The premise of the game is that evil lurks just around every corner and only Julie can save the planet of Eden. It should come as no surprise that the environment reeks of minor details. Though Sin was something of a disappointment (pre-patch), the game sported some of the best art and level design in a first-person shooter. If anything, the guys at Ritual have one claim to fame: they know level design. Never before have I found a game with such beautiful graphics and design from start to finish. Once Julie has entered the real world you will find an environment rich in characters, small furry animals and impending peril. The training session is thorough and complete without missing anything. Along the way, players learn how to use a variety of weapons, climb walls, skirt narrow cliffs and use attack combinations. The game begins with a training session to help non-third-person adventure gamers (like me) get up to speed with running, jumping, crawling, climbing and fighting. Is any of this sordid background necessary knowledge to play the game? Well, no, but at least now you know why the heroine chooses to reveal so much flesh. Quick fact: The lead character was inspired by B-movie actress/Penthouse playmate, Julie Strain. It became quite a cult hit - enough to approve funding for the raunchy 1981 animated movie based on stories from the magazines, a sort of westernized anime full of aliens, action and 'naked chicks.' Roll on the new century, and Heavy Metal has already met a strong revival with its recent home video/DVD release now a new Heavy Metal movie has just been completed (dubbed 'Heavy Metal 2000') based on the F.A.K.K.2 stories and this game is all part of the franchise. Actually, it does make a good lead-in to a brief background on the 'Heavy Metal' reference in the title - for those not in the know (and many of us aren't), Heavy Metal is an adult sci-fi/fantasy comic magazine started in the glorious age of the politically incorrect seventies. The header above has nothing to do with what I am about to write, but I just had to get that out now.

It's just a shame the end is so much closer than you think. I am very thankful I did, though - rarely do I play a game that I absolutely want to play until the very end. Being an FPS-only sort of gamer, I generally lost interest, but by the time the game rolled around I had completely forgotten about the fixed perspective and ignorantly requested a copy to review. I couldn't get much of a description of the game from the guys except 'it's gonna be way cool' and that it would be played from the 3rd-person perspective. I had no idea then that the concept art I was looking at would develop into something so special.

2 when I visited the Ritual offices two years ago.

F.a.m music download