually pretty good and fluid and decent... when they work. However the game just isn't that fun to play. I found landing shots in max payne very satisfying, this has a kind of natural auto aim thing going on that works in bullet time, and a seperate awkard FPS mode for sniper rifles. It doesnt really hit the mark when it comes to pleasing as a TPS....

I mention the controls are nice 'when they work' It does have some fancy moves you can do in bullet time. Close combat takedowns in the midst of gunfighting, and cartwheels on walls. These kinds of move are pretty natural and tend to happen properly. So the game has its' moments...

However it also has its moments when you switch to a weapon, forget to draw it out (or holster it automatically after say... opening a door of climbing a ladder, or interactivng elsewhere with something in the environment) and stumble about blindly doing melee moves because you can't pull your gun out! this is a damnably bad oversight. Also grenades require a few combinations of keys to be pressed at once that i never quite figured out.

The main cause of death is jumping puzzles that aren't so much puzzles as failure to connect. This result in going back to the last 'checkpoint' The second main cause of death is someone who is on a mission with you dying because you have to find who is shooting at them and act quickly. I never got 'shot' to death once.

There are these strange rail shooter scenes where you gun your way out the windows of cars, or drive (depending on which character you pick) that feel rather unnecsary, and lack a lot of control, possibly due to porting.

The tires on cars are squares. Why that is i don't know, but it adds to the wonkyness of this machinima matrix.

This game was actually probably a big production in it's day, i remmeber lots of marketing hype for it. the credits are enormously long for a game.

Some good music is in it. It has level music that are don davis-ish and then fight scenes similiar to say Spybreak. Good sountrack here: Fluke - Atom Bomb, Juno Reactor Kayuga Hime, and similiar ilk.

Ultimately, its a strange game. The maps are short. Some are very short (maybe 5-15 seconds) And it feels at times not very 'game-like' to me. Especially with the switching of rail shooter bits... Protect the other person type bits, etc. it weaves a narrative that ties in some background material on the movies but in and of itself makes very little sense, and doesn't feel like a full fledged game. You remember those awful games like Mad Dog Mcgee by american laser games? How they seemed really interesting and different but they just werent that fun to play or really games? I must admit, this is a bit like that. It feels like a junky interactive video where the game took a backseat.


In the end. You play a game that cost too much to produce for what resulted,t was released in 2003 but feels like it was developed in 1999.. Sure, it might have some cool material on the franchise, and have some interesting bits in it, but it still feels a bit like a mash up of mission impossible with square tires. Worse, it stole some of the better aspects from Max Payne and put them into a highly unimpressive technical engine, threw in some FMVs glued with fandom, and stole some of the bullet time type dynamic from MP.

Don't play this, if you must, just watch the videos on youtube. I want to give it a third star for the hacking mode but Even with some of the gimicks it just isn't deserving of 'average' IMO.