Dead to Rights Retribution (Xbox 360) E3 2009 impressions

By Sid Shuman
June 06, 2009 01:53 AM PST
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Sid rips into this nutty third-person action shooter and finds potential.

Dead to Rights Retribution (Xbox 360) E3 2009 impressions

Sid's E3 Treasure Trove

GamePro senior editor Sid Shuman?s hands-on impressions from E3 2009's show floor.

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Split-Second impressions: Possibly better than Burnout
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Dead to Rights Retribution hands-on: Dog bites man

Dead to Rights Retribution is a simple game with simple goals. You control Jack Slate, a hardass cop who beats and blasts criminals like he's serving up parking tickets. The resulting gameplay feels like one part Max Payne">Max Payne and one part Wanted: Weapons of Fate.

After I picked up the controller, I noticed some eye-catching flourishes to the gameplay. Jack can violently snatch a gun away from an enemy with one button press, then blow him away with another. Ammo was limited, but with careful shooting and cover-hopping I mopped up most of the enemy gangsters without resorting to fisticuffs. The close-range melee combos add an element that games like Gears of War 2 and Halo don't have, but I preferred using the guns whenever I could. Slate has some police-style takedowns and gory finishing moves ala 50 Cent Blood on the Sand.

Chopper, sic balls

The highlight of the game was when I played as police pooch Shadow and defended Slate while he limped through gang territory. Shadow is fast and possesses enhanced visual perception, making my human targets easy prey. Jerking the right trigger, I pounced onto a clown-faced thug and Shadow graphically ripped off the thug's babymaker in an extended and unbelievably brutal animation, then crushed his throat with his jaws. Wow.

The single-player game runs a risk of becoming tedious if the developers can't keep the variety and pacing high, so I'm hoping (but not assuming) that the final version of Retribution will include online cooperative play. That'd be a pretty cool combination, with one player controlling Slate and the other controlling Shadow the wonder-pooch.

Dog Eat Dog

It probably won't change the world, but Dead to Rights Retribution is growing on me. That's partly thanks to the aforementioned death-by-castration sequence (a must-see), partly thanks to the strangely satisfying third-person shooting and beatdowns. The game has a neat look, too, with rainy, dark, trash-strewn urban backdrops that look like they were plucked out of The Crow and Seven. The original Dead to Rights has some very focal fans (my little brother included). Whether Retribution will live up to the promise of the first game is a question for another day. But for now, I must admit that my interest is mildly piqued.