This needs to clock in more training at the Academy (X-Men Mutant Academy 2 (PS))

Member Name: Wolfzilla

Product:	X-Men Mutant Academy 2 (PS)
Date:	10/06/08 (57 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Fairly nice graphics on the characters, not the worst

Disadvantages: There is already a much better game like it, rather slow, silly Super system...

I can't say I ever played, or even entertained the thought of playing the original X-Men Mutant Academy for the PlayStation. I dont believe it was all that popular, and was surprised to see a sequel. Surprised until I realised that the X-Men movie was due out, and this was a clear cash in. The only reason I bought it was because you got a free memory card with it, and the shop didnt sell memory cards separately. Given the fact I had given up on comics for a few years, I was expecting characters and such I didnt recognise, but I remembered how awesome X-Men: Children of the Atom for the Saturn was, so went for it anyway.

The game is a pseudo-3D fighting game, along the same lines as Capcom's Rival Schools, where the gameplay is firmly rooted in 2 dimensions, yet the game uses 3D character models, so as not to alienate the audience who turn their noses up at 2D looking games. It works in the standard fighting game fashion, best out of three rounds, and is, in almost every way, the standard fighting game template.

The main addition to game to separate it from the oodles of other fighters from the console is clearly the license, and indeed, if you are drawn in by the promise of scrapping with Marvel's mighty mutants you won't be disappointed with a pretty solid line-up that includes obvious choices like Wolverine, Cyclops and Storm, and mixes them in with some rather cool and less famous names Psylocke and Nightcrawler(this was pre X2), although some of the cast requires unlocking, so this does add some single-player life to the game.

The only real gameplay difference between this and every other fighter out there is the Super-Meter. Or Meters if you will. You see, in their attempt to try and be smart, Activision have put in 3-Super Meters as opposed to the regular 1. So what the hell do you do with 3? you may ask, and you would be informed that you have 3 Super Moves, and one meter for each move. So how do you fill 3 up? to be honest, it's where I got lost as well, as far as I can tell, one fills with normal moves, one with special moves and the other with...throws? you can transfer energy from meter to meter as well, but to be completely honest, the system is so stupidly complicated that within 10 minutes you will give up. I've played literally hundreds of fighting games, learned a plethora of systems, and I've never come accross anything as outright stupid as this in any of them. You spend more time trying to work out meters at the bottom of the screen that the actual fighting becomes secondary, which isn't necessarily all that bad a thing, because playing the game for any length of time will reveal how completely uninspiring it is.

Some of the characters have throws that utilize a 'bullet time'(where everything slows down and the camera spins) effect, which looks cool the first 3 times, but the basic meat and bones of the game's engine is completely generic.
Standard Capcom-esque Quarter D-Pad motions for special moves, standard projectiles and rising uppercuts...basically Activision dug their own grave, by making this game seem so much like a lame Capcom effort, and using a license that Capcom already utilised in a most splendid fashion is just going to draw comparisons, comparisons to a game that this quite simply cannot stand up to. Where Capcom's game was a fast and furious super-powered duel, this is a slow and rather tepid slug-fest with horrible slow and floaty jumps. I mean it has decent hit detection and there are no response issues, but it's just such a generic and tired game that I can only imagine it's prequel is actually identical, and this was bunged out with a couple of new characters for the benefit of catching new fans based on Bryan Singer's excellent movie.

Speaking of that, there is a trailer for the movie in here, as well as some nice little FMV videos you get if you complete arcade mode with each character. This isn't exactly something to buy the game for, but at least it had some variety of decent extras to it.

The game controls fairly similarly to the Capcom fighters as well, 3 Punch Buttons (Quick, Medium and Strong) and 3 similar kick buttons, as well as buttons used to try and work the multiple Super Meters, but this also brings up a problem native to Capcom's games for the console, where an alternative controller is really necessary to properly play the game, because functioning with only 4 face buttons is murder. However, whereas it was worth investing in another controller for a good Capcom fighter, this game really won't be all that much fun, even if it is played on a controller with 6 layed out buttons for attacks.

Graphically the game is actually pretty good for an original PlayStation release. Sure it came late in the console's life, but I was still pretty impressed with the character models, which not only look the part, but are well animated as well. Sadly the stages range from bland (Gambit) to pretty well detailed(Storm), but seeing as they are firmly rooted in 2D, it does kind of create a clash with the 3D fighters duking it out in front of them.

Sound in the game comprises of some incredibly boring and non-descript music, as well as the characters' voices, which are provided by the folks who voiced them in the cartoon, which would be an awesome touch...if Capcom hand't already done it about 4 years prior. Still, the sound isn't exactly bad, I mean I did mute it and go for the CD player a few times, but that was more through choice than being driven to it by bad sound.

At the end fo the day...there really isn't much point in recommending X-Men: Mutant Academy 2. It isn't the worst fighting game ever, or even the worst on the console, which saw some real horror-shows in it's day, but the simple fact is, if you want a 2D fighting game featuring the X-Men, track down Capcom's older game, even if it is in the inferior PlayStation port. This game is essentially the same thing, without the great gameplay and wonderful speed. It's basically just another fighter, and is really only worth the 2/5 it's getting.

Summary: Skip this and find Capcom's older X-Men game, it's along the same lines, but so much better realised