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Twisted Metal 2 - Still widely considered to be the best car combat game ever made, what makes Twisted Metal 2 so special? Find out in this exhaustive deep dive! |
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Premise:
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The first Twisted Metal tournament reduced the entire city of Los Angeles to ruin. It couldn't have gone better! But now the tournament's enigmatic host, Calypso, faces a dilemma. Where can he hold his next installment of vehicular homicide based sports entertainment? Then it hits him like a head on collision: the venue for Twisted Metal 2 will be the whole world! Paris, Hong Kong... Even Antarctica. This time there will be nowhere to hide.
The rules are as simple as ever. Twelve contestants enter. One contestant lives. The prize? Anything the lucky winner desires... But they had better be careful what they wish for. Are you ready, driver?
Gameplay
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The first thing you'll notice about TM2's gameplay is that the physics are completely insane. When your vehicle drives up an incline it gets flung high in the air, and the way momentum works in general is absolutely bananas. You can hit a ramp at 100 MPH, turn 45 degrees in mid-air, then the moment you hit the ground you'll just keep going at 100 MPH.
It seems uncontrollable at first.
But then you realize your vehicle is super easy to control when it slows down. And it dawns on you: the physics can be tamed. You just need to learn when to drive slow and when to drive fast.
You'll also learn how to turn your vehicle faster than lightning using the quick turn button(press X + Left or Right when you're moving at low speed, or X + [] + Left or Right from a standstill).
And how you can perform different degrees of powerslides depending on your speed, the sharpness of your turn, and whether or not you brake.
After a while you'll have movement mastered. It takes skill and patience, though. What I'm saying is, TM2 doesn't have shallow gameplay. It's not like you can just hold the accelerator and mindlessly blast things. It's actually pretty deep.
Weapon pickups are generously scattered across every level but they don't give you much ammo so you'll constantly be racing around grabbing more.
These pickups come in two flavors. Guided and unguided.
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Fire Missiles
Your basic missile weapon. Weak homing.
Homing Missles
These are like Fire Missiles but they're much, much better at homing.
Napalm
A ball of fire that gets lobbed like a mortar. Very weak homing, very hard to aim, but also very destructive.
Lightning
Certain levels feature a lightning trap that electrocutes any vehicle unfortunate enough to get near it. Use this to activate it. |
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Power Missiles
They deliver high damage but their total lack of homing makes them hard to aim.
Ricochet Bomb
A huge, powerful bomb that ricochets around the level until it hits a vehicle. Any vehicle. Even yours. Use with caution. (Note: It's also slightly buggy. If you launch it while going too fast it'll instantly explode on you, so slow down before unleashing it, or use a slower vehicle).
Remote Bomb
You can plant this fearsomely powerful bomb anywhere and detonate it at will. It also explodes on contact so it effectively doubles as a landmine. Great for use against immobilized opponents. But watch out. You aren't immune to its explosion. |
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Not only are these weapons fun to use but they're as close to perfectly balanced as it gets. None of them are overpowered and the stronger ones are made fair by being tougher to use.
Oh, but that's not all. Each character also has his or her own special weapon. These aren't pickups, though. Getting them is automatic, with one round popping into your inventory every minute or so.
These special weapons range from Twister turning in to a literal tornado, to Thumper unleashing a killer flamethrower, to Hammerhead just flat out running other vehicles over, and many more. These aren't quite as balanced as the regular weapons but they're still very fair.
Then on on top of that, you have advanced moves activated by button combos. Among other things, you can activate a shield, fire a weapon behind you, and launch an ice missile that freezes opponents for a few seconds.
Each advanced move drains energy from your advanced move bar. It recharges fairly quickly, though. So you can go pretty crazy with advanced moves but you can't outright spam them.
It should be noted that TM2 is a bit finicky about recognizing button combos. I found that inputting them quickly actually makes them fail frequently. It's better to input them fairly slowly.
As for game modes, TM2 features a singleplayer tournament that has you going through all the levels facing randomized opponents(your heart will sink whenever Sweet Tooth shows up), a challenge mode where you can freely select any level and choose your opponents, two player deathmatch, and amazingly enough two player co-op. It doesn't seem like a lot, but trust me, combine that with 12 playable characters and it's enough to keep you occupied forever.
So yeah, did I mention the gameplay's deep?
Artificial Intelligence
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The AI-controlled players in TM2 are far from being mindless targets. Each one seems to have an actual personality, from Sweet Tooth constantly spamming his special attack at you from across the level, to Mr. Slam creeping up to capture you in his shovel, to Grasshopper yelling "YEEHAW" and flying in to you whenever you're anywhere near her.
They're like really good multiplayer bots way, way ahead of their time.
Of course there are moments when you can tell they're only AI, but they mostly do a remarkably good job of seeming like real people. You'll even develop major grudges against some of them. Think you won't? Oh, you will. You will.
Sure, a lot of the AI's individuality is probably just smoke and mirrors, but they're very convincing smoke and mirrors.
And by the way, they're all extremely vicious. Good luck beating tournament mode with only 3 lives. You'll need it.
Levels
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The levels in TM2 are a major ingredient of its greatness. There are only 8 in total but I think that's because SingleTrac refused to repeat any ideas or add any filler.
You'll find yourself tearing up the streets of Paris(where you can fight inside of - and demolish - the Eiffel Tower), jumping across rooftops in New York, and racing against the clock as the entire level crumbles around you in Antarctica. And that isn't even half of it.
Two of the levels are on the simpler side, but their simplicity makes them stand out in a positive way. Moscow is best described as a two-tiered bowl of death, and Holland features an ironically serene field with nowhere to hide but two windmills. Although don't hide for too long or else the AI might blow them up in their quest to get you.
But everything else is more complex. Los Angeles is a playgound of destruction filled with ramps, tunnels, a fire pit, some destructible buildings, and a big lightning trap you can use to zap your enemies(or yourself if you're not careful).
Hong Kong offers more than just sprawling streets, it has a working subway system and a whole battle arena tucked away in the middle of the city that's like a level-within-a-level.
Amazonia sees you fighting for dear life on precarious pieces of land floating in a sea of lava.
Another thing to note about these levels is that they're big(with the exception of Moscow and Holland). Really big. And amazingly enough, the draw distance is excellent. You can see for what seems like literal miles, which means you can attack your opponents from extreme distances. But then again, they can attack you right back.
But maybe the best thing about the stupendous stages in TM2 is that they aren't designed like singleplayer levels at all. They're designed like multiplayer levels streamlined for fast, fun human competition.
Think 2fort5 from Team Fortress or Blood Gulch from Halo. They're good like that.
And although you probably won't be facing any real humans(good luck finding somebody to play TM2 with in this day and age), the AI is human enough to make these brilliant multiplayer-oriented levels truly shine.
Sound
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The music here is generally 90's hard rock/metal, but it takes some detours in to awesome orchestral arrangements and even a traditional Asian-style piece for the Hong Kong level. These tunes are as varied as the levels themselves and they fit the car combat mayhem like a glove. For lack of a better term, they just hit right.
This is hands down one of the best soundtracks to ever grace the Playstation. Is it worth hearing even if you aren't interested in playing TM2? You bet it is. It's that good.
Sound effects are beefy and full of personality, with no two noises sounding alike. The whole thing is a chaotic cacophony of blazing weapons and squealing tires, and best of all, they neither overpower the music nor are they overpowered by it. The mixing is excellent.
The voice acting is total cheese, but it's really good cheese. The voice actor for Calypso in particular, Mel McMurrin, deserves a special nod. He's got a fantastic voice and he's clearly good at acting, but he chose to ham it up like crazy here and TM2 is all the better for it.
Overall, the best way to describe TM2's audio is pure fun. Top notch sound design all the way.
In Conclusion
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Is TM2 the best car combat game ever made? Yeah, I'd say so. Nobody has ever managed to replicate its formula of deep gameplay, human seeming AI, and superb level design.
It was lightning in a bottle that not even its own creators could recapture.
Playing it is genuinely like playing a really great online multiplayer game, except offline and somehow contained in a Playstation. If you have any interest in action games and you're in for a challenge, get TM2. It's as good as the legends say.
RATING: BEST OF ITS KIND, QUINTESSENTIAL PLAYSTATION GAME
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On the week Twisted Metal 2 was released...
Bill Clinton won re-election against Bob Dole in a presidential race that was a gift to comedians everywhere, Conan O'Brien visited London, and Kobe Bryant debuted in the NBA. |
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