Inversion Preview
At this week’s' Ignite media event, publisher Namco Bandai claimed it's on the brink of setting the shooter genre on its ear. With its new action title, Inversion, Namco plans not only to revolutionize the way we look at shooters, but to convince the naysayers that its gravity-manipulation mechanic is more than just a gimmick.
Created by Saber Interactive, makers of sci-fi shooter Timeshift, Inversion puts you in an alternate reality where Earth's gravity has undergone let's say, some changes. Details on the fiction are sketchy, but the Xbox 360 demo began on a level called A2-2 Rummage (placeholder?) which was set in a rubble-filled city street. I and my NPC partner, both beefy manly men (not Gears of War beefy, but getting there) went careening through the ruined buildings killing enemy soldiers and doing our best not to get shot. In addition to the usual run-of-the-mill gunplay, I was able to access my “Gravlink”, a handy gadget that allowed me to manipulate gravity to my advantage. With it I could target an enemy and levitate him off the ground like Yoda using the Force. Once there, I could do any number of things with him: shoot him, throw him or finish him off with a nasty looking head-stomp move. (Mind you, enemies were still able to fight even as they were floating so deciding on a course of action quickly was in my best interest.) As I progressed, I found the Gravlink mechanic to be handy not only because it can weaken enemies, but because it also enables you to grab ammo from far away and to snatch weapons out of the air.
To use the Gravlink, you have to keep an eye on your gravity gauge, a blue bar on screen that depletes when you use it and slowly regenerates over time. Once you have enough gravity, you aim with the reticule, then hit RB to use Gravlink. It's a nifty mechanic, if somewhat familiar in feel, like various forms of telekinesis. My partner and I fought our way through the ruins and then fulfilled an objective to take a turret in a debris-strewn courtyard. Manning the turret, I chewed through a multi-story building opposite called the Terra Club, watching in amusement as the whole thing collapsed, dropping guys everywhere. When the dust cleared, I noticed something. Despite the fact that my feet were planted firmly on the ground, there were all manner of small items floating in the air around me. Upon asking questions regarding the logic of that, I was told by the demo rep that in the game, gravity's basically “all messed up”. So much for specificity or believable logic.
Anyway, post-turret, we proceeded to an outdoor area where we watched a huge skyscraper topple to the ground and then were attacked by a veritable onslaught of enemies. Here we were treated to another aspect of the game's gravity manipulation—the Vector Shift. During a Vector Shift, entire areas can randomly change axis, so that you find yourself running on ceilings or sideways on walls like the guys in that crazy fight scene from the recent movie, Inception. Interestingly enough, these shifts don't necessarily affect entire levels. At one point, I was taking cover behind some concrete chunks with the gravitational orientation as it should be but I was being shot at by guys who were stuck to the left hand wall like heavily armed flies. I was shown how to use this setup to my advantage, by tossing grenades and watching them re-orient themselves according to the local gravity, curving around corners, or even falling up--admittedly pretty cool.
After this, we fought off enemies as they came at us from multiple levels of a multi-tiered structure and used exploding red barrels to take out several at a time or to destroy the structures they were standing on. The game features a surprising amount of destructible objects, upping the mayhem that much more. I finished the demo off by using Gravlink to lift a heavy enemy off his feet, then zooming in with the mini-zoom and sniping him in the head.
Namco’s demo has done its job demonstrating that Inversion's core mechanic isn't just a gimmick, but until more of the game can be played, the idea’s lasting appeal remains to be seen. In some ways, gravity manipulation is like using the Force or the forms of kinesis seen in other games so it's not as revolutionary as its creators might think. However, if Inversion can present a well-constructed narrative and some interesting level scenarios along with it, it just might convince the skeptics. Look for Inversion on PS3 and Xbox 360 in February of 2012.
