Eat Lead Notes

Three difficulty levels Hardest is ghosted, choose medium.The intro cut scene is narrated by Matt, basically it suggests that Matt Hazard is an actual actor used for the Matt Hazard series of games which started as 8-bit side scrollers. Things progressed as they do and Matt found himself in 3D FPS's and then on into diverging game genres. Ultimately like all long running franchises the karting game and non-violent water pistol shooter saw his popularity wane. Taking things in his own direction was the final nail in the Matt Hazard franchise coffin. A new Owner has bought Marathon, the company who make the games and they want Matt to star in their new next generation game.
The game starts with Matt making the game, which is of course achieved by us playing it.The story sees Matt as a private detective taking on some triads in a chinese steakhouse.
TutorialLeft and Right analogue sticks control movement and camera as usual, third person view of character. Clicking right stick changes which shoulder you view over when aiming/zoomed using left trigger. Right trigger shoots. Right bumper reloads.Pressing A near cover goes into cover. Pointing the crosshair at nearby cover and pressing Y moves you to that cover swiftly. Pressing B while moving into cover vaults you over it.Pressing X melee's opponents.
Level 1We move into the resturaunt via the kitchens taking out suited soldiers.After the kitchens it's the steakhouse proper and then up into an office where we meet our first boss. He is Sonny Tang a blacksplotation 70's disco Kung fu idiot.I beat him up using dreaded quicktime sequences, which at least are always the same sequence so aren't all that frustrating.115 achievement points in about ten minutes, this game is good for score whores.We then go back to fighting the usual goons in the steakhouse, back out into utility areas and then into another office.We meet Sting Sniperscope, who sounds like a bad arnie rip off. He shoots us in the head and the game pauses, well everything except for Matt. A voice in his ear tells him that all of his saves have been erased and if that bullet had hit him then he would have been dead. Someone is tampering with the game and Matt is trapped in it. If he dies in the game he dies for real. The mystery female erases Sting's gun and we knock him down with one punch while he is paused.The woman tells us to call her QA. In some kind of holodeck type affair she appears as a digital ghost. Someone was going to pull a fast one on Matt, he was to be killed in the first level and Sting Sniperscope was to take over as the hero. QA tells Matt to carry on and she will try and get him out and help him through the game if she can't.She restores his saves and gives him weapons.
Level 2The next level is a meat market and casino???QA tells us that we can now absorb enemy code packages when they die.We move through the shopfront of the meat market and then into the freezer rooms with sides of beef hanging up. We progress into another area and then the game is hacked by someone else. The scene changes to a western scene. QA is puzzled but can't help, we will just have to progress.The western scene does not last long, but the cowboys keep coming. We make our way through the casino to the mangers office, which was the original level objective. The soliders here are armed with different weapons. Shotguns magnums etc.At the managers office Matt meet's Kitty who seems friendly after she knee's him in the crotch. The unknown bad guy uploads russian soliders from another game into the level and we have to help Kitty kill them all.Once that is done QA opens an exit for Kitty. We have to finish the level to progress though.We now have an ice upgrade, the code packages fill a meter and once full we can now unlock ice bullets for a short period of time.We have to fight through the lower floor of the club with it's horde of robotic dancers. Back into the western area we started in and we meet General Neutronov.This is a traditional boss Fight, Neutronnov has an atomic bomb, we have to shoot him from a series of platforms, and once shot enough we move onto another of three sets of platfroms. Different objectives, like shooting exlpoding barrels on his platform and releasing clamps make our progress. Once we have shot him enough the final time we can go and disarm the bomb.
Level 3Bill the wizard has been taken from his game and we need to save him. It seems that all the marathon company heroes are under attack in this game not just Matt.when we enter the level Bill is being ambushed by teams of about four guards at a time. We are on the roof and have to snipe them to prevent Bill being killed.We then run around on the roof shooting at enemies. We have to defend Bill again with the sniper rifle again.New enemies are hacked in, from the kid friendly shooter "Soak em", cue laughter, however the water guns turn out be just as deadly as real guns.We fight some more with the water shooter guys and then snipe more for Bill.Next Sting turns up on the roof accross the street and we have to avoid his sniper fire.Usual laser sighting we have to stay in cover.We have to work our way through the warehouse avoiding sniper fire and the usual enemies.A flying alien ship turns up ourside the warehouse and fires in through the windows at us.after we have avoided the ship for a while and shot some more baddies Bill the wizard turns up and uses his staff to knock out the helicopter as they describe it, looked alien to me.Now we have unlocked fire bullets.We come to the showdown with Sting Sniperscope.We have to make our way through a long room avoiding his sniper fire and killing the super soaker commandos.This is a real pain in the ass, avoiding the sniper fire is hard work. Eventually I get to the end ducking and diving and finding alternate routes between all the machinery. When you reach the end of the room you get a quicktime fight sequence with Sniperscope and kick his ass for the second time.
Level 4We watch a cut scene where we find out that the new owner of Marathon has a grudge against Matt because as a kid he couldn't finish his games. He wants him killed off. New characters are found from other games to be patched in to kill Matt.The next level begins and we have to find Dexter who was Matt's partner in a previous game.This level starts out in a luxurious house by the sea with nice gardens.Swat type enemies, nothing new here so far.we reach a tennis court and suddenly the game is hacked. Zombies rise up out of the ground. We have to shoot them in the head.We get a few areas where the zombies are mixed in with russians and swat guys. Then the super soaker commandos turn up again.We find Dexter lounging in bed, Kitty and another scantily clad lady turn up, seems they are duplicates under Dexter's control. Dexter has been promised his own game if he kills off Matt for the CEO.Killing the two fembots isn't hard if you have managed to keep the ice upgrade handy.We get a dual wield sub machine gun for killing them.We catch up with dexter and have a quicktime fight with him, he kicks us in the balls and manages to get away. So we are after him again.After more shootouts with men and the female bot defenders we come back to Dexter and beat him up. Matt stops short of actually killing him however.We have to go back to the guest house to find the exit to the level.Which basically means there's no more level and we are just backtracking with different amounts of varied enemies in the same areas as before.When we get back to where we started a cut scene starts.Matt is trapped in a room of the mansions with Zombies in large numbers trying to get in. He asks QA to open an exit but she is having trouble and says that someone is trying to block her out. QA appears but she is acting strangely and is probably an imposter. She tells Matt to leave through an exit she opens up.
Level 5We find ourself on a ship.Where we fight through corridors and a submersible bay. After fighting through a house type office area on the ship, Don't ask, the game is using game cliches to allow any type of environments it wants at any time. We meet up with Master Chef. No, I didn't think it was funny either. He is pinned down with no gun in a kitchen. Space marines are coming to attack him and we must save him. Even the music here is riffing on Halo. There are two space marines in the area which must be killed to progress, they take a lot of shooting due to their advanced armour. After we have dealt with them we get some new weapons. QA is acting oddly again. Even Matt is starting to doubt it's her.The energy pistol is a good weapon. Shame the plasma rifle isn't so good. The ODST troopers drop in using pods, and refreshingly you can shoot them whilst they are still in their pods to make them a little less of a pain in the ass. You make your way through the ship with the ODST fighting you all the way, there are some zombies thrown in to make things fun. Eventually you come to a face off with Evil QA who is still acting badly. Real QA breaks in and tries to shut out the evil QA. She can't and the ship turns into a pirate ship with a huge sea monster boss to deal with. Seems from the references here we are taking the mick out of God of War.The tentacle beast of Tramm is a really hard annoying boss battle. I am sensing a theme here. You have to hit it's tentacles on certain orange areas as it gets them stuck in the deck. Do this six times and it's onto the next stage. Here you have to shoot smaller tentacles to get the larger ones to appear and throw mines at you. If you hit the mine enough it explodes in the tentacles grasp hurting it. Yes again six times you do this. Then you have to shoot the tentacles as they wave around in the air jabbing at you again. Whilst all this is going on the ODST's drop in and run interference. You get a 40 point achievement for doing this missions and it is well earned.
Level 6The CEO is getting even more upset with his underlings at Matt's ability to survive everything they are throwing at him. They have also lost him in the server.QA explains to Matt that he is in a warehouse level of another action hero.We fight our way through and find Captain Carpenter. This area is the place where all the game props are made and stored.Captain carpenter is a poor Mario knock of who vanishes down a pipe when we rescue him.We have to clear out all the enemies from the warehouse to stop the enenmies from having better weapons later on.There are little jokes about long waits in elevators.We start to come across 2D sprite enemies from early 3D games like Wolfentstein.Then the ODST rip offs return.We fight past them and come to a large area with a glowing crystal in the middle.A cut scene starts and we have come to the JRPG mickey taking section of the game. The Final fantasy generic androgenous warrior talks in text speech bubbles and fantasy cliches. He has been sent to kill us.He has a few attacks, a swirling sword, ice meteors, bringing down odst's. He also regenerates his health, which you can stop if you shoot the health globes as they approach him. Ammo is the hardest thing to find here, with ammo spread around the wide area leaving you running exposed to Altos's attacks and and odst running around as well. Killing him is easy enough if you manage to shoot all his health globes and keep his health going down instead of up.
Level 7We watch Wally the CEO shouting at his programmers again, this is the last level of the game. They are going to throw everything they have to kill Matt, well I would expect nothing less. This level takes place at a Dock.The docks is all about wide open areas, fight boxes, filled with waves of all the enemies seen so far.It's actually quite fun.We progress from the dock onto a ship, with long corridors, bunk rooms and cargo areas.Interesting bit here when a huge crane trundles through the firefight box. Moving cover.Never mentioned the Master shield and Maximum Hazard power ups that can be found on some levels. These give you around 30 seconds of increased bullet damge and invulnerability.We progress into real wolfenstein 3D territory.
get the stuff from the ipod to go in here*****************
When we finally get past the countless space marine office staff controlled respawning enemies we find outself in Wally's office.Evil QA appears and gets killed by good QA then good QA gets zapped by Wally.Now we have the final boss fight with Wally, of course he is not going to be alone and loads of varied enemies run interference.We have to survive a few waves of robogirls and zombies, then go hit a switch. Once we have hit it we get waves of odst and wolfenstein sprites.In between this we have to avoid the de-rezzing gun that Wally weilds from his high platform.Getting from cover to cover should be easy with the point and click cover system, however it's more trouble than it's worth most times, ending you up on the wrong side of cover etc.After hitting the next switch we get waves of the inept worker players again.We have to avoid his de-rez fire to hit another switch.A cut scene shows Wally cornering Matt and about to kill him when Dexter turns up with two fembots and shoots Wally.Matt gets to go bare fists with Wally.Which is censored due to violent content, we see a black screen while comedy chainsaw sounds happen. Matt knocks him out then Dexter and QA comes to chat. Turns out that QA is a guy called Quentin in real life.
Completed in around 15 hours playtime. Have to say the levels themselves were easy enough, the boss battles were annoyingly hard. Still 815 achievement points for one playthrough on Normal are not to be sniffed at.