Lady Eh:
Contrary to what the title might suggest--and many hormonal young boys had hoped---there is nothing "wet" about this game (or it's main character). Except maybe all the blood you'll encounter.
WET derives it's name from the euphemism "wetwork," which refers to murder or assassination; hands literally "wet with blood." Sounds pleasant, doesn't it?
Given that background, the player can assume they're not gearing up for a romp through a field full of daisies. You play as Rubi Malone, an assassin for hire who's willing to do just about anything if the price is right. But Rubi isn't just any assassin, she's not only skilled in gunplay, she also wields a samurai sword with very precise accuracy.
The core of the game is the acrobatic maneuvers you can use to dispense of your enemies. In this game it's not only about killing everything in sight, it's also about how fancy you make it look. Jumping from the ground, from a table, off the wall, or off an enemies face, and firing your dual-wielded weapons (be they Pistols, Shotguns, Uzis, or Crossbows) sends Rubi into a slow-motion, acrobatic dive which come to a halt when you land on your feet once again. If you're not into jumping you can also slide on your knees, which elicits the same slow-mo sequence but doesn't last as long and you're shooting up instead of down which makes headshots a bit more difficult.
When you first pick up the game the controls feel wonky, and I put holes in everything but my intended targets, but once you've completed the first level you should be fairly accustomed to them.
Your main goal is to finish each level (which consists of killing everything in sight) to advance the plot. Each level contains one or two "arena" areas where your goal is to shut a number of doors to stop the bad guys from pouring out of them. These arenas range from maddeningly irritating to cake walk easy. For example, I breezed through the arenas on the final chapter (Chapter 12), but got my butt kicked more times than I can count in the arena on Chapter 10.
There is nothing overly difficult about the game (I played on the Normal difficulty) but the best strategy is to remain airborne and in slow motion as often as possible. You take a ridiculous amount of damage when you aren't airborne, while your enemies take close to zero. It's the reverse for when you're in the air. Your accuracy is deadly but your enemies (maybe too distracted by your amazing acrobatic skills?) have a hard time hitting you.
Your acrobatic finesse also awards you with points, which can be spent on upgrading Rubi's abilities or weapons. You also receive a "grade" at the end of each chapter which factors in a number of things, the biggest of which is the amount of kills you earned while in acrobatic slow-mo, so if you ignore the acrobatics and try and breeze through the levels you'll have trouble upgrading Rubi (you probably wouldn't make it to the end of the chapter anyway.)
The game does a decent job of breaking up the acrobatic gunplay with two highway sections where you bounce from car to car and kill people (I guess some would consider that variety??), and a Tomb Raider-esque method of climbing buildings and walls to reach your targets.
If you're wondering about the graphics, they blow chunks. Well, I guess that's not a fair description... We'll go with "not good" for now. They're nothing spectacular and the game tries to hide that with a film graing overlay which can be very tasking on the eyes when you're trying to focus on a plethora of enemies hacking (and shooting) at your shins). Thankfully you can turn this feature off, but then you can't help but focus on the lackluster graphics. I suppose it keeps with the whole theme of grindhouse, but unlike the music, the film grain doesn't really add the the atmosphere, it's just irritating.
The acrobatics are fun, but become increasingly repetitive as you progress, especially the arena areas, which are a case of doing the same thing in some place different (but most frequently a warehouse). What's most disappointing might be the ending. I certainly wouldn't say the game is bad, but the ending was just that. I won't ruin it for anyone who hasn't played it yet, but just prepare yourself to be disappointed. No one will like the ending of this game. I felt seriously cheated. SERIOUSLY.
WET might not have blown my socks off, but it was certainly worth the $6 I paid to rent it for a week. Considering it has no multiplayer it's not really worth a full price purchase. It did it's job in offering me a break from the mass of canon shooters out there. I enjoyed it enough to finish it, but I wouldn't play through it again.
For the record, Rubi Malone has topped my list of favorite female protagonists. She's hardcore, fully clothed, and doesn't take crap from anyone. The game might not have been fantastic, but Rubi Malone's character was spot on.
Miss Tique:
In this acrobatic shooter, you play as Rubi Malone (who's voice is provided by Eliza Dushku, most recently of Dollhouse fame). Reminiscent of Kill Bill, you find yourself in China seeking revenge due to an unsuspected turn of events. Rubi has her many guns to choose from and her trusty sword to slice-n-dice through enemies rather quickly. Apparently she is also an alcoholic since a shot of Quebec helps her regain health. There are other ways to accomplish this - for instance, you can increase your multiplier score by performing acrobatics such as wall-running and killing your enemies as quickly as possible. Increasing your multiplier increases your health.
"WET" presents you with different fighting scenarios throughout the game. You have your typical run-and-gun, a rage scene where everything on the screen is red (like in Kill Bill) and you just go on a rampage while blood is splattering everywhere, the highway scene where you jump from car to car in order to catch your enemy, turret section and a finally a part where you have to disable all spawn doors and kill all remaining enemies.
I am all about girl power and was super excited that a game came out with a Heroine instead of a Hero but once I played this game, I was disappointed. I was expecting more out of this - it became old and boring rather quickly. The game play became monotonous. The story line wasn't the greatest, but it wasn't the worst. The only reason I finished WET is because of the achievements, other than that I would have put my controller down within 10 minutes. It's definitely a rental (for the achievements) but not a buy since it would be a waste of money. Hopefully the sequel will be better.
Tips
- Never stop moving. It is harder to be shot at if you are on the "go"
- Upgrade your health - This is something you will need later on in the game
- Upgrade your machine gun ammo capacity and the hit damage - It's very helpful when fighting against a mob of enemies
- Do a lot of acrobatics. The higher your multiplier, the faster you regain your health when there is no liquor around.
