Wanted: Weapons of Fate

I have nothing against short games, so long as there is proper incentive to play multiple times. Wanted lacks any such incentives. Something as simple as an arcade scoring system or in-depth stats might have been enough to make a second playthrough interesting.

It's the equivalent of getting a donkey, strapping a jetpack to it but only filling the tank halfway. It takes something old that's been way overused, attaches something new to it to add more fun, but then takes away this fun and orginality by being too short. OK, that was a terrible analogy, but you get the picture.

While not a horrible game by any means; Wanted: Weapons of Fate has its share of fun action-packed moments that runs out of steam way too quickly. With linear levels and poor enemy AI, it’s hard to enjoy the game’s awesome gunplay. This one is worth the look if you liked the movie and the graphic novel.

A good, but flawed game. [June 2009, p.84]

The cool Hollywood touch is fun for some time, but the action quickly gets repetitive.

Entertains while it lasts but as soon as you start enjoying it, the game ends. With no repetition value and a very short campaign, the game can also become repetitive and uninteresting in a medium term. The potential is present but could have been more.

The main problem with Wanted is that it basically only has one mode, a single player campaign that really doesn't last long.

The title had promise and looked like it was going to be quite fun to play after playing through the first level or 2, but once the novelty wore off that’s where the game then became repetitive and quite frankly a bit boring.

A fantastic action game with unique feathers. Make sure you rent it, though. [May 2009, p.77]

Wanted: Weapons of Fate doesn’t suffer from the “Bad movie-license game” curse. It is not that bad. But it suffers from being too short and not having enough after you beat it to keep on playing.

Wanted: Weapons of Fate combines interesting gameplay ideas with an highly cinematic style, creating an enjoyable experience even if a little repetitive. Unfortunately, its merits get overshadowed by its four hours longevity, more adequate to a Live Arcade game than to a full price retail game.

The problems arise when you realize the game is able to be finished within one sitting and there really is no reason to go back through outside of unlocking some Gamerscore.

What wasn’t disappointing, though I expected it to be, were the John Woo-style quick-time events.

Wanted is an unfortunate disappointment to me, but not as much for its gameplay design, which is where a lot of games lose points. It has a nice control scheme, it has some grin-inducing comedic dialogue and more. The key argument against it is that there’s simply not enough of it—and that ends up drawing a big thumbs down from me.

Wanted has several good ideas, and it's not a bad game on the technical side. But, overall, it seems a bit uninspired when it comes to exploit all its potential, and it's extremely short, with little replay value, just replaying the main story with different characters. Fun while it lasts, but it won't be long.

Wanted is a pretty decent effort, and a new example that not every cinema adaptation is condemned to failure. With a longer playthrough, a multiplayer mode and a brighter IA, Weapons of Fate could be a far better game, but nevertheless is an interesting option for action fans.

Wanted; Weapons of Fate could’ve been a great action game. Gameplay is solid, even if not original, and will deeply entertain you, and graphics are sometimes stunning. The big drawback is the length: it took us four hours to get to the final sequence, which really isn’t enough as of today. Consider a purchase only if four intense hours of gameplay is enough for you.

Wanted is mediocre and too short, and it's only of vague entertainment even for players with prerequisite interests.

The short length of Wanted: Weapons of Fate is actually its rescue. If the game would have been any longer it would have gotten boring. For that reason Wanted is only recommendable for the most fanatic Wanted fans. Everyone else might give this average shooter a chance when it’s in the discount bin.

Whilst it's not a terrible game, and there is some fun to be found here, it gets repetitive fairly quickly.

Quotation forthcoming.

The good news is that the game, as dull as it gets, doesn't last for more than five hours. It's quick and dirty. [Apr 2009, p.77]

Wanted: Weapons of Fate, unravels the Loom of Fate a little too much as the game adaptation feels less inspired then its source material.

Wanted: Weapons of Fate is arrogant and patronising ... which would not be a problem if the game was amazing; but with flawed controls, repetitive action and an extremely short experience overall, this was never going to live up to its own delusions of grandeur.

This movie-inspired shooter is fun for a while, but the action becomes repetitive long before you reach the end of the six-hour story.

It's a short game, but if it were longer, the excitement of bullet curving would probably wear off. That said, it's got some cool concepts and it compliments the film fairly well. If you can find it for less-than-full price, it's worth checking out.

Wanted: Weapons of Fate looks good and plays well. However, there isn't much that makes the game special. The tutorial teaches you some pretty amazing stuff but in the end you will hardly use any of those abilities. Besides that, there is no multiplayer mode present, making the game nothing more than average. And that's a shame knowing that the game could have been much more.

GRIN clearly has the capacity to go beyond what it does in Wanted, and it's a shame that the game only aspires to be a competent, mildly inventive extension of the film.

With a license that seemed tailor made for the video game treatment and a competent developer (Grin, makers of the PC GRAW titles and the forthcoming Bionic Commando) in charge, there was a chance this would be something really rather good. What we ended up with is a perfectly passable, often enjoyable game, but not something that will be remembered once you've beaten it over the course of a few evenings.

What Wanted does well, it does well enough to warrant a look, if it wasn’t so short we’d be raving about it. But no game should last a few hours, it doesn’t matter how good their gameplay is.

There's no multiplayer, and even on the Hard setting this game is a piece of cake. It's fun while it lasts, but it ends so quickly you're bound to be disappointed.

Due to its shortness of length, repetitive (and at times annoying) gameplay and non-existent re-play value, its hard to justify paying the full recommended retail price for it.

The ideas Grin has introduced work well within the plot put forward by the comic books, it's just a shame they don't hold up over an extended period. [May 2009, p.110]

For its six-hour playthrough (you can extend that by unlocking alternate characters, but they're so unmemorable and non-gameplay changing, that they provide no incentive to play through again), Wanted: Weapons of Fate is at best a competent, fire-and-forget movie game -- not much more nor less.

It’s just boring and redundant. It’s worth a rental, especially if you enjoyed the big-screen or comic book incarnations of the franchise, but even a guest appearance by Angie herself wouldn’t make this worth full price.

If you loved the movie or just want to spend an hour or so with the game, then it's worth renting as long as you're happy with what you're getting yourself into. As a purchase, though, it's far too short, easy, and buggy to be worth the price.

Too short and too late to be wanted.

Those who have seen Wanted should certainly play this game, because the story continuous where the movie has stopped. Other shooter fans, better leave this title out. The game is too standard, and not worth 60 euro for only 3 hours of gameplay.

It can be completed in less than six hours and that's even if you do your best to find all the poorly hidden paper slips that unlock the development team's concept art and such (yaay!).

Cold language of numbers is the best way to describe Wanted. 9 levels, 5 enemy types, 4 hours to complete, 2 weapons, 0 multiplayer modes, 0 "wow" moments, 0 thoughts about playing this game again…

Another movie tie-in game, another poor title. Weapons of Fate had the potential to be a great game as the bullet curve system is very unique and fun to use. However, the game suffers from repetitive gameplay and barely serviceable graphics. In essence, the game doesn’t leave you wanting more – it leaves you wanting an entirely new game altogether.

All in all, Wanted: Weapons of Fate isn't so much a game for fans of the shooter genre, but it's a game for fans of Wanted.

As dense and nihilistic as the source material, but not nearly as thrilling.