Review: Just Cause

Well, I finally got my butt in gear on the story missions and finished Just Cause. I had to cheat to finish one of the final missions. When you've got six rockets, and endlessly respawning helicopters are shooting missiles at you, you tend to die constantly. But, one totally broken mission aside, let's make with the review of Just Cause (Avalanche, 2006). Basically the game is about you playing a guy working for the CIA to topple the government of a fictional South American island state.

Gameplay
As the intro alludes to, Just Cause has some pretty broken gameplay. Gun shots barely hurt, but getting hit with a car is often instant death. Explosions are also highly lethal, and the idiots on your team will shoot explosive projectiles at enemy vehicles that are trying to run you down (this is of course when the idiots on your team aren't running you over and killing you themselves).

The dominance of vehicles would make them seem like the way to go, but the second I get in one, enemy helicopters switch from hair mussing 50 caliber machine guns to rockets which generally explode me and any vehicle in short order, so it's generally safest well away from the roads.

Just Cause also has a stunt system that lets you jump on top of your vehicle and leap to other vehicles. This mechanic feels pretty loose and uses context sensitive buttons which makes it easy to press the button a split second too early or late and completely screw up the maneuver.

There is also a grapple gun which lets you parasail behind boats, cars, helicopters, etc. It's occasionally handy, but using it to try and get those ever annoying helicopters off your back is a pain.

Theatrics
These are a joke. Just Cause's hero is supposed to be some sort of Latin James Bond. But with as often as he muffs stunts and gets run over, he's more like Inspector Clouseau. And the complete hack job that passes for a story and characterization is best left for an autopsy, not a game review. That crap was DOA.

Aesthetics
And here is the section where you are rewarded for listening to my complaining with pretty pictures.







Again, this foliage and cloud mass is non interactive, which is always disappointing when I remember that even Joint Ops had effects for chopper wash. But at the end of the day, this stuff was the best part of the game. Off-roading through the jungles in first person, dodging rocks and trees was great. Flying and skydiving past amazing scenery was great. Even boating had its moments. As a game, Just Cause was lame. But as a reminder of vacations past...



It made me happy.

Final Score
3 of 5