WET - Review | crystalgamer.com

WET – Review

Over the top, grind-house, badass, action, non-stop, unique. All those words describe Bethesda’s latest release, WET, but can “good” be one of them?

WET’s story is inspired by 70’s exploitation films, otherwise known as Grindhouse, or at the very least Quintin Taranteno’s inperation of the genre. You take control of Rubi, a fem-fatal gun for hire, out to collect briefcases, get double crossed and get revenge. Although it might sound generic, the game tells an interesting story that spans the globe and even take Rubi out for a sky diving lesson with no parachute, it’s the over the top moment of the game that will keep you going through the story rather than the story or the characters as they have little or no development, except for Rubi.

Action titles don’t get any more straight forward than WET, which has a story that can be completed in 8 hours, containing 12 chapters of varying lengths and is very linear, but often having a few dead end routes that will lead to Toy Monkeys. Completing the game will unlock Challenge Mode which allows you to play isolated sections of levels for faster times or more points but with that all said and done you can experience everything WET has to offer in one play through.

The titles focus is showing off it’s unique style, such as the Grindhouse cheap movie theatre movie flicker look, random advertisements for refreshments that are often funny but would leave you leaving with an awkward look on your face as one second you’ll be in an elevator, the second after the minute ad you’ll be hanging off a side of a building wondering how the hell you got there. But like I mentioned it’s all about the style of the game which it borrows a few, dare say retro action elements, like glowing skulls that when destroyed will close enemy spawning doors and visibly racking up points for every slow mo kill and perform special moves that will put you into slow mo, somewhat like the old Max Payne games. By the way those points a mentioned before, for killing enemies, the more you kill, i.e. in a Combo, and the cooler you do it will rack up more points which you can then use to upgrade Rubi’s abilities as well as her weapons but this process isn’t entirely satisfying as many of the new abilities you simply wont use. As you progress through the game the enemies gradually take more and more punishment from you, which means it is necessary to upgrade your weapons, but they don’t feel any more powerful. However a cool feature that always helps in a fire fight is the dual lock on, perform any more that slows down time and Rubi will lock on with one weapon to the nearest enemy allowing you to free control gun number 2 to do some damage.

You’ll often find your self up against a number of foes, you often find that you’re just cleaning out one room and moving onto the next. While killing enemies in slow motion is cool, it does eventually follow into a repetitive pattern that consists no more than room clearing. Quick time events do come into the game on occasion but they often randomly appear and catch you off guard until your third time through the QTE. The game does have little variety, like with car surfing and the blood rage but these later repeat themselves way too many times but I have to say are pretty damn cool.

Overall the game is nothing more than a B movie, however a fun B movie to play and see how the story plays out. There are generally quite a few things in this game that will put a smile on your face and for me personally I’m looking forward to a sequel that will hopefully improve the variety of gameplay and maybe have a true full non interrupted story.