Being just another video game inspired by a Movie, that happened to be launched at the same date as the motion picture premiere, I wasn't expecting much from X-Men Origins: Wolverine the Game. I was praying for it to have at least five to eight hours of some action gameplay, so I wouldn't get bored to death.

But Raven Software proved me wrong, and delivered the ultimate X-Men game experience, and I know now I shouldn't have doubted them. But hey, you can't blame me, these days everyone tends to sell themselves cheap in order to get some fast cash. And neither I nor you can blame them, right?

So being delivered on time, May 1st, can be considered indeed an achievement, but showing off with the game on so many platforms and not making many compromises to quality surpasses that. Evidently the game isn't perfect, the lack of video options for example being one of its biggest flaws. It could probably have looked much better if you could tune texture filtering for example or add some anti-aliasing.

Story wise, Wolverine lets you experience everything the movie has to tell you, plus some extra chapters that extend gameplay even more. We find out about Logan's military past, his Africa mission where things "went wrong", how his bones were coated with the indestructible adamantium substance, how he found out plans to terminate him and how he managed to escape. Of course, every aspect of his life puts you in his shoes, and lets you make decisions and take actions. The story ends up with Logan saving the world from an anti-mutant weapon and finally seeking revenge on Dr. Stryker. He finds his love Kayla and faces Weapon XI on top of a nuclear reactor. Without revealing too much, the game skips further into the future, in a wrecked, destroyed world, where Logan promises to fix everything...

This offers by my estimation roughly twenty hours of action thrilling gameplay, with alternating past, present and future flashes. Each time period and level has its own design, and while everything you experience in the present involves more killing and jumping around, your flashbacks from the African mission for example are more chilling moments, oriented towards logic puzzles and finding your way to various objectives.

Anyway, each zone is unique, because the developers didn't just recycle textures but did actually bother to create various settings and enemies as you progress further into the game. This prevents boredom of course, but what really determine you play till the end are the roleplay elements introduced.

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Wolverine has an experience bar that fills up as he kills his enemies, and gains levels, making him stronger. For each level you gain a certain amount of skill points that can be distributed freely to enhance your claw damage, special abilities or gain special attacks.

Special mutagens found in various places can add enhanced damage, health regeneration, defense or extra offense when worn. Up to a maximum of three mutagen slots will be available by the end of the game, allowing you to choose from a list of found mutagens. Mutagen substances can be upgraded as well up to three times, for an enhanced effect.

Exploring even the dark corners could always reveal a permanent 5 points health boost or a dead soldier. Picking up his dog tags will also add points to your experience bar, so you are encouraged to fully explore every level before venturing any further into the game.

Three seems to be the magic number for Raven; three bonus Wolverine costumes can be unlocked by picking small action figures with our main character found in secret places throughout the game. Once the required amount of figurines are in your possession, you can take the required challenge from the Bonus section of your main menu. You will face yourself, but your "other self" will be controlled by the computer AI. Defeating this opponent will finally unlock the specific costume, and that will be available in every level you may choose to play from now on. Though I recommend playing the game at least once with the default costumes and then getting all nostalgic...

I found a couple of Easter eggs hidden in some game areas as well, specifically the Frostmourne sword and a skeleton with a yellow exclamation mark above his head in the frozen levels of the game, a direct allusion to Wrath of the Lich king expansion for World of Warcraft of course, that also takes place in the frozen north; and a birthday cake with Surprise! Text written all over the floor and walls near it in a secret room of a lab, probably a reference to Valve's Portal cake - that is a lie... or... is it?!

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Logan's attack keys are naturally placed on the keyboard and mouse, and without too much needed practice you can safely get right into action and hack and slash your way around soldiers, robots and evil mutants that get in your way. Combining abilities is easy enough, and you don't need to look in your combos list every time you want to do something special. Just be inventive and creative. Plus, since you aren't given all the abilities from the beginning but rather step by step through leveling, you have all the time to practice and get good.

You can also tailor playing experience to your liking by spending skill points on the abilities that you feel more comfortable using, or on those that you feel will impress your friends more...

Logan's voice is played by Hugh Jackman himself, making his life story sound more plausible especially to movie fans, but his quality voice acting convinces even the worst critics.

The complexity of the story, plot twists and good voice acting coming from all the actors involved is surpassed only by the quality of the storyline and good looking cinematic clips.

Still, because we have to mention some problems you may encounter in this game, here's what you should know and may not like about the Wolverine game. As previously mentioned, there are virtually no visual and audio options other than resolution and a "low textures" mode for graphics and volume sliders for sounds and music.

Relatively long loading times are present as well, just like in every other Unreal Engine game really. Fortunately, loading screens show interesting quotes from various Wolverine publications, something a becoming fan always finds informing.

Checkpoints are frequent enough but some rare zones just don't want to save your progress for long periods of gameplay time, and if you end up dead you'll just have to kill those foes or climb those towers again and again.

Also, camera can play cruel tricks on you sometimes, as the perspective shifts to fixed points when climbing, running or fighting someone for various occasions as a 3rd person perspective wouldn't probably be viable at that point.

Just remember, if you ever get stuck in a puzzle, use 1, or your Feral Senses mode and you may get an idea where to go or what to do next.

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Conclusion

While X-Men Origins: Wolverine isn't a perfect game, Raven Software did a mighty fine job with the franchise. It is certainly the best game wearing the X-Men name a fan could buy, and if you haven't seen the movie yet, it makes you want to buy it. An enjoyable and decently long experience that doesn't disappoint one bit.

Gameplay: 81

A violent, bloody, action packed gameplay, just as a fan of X-Men and Wolverine would expect from this. The intriguing story combined with puzzle moments and a lot of fighting make this game a worthy experience not only for comic book or movie fans, but for every action fan out there. It has its flaws, it may be a console port, but considering the circumstances, nicely done Raven.

Graphics: 79

Looking good all the way through except some random textures that seem to low; nothing to worry. I would have just preferred more video options all around, cause it's a shame of those wasted resources that could have been used on powerful gaming rigs to make this look even better.

Multiplayer: N/A

Sound: 80

Hugh Jackman and other good actors manage to create an immersive movie experience, and sometimes you can forget you are playing a videogame, until a monster hits you in the head. Everything from slashing sounds to background computer noise is great, and game music is alert and changes pace according to gameplay, without being over the top.

Hardware: 84

Except the lack of options and long loading times, there's nothing to complain as the game uses Unreal Engine 3. This probably made possible such a quick and quality release on so many platforms.