CCO has all of the gameplay, story, visuals and atmosphere that you could possibly want in a mystery game and I think does them all to a proverbial "t".
Smashing a street thug over the head with a crowbar and then snapping his neck with your bare hands has never felt this good. Condemned: Criminal Origins is all about delivering a disturbing atmosphere and brutal melee combat. In that regard, Monolith has hit the nail on the head.
Although at times the gameplay is monotonous and it doesn't feel like there's much to the game, Condemned makes up for all of this by being one of the scariest and atmospheric games ever made.
The game is a short, brawl/shoot em up thriller with low jumpscares. Like many games of its time that were of higher quality, it relies more on psychological horror than jumpscares. Which works perfectly for it!
Brawling and shooting mechanics are top notch, you can only use melee (no fists) or guns and even in more shootouty sections it feels fleshed out and tense, gritty, powerful. Melee combat is meaty, messy, responsive and surprisingly authentic. You and enemies both react to each others strikes and almost have scuffles in believable ways. In other games you simply create a blood spot on an enemy or you square up and do a perfect, nice boxing ring match, but in this game, there's a VERY VERY visceral melee system. Rolling around in the mud and gouging each other's eyes out doing so wouldn't be at all out of place in this game's combat.
Overall, I'd say worth 10 EUR/USD even today! Money well spent. Back when it came out, I'd say worth even 30.
This game earns a two for it's ideas and for attempting something different using light effects well in a new generation but the truth is I owned this game and never completed it and I think that says a lot for the immersion I felt with this game. I thought the combat was sloppy and got really boring really quickly and there was nothing in the story keeping me gripped. If you can get along with the combat it may be worth getting in an Xbox Live sale for a quid or two.
This is really horrible. I do not want to play this game. I'm glad i borrowed it before playing. Now I'm recommending that everyone save their money and don't bother buy it. Truly awful. It is boring, tawdry, and the story is so derivative. The acting is third-rate, amateurish. The effects look like they were drawn using crayon. A piece of godawful trash.
SummaryCondemned: Criminal Origins allows players to experience a heightened level of psychological tension as they use their instincts, forensic tools, and melee combat to hunt serial killers and bring them to justice. Agent Thomas, an FBI investigator in the Serial Crimes Unit (SCU), pursues relentless serial killer through detailed urban env...