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Remember Collective Soul? They had those massive hits in the early-to-mid-90s and they still put out pretty good albums even if radio largely ignores them. I don’t play my Collective Soul CDs often but, when I do, I think, “You know, this is a very good band. As solid as you want a rock band to be. I should listen to them more often.” Then, I promptly forget about them again.
That’s exactly how I feel about Sega’s The Conduit for Wii.
Trust No One
The game starts towards the end of the story, with you having survived some sort of attack. Some guy starts talking to you about getting your functions back online, and runs you through a quick tutorial. After a bit of fighting, you enter a conduit and we flash back to the beginning of the story.
Some sort of alien race has invaded Washington, DC, government operatives have fallen under control of this menace and the President’s life is in danger. You, as Agent Ford, are tasked with discovering what’s going on while trying to eliminate the threat, and guess what, betrayal!
Who can you trust? No one!
Who’s side are you on? No one’s!
So, what do you do? You may as well side with the disembodied voice that steers you towards the cooler weapons. Also, old white men are always bad guys. I wonder at what age we turn evil, because I’m surely closer than I’d like to admit.
Stay in Control
The game received a lot of hyperbole mainly because it’s a first-person shooter built exclusively for the Wii. Quite a rarity, right? This is unfortunate, because the WiiMote + Nunchuck combo is perfectly suited for FPS games when done right, which The Conduit did. The controls are perfect. If you don’t like the defaults, you can customize them to pretty much exactly what you want. PS3 and Xbox 360 owners can claim their gamepads are just fine for FPS controls, but they’re either lying to themselves or they’ve just never played a good one on the Wii. After The Conduit, you’ll never want to go back to a standard gamepad.
The only time the controls felt strange to me was when I was using the All-Seeing Eye (ASE). This is a small orb that floats above your hand and allows to find hidden items and messages, hack into computer systems, etc. It’s a cool little device, but somewhat awkward to control, largely because the developers restricted its use to walls. You can’t aim it at the ceiling or floor.
But the PlayStation and Xbox owners have a better argument against us in that the controls do not make a great game. You need great action, variety, solid graphics, a good story, and – for some – robust multiplayer features. The Conduit delivers on some of these but misses on others.
Keep a Level Head
First, the graphics are some of the best I’ve seen on the Wii. They’re still short of their modern console counterparts but here we’ve at least got a game that doesn’t look like it was ported over from the GameCube. The colors are crisp and vibrant, the lighting effects are outstanding, and the designs are fairly unique. There are also some really unique weapons to experience, and the enemies are kind of cool looking…at first. More on that in a bit.
And yet, the visuals overall are somewhat lacking solely because the levels are lifeless. The game takes place in Washington, DC, but it seems more like a photo album of DC with snapshots taken after everyone’s in bed. You run down hallways that are largely repetitive and the exteriors seem oddly empty and confined. And if you’re a completionist, you’ll end up slowing the game down by going back through entire sections with your ASE after you’ve cleared them of threats to see if you missed any hidden items. This kills the pacing but leads to unlockable items. You can decide what’s more important (although, if you choose unlockable items, you’re wrong).
Never Abandon Your Fellow Soldier
The single-player portion of the game isn’t all that long but the multiplayer component helps to compensate for that. It offers easy connection, support for WiiSpeak, battles against up to 11 other opponents and plenty of game variations.
It’s easier to overlook the game’s shortcoming in multiplayer mode, so it’s a much better purchase if you plan to utilize that portion of it. I’ve never played Halo, so I can’t make the comparison that so many others are doing, but I have played the Call of Duty multiplayer games. The Conduit doesn’t quite hold up, but it’s not really a fair comparison. CoD has had many opportunities and more than a decade of development to get that right (Halo, too, for that matter), while The Conduit is on its first run. That it did this well right out of the gate, however, speaks highly of the development team. Plus, they’ve got some great variations in here that other multiplayer games are lacking.
My favorite was ASE Football, which is essentially Get The Kid With the Ball. In this, you have to find the ASE (football) and hold onto it the longest without being killed (tackled). It’s very fun, and much more entertaining than Capture the Flag (although that’s in here, too).
Let Loose the Drudge of War
When playing through The Conduit there was never a point where I was completely blown away. However, there was also never a point where I regretted the purchase. Playing through it is like reading a pulp sci-fi novel (but you probably guessed that from the cover art, right?): Light, fast and entertaining, if not completely satisfying.
If you’re willing to wait for the price to drop $10 to $20, you’ll be happier with your purchase. When that happens, it should become a steady seller, so I expect the game to hang around for quite some time.
You know, like Collective Soul.
Read [Gamertell] Read [The Conduit]
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