IGN
The game's scenario has been almost completely rewritten. According to Activision, GoldenEye 007 is a reimagining of the GoldenEye story, just as Casino Royale shook things up with a much more gritty version of the James Bond character. GoldenEye still retains the basics of GoldenEye's story, but retells it in a way that makes sense with Daniel Craig's interpretation of James Bond.
The Wii game has been developed by Eurocom, fresh after its work on Dead Space Extraction for Electronic Arts and Visceral Games. GoldenEye 007 retains the polished scripted storytelling of Extraction with extremely well acted and animated in-game cutscenes.
Players can climb up guard towers and hit the high ground or take cover behind structures. Environments are fully destructible, a way to keep the player moving: enemies will whittle protective cover down until it's useless. The missions will have multiple paths that balance covert and stealth with all-out firefights -- if you alert an enemy to your location, you have time to take them down before they alert their pals and make things even more difficult.
It's a contemporary FPS design: no health pick-ups. Instead, you take cover to get your health to regenerate. You'll be able to vault over ledges and banisters, and take down enemies with up-close melee attacks.
The playable version at E3 will focus on the multiplayer. The version at the show is using four player split screen. Multiplayer will be enhanced with a full-featured online mode, complete with a full-fledged experience point system;
players will be rewarded with XP for specific tasks in online matches that will offer achievements and unlockables.
The final game will feature an incredible amount of customizable control options. Not only can you play with the standard Wii pointer and nunchuk combination and tweak the sensitivity, you can also plug in a Classic Controller or Classic Controller Pro and play via the dual-analog way. I'm partial to the Wii remote for FPS, but the Classic Controller worked pretty well too.
GoldenEye 007 looks pretty darn excellent, with a solid and smooth framerate and some slick environment effects. The game has full voice acting, as Activision has recruited the assistance of Daniel Craig and Judi Dench to provide voice over for this original script.
While the game is a completely original take on GoldenEye, there are a few nods to the classic Nintendo 64 game.
GoldenEye 007 still has a ways to go before its November 2010 release, but even now in its early E3 debut the game's looking hot. We'll have more on the game in the coming months, as it's easily one of the more promising third party Wii games at the show.
GI hands on Goldeneye multiplayer I just returned from the Nintendo booth at E3, and I’m surprised at how much fun the new GoldenEye is.
I just returned from the Nintendo booth at E3, and I’m surprised at how much fun the new GoldenEye is. The game’s multiplayer is reminiscent of the Nintendo 64 classic.
The game features a similar multiplayer set-up as the game you know and love, with 2-4 player split-screen. The demonstrated multiplayer map harkens back to the Archives level from the N64 GoldenEye, populated with multiple floors, crates, and barren concrete walls. Graphically, the game blows many other Wii titles out of the water. This game looks so good it’s hard to remember it’s on the Wii when playing it.
Activision showcases the game with the Classic Controller Pro. Using the controller’s dual analog sticks and shoulder buttons feels like any other modern shooter. Iron sight aiming, melee, grenades, and crouch are notable additions to the move set. There’s still no word on how the game plays with the Wii Remote and Nunchuck.
So far GoldenEye’s cast of conjures up wistful memories of the N64 game. Classic characters like Bond, Jaws, Oddjob, and Alec Trevelyan (006) make a return, with newcomer Scaramanga from The Man with the Golden Gun joining the fray. Special character-specific moves are incorporated as well, with Jaws sporting grenades and a lethal melee, and Oddjob tossing his trademark one-hit-kill bowler hat. I loved lobbing the deadly hat down long hallways for hilarious kills. The new Oddjob is sure to be even more loathed than the original.
Weapon and ammo pick-ups do not appear on the map like in the old game. Players seemingly start out with a predesignated loadout, and the classic AK-47 (not K7 Soviet) is front and center. The gunplay is crisp and accurate, a far cry from the awkward N64 control scheme. It feels great using FPS skills I’ve honed over the years in an updated favorite.
Overall, GoldenEye’s split-screen multiplayer is looking great, and the simple-minded fun of the N64 classic is alive and well so far. Keep your eyes on Game Informer for an upcoming look at the game’s single-player, which updates the Pierce Brosnan James Bond to Daniel Craig.
Goldeneye Gameinformer single player GoldenEye 007 looks very promising at this stage of development
The original GoldenEye for N64 was the first solid console multiplayer FPS of its time when it released back in '97 and is treasured by hardcore fans who sunk countless hours into the game with friends. Now Bond is back in a new adventure for the Wii that was announced yesterday at Nintendo's press conference under the same name as the original.
The new GoldenEye 007 features Daniel Craig (not Pierce Brosnan) and will include a single-player campaign, and of course, four-player split-screen is back and loaded with classic playable Bond villains. Plus with the Wii's online capabilities, there will be 8-player online multiplayer that has the potential to give Wii owners the FPS multiplayer experience they're looking for. We caught a glimpse at the game's single-player mode and got new details on GoldenEye 007's campaign and gameplay.
The hands-off single-player demo features Daniel Craig as Bond. He and agent 006 are tasked to infiltrate a Russian base to destroy a weapons cache. The duo take cover behind a blockade and stealthily take down the two guards standing in front of it by clicking the A button to "Subdue." Bond pulls a guard over the barricade and knocks him out with a solid punch to the face. The pair continues toward the facility by vaulting over walls and stealthily taking out enemies from behind with a silenced pistol or with brute force. Atop a set of stairs, Bond uses a sniper rifle to take out a guard, which alerts a group sparking a firefight. Bond takes out his AK-47 for some serious damage. As 006 and 007 fight their way through the opposition, they dish out a few melee shots and jump into an armored truck.
A pair of guards question the two in Russian, and one of the guards grab Bond which triggers a sequence to shake him off. 006 pulls out his piece and takes the opposition out as any good partner should. They narrowly escape by driving into oncoming traffic for an on-rails shooting segment. Once they safely arrive to the facility, 006 and 007 breach the entrance breaking into slow motion and shooting guards in a bullet-timey sequence. The end.
Activision tells us they really want to drive home the sense of feeling like a secret agent with varied gameplay mechanics and the overall atmosphere. The most important aspect of gameplay, Activision said, was creating a game around player choice. Like many action titles, you can take a more covert approach or go in guns blazing. There will also be 25 weapons to choose from. You can even choose your favorite controller type.
If the Wii remote is too clunky for you, play the game with the Classic Pro controller.
Activision also says the environment will feature tons of destructibility requiring you to keep on moving through the entire game. No cover spot is entirely safe as it may be blown to bits in front of you. Finally, when asked why Pierce Brosnan wasn't chosen as bond, the reps responded that Craig "brings something very new to Bond, grittier, darker."
GoldenEye 007 looks very promising at this stage of development and we look forward to getting more details. GoldenEye 007 will release exclusively on Nintendo Wii this November.
The news today that a new version of Nintendo 64 classic GoldenEye 007 was met with cheers at today's Nintendo E3 press conference. I played the game. It's good but it's not the remake you may have thought it was.
The James Bond game is being developed by Eurocom and Activision, not Rare and Nintendo, the companies that made the original Nintendo 64 GoldenEye. That's not a surprise and not necessarily a problem. Eurocom can make a good game.
It is a first-person shooter, based on the fiction of the 1995 Pierce Brosnan movie. But the story of that movie has been changed. GoldenEye is now the adventure of the Daniel Craig version of James Bond and plays up an international banking crisis angle rather than a Cold War problem. Both games, however, send the player, as Bond, around the world to locations important to fans of movie and games: A dam, a statue park, the streets of St. Petersburg, where a chase involving a military tank will occur.
The levels of the new GoldenEye are not necessarily recreations of the original game's. The locations have been changed in some cases the developer told me. Happily, the game's opening dam level gets some loving care in being updated for a modern audience. It opens in similar fashion with a camera swoop that brings us into Bond's point-of-view. It starts with a scramble past some guards into a guard tower (which contains a sniper rifle, of course) and then through a tunnel inside a truck. That's the spot where differences become abundant. Did you play the original GoldenEye dam level and hide behind that truck? You'll be in it, riding shotgun (Alec Trevaylan is behind the wheel), getting stopped by guards and suddenly in an on-rails shootout. You'll be shooting your machine gun through the front window as guards try to run you off the wall. You'll be blowing up a tanker truck that is in the way and out to the dam you'll go, as a rocket launcher flips your truck.
As with the original GoldenEye, the game will require players using harder difficulty levels to complete more mission objectives. New to the game will be forking options to turn the game more into an action shooter or into a stealthy hunt.
Many of Bond's classic weapons are back, including the Klobb, which has been renamed the Klebb. The health system has changed, now using the same regenerative system seen in most shooters.
Multiplayer is presented in four-player splitscreen or eight-player online, with an experience points system that unlocks perks. Maps will be drawn from familiar locations, but the layouts will not be the same as they were in the Nintendo 64 version of the game. After watching the dam level, I was able to play a round of four-player split screen. In the mode we played, the first player to 10 kills won. I got seven and found the gameplay to be smooth. I used a Wii Remote and Nunchuk set-up which used the pointer to aim and mapped a melee move to a shake of the Nunchuk (probably will be changed to a button press, I was told). Other players used the Wii Classic Controller Pro.
I didn't see but was told that sticky mines will be back. I think people will like that, yes?
GoldenEye will be out exclusively for the Wii in November. It was fun, but for better and worse it is not a slavish remake of the original GoldenEye. They are doing the reinvented-for-modern-times thing. Let's hope that is the right thing. The re-imagined dam level had enough callbacks to the original game to make me smile and just enough high-action set-pieces to remind me that we are not in a 90s video game world anymore.
Be optimistic about this one, but pay attention to the pitch.
Hello, Mr Bond. We've been expecting you.
Every since leaked images of Activision's GoldenEye 're-imagination' (don't call it a remake) emerged, we've been itching to grasp our Golden Gun once again.
Today at E3, we finally got to do so - and early signs are fairly positive. If you're a fan of the original N64 game (and, let's face it, who isn't?) there will be plenty here to satisfy your nostalgia - supported by the essential cornerstones of what makes a Good Modern Shooter.
The title has been created from the ground up by UK-based Eurocom. And although original GoldenEye developer Rare isn't involved in the project (they're too busy larking about in front of a camera), their footprint is very obvious in the new game's make-up.
We are taken back to 1997 almost immediately - with the brisk tones of Judi Dench as M prescribing us our first mission: To infiltrate a Russian base and prevent terrorists from loading a boat with chemical weapons, in the classic Arkangelsk level. So far, so rose-tinted specs.
But not everything proves quite so reverent of the past. Using the silent P99 pistol to take out guards - via a contemporary left trigger/aim, right trigger/shoot mechanic - we are informed that the game offers the player two ways out of any situation: Covert, sneaky stealth or balls-out firefight.
Opting for the former, we eventually tiptoe our way into a truck with 006 (Sean Bean's likeness nowhere to be found), using up-close silent takedowns to remove certain enemies, crafty headshots to dispatch others.
We're told that Daniel Craig's (bizarrely incongruent) Bond is a rougher, more brutal fellow than Piece Brosnan's suave assassin, and it soon proves the case. A vicious close-up melee mechanic ends with a satisfying, thud-accompanied smack to the mush for poor Ruskie.
If that all sounds a bit Splinter Cell, you won't have to look too far for the other major gaming hallmark to influence the update.
It's Activision, it's current and it's an FPS. Call Of Duty-esque elements include a real-time, reddening damage indicator (complete with crimson flicks in the centre of the screen) and a constant radar in the corner - showing enemies and useful tidbits via obvious colour coding.
The dialogue we witness is spiky and impressive - especially for a Wii game - and it probably should be, considering Bond writers are on board. The background music, too, is reminiscent of a slick movie production - we have modern-day Bond composer David Arnold to thank for that.
Our single-player experience finishes on a more frantic note - AK-47'ing our way through quickly gathering reinforcements on a sodden dockyard.
If you're wayward with your shots or opt not to use the sneaky crouch position during certain sections, guards will be alerted and call for backup; quickly shifting the game into an explosive gunfight.
GoldenEye certainly looks good for a Wii game - with only the cardboard destructible environments letting the side down in the visual stakes.
Sound, too, is top notch, especially in terms of demarking different weapons in your possession (hardcore N64 fans will not be best pleased to see a correctly-spelled 'Klebb' in 007's inventory). In addition, dialogue is cleverly muffled to the ear when Bond is in a camped position.
Environments, meanwhile, are noticeably next-gen - with some clever rain and steam effects giving our brief battle a nice sheen.
Controls are simple, elegant and - in all key areas - obvious to anyone that's played a first-person shooter in the last eight years. We used the out-in-the-US N64 Classic Controller for Wii, which was very intuitive - but you can also deploy the standard Wii Remote & Nunchuk.
Level design, however, threatens to be more of a bugbear. It's all a bit 'boxy', featuring plenty of all-too-convenient cubes - whilst the feeling of floating rather than walking up staircases chinks off another chunk of realism.
The question, of course, is if this sort of thing can be classed as a lazy letdown - or whether Eurocom did so as a respectful nod to the original game.
In fact, that's the biggest conundrum you're left with having played GoldenEye: If you're to explain away its flaws and lack or originality by saying 'it's for the nostalgia crowd', then why remake it at all? Why put Daniel '1,000 yard stare' Craig in it? If it's not, and it instead an ambitious 2010 shooter, why generously fluff so many memories of the N64 golden years?
One area that's guaranteed to put a smile on your face is the multiplayer. All of the old crowd are in there - Oddjob, Jaws, Scaramanga, Bond, - and four-player split-screen is back. Yes, we grinned like idiots just like that when we heard it too.
A host of multiplayer mission types are included, we're promised - and there's eight-player online for those of you that want to go all 20th Century on us.
So, nostalgic time trip or genuinely progressive shooter? GoldenEye certainly seems to fall more towards the former - despite offering a host of all-new scenarios and extended scenes.
Yet with Wii not exactly flushed with top-quality FPS games, this promises to stand out for reasons above and beyond mere affection from gamers of a certain age.
There is one very telling modern addition to GoldenEye 2010 that you might not be expecting: Bond carries a very Apple-looking smartphone around in his top pocket, ready to take snaps of evidence for Arkham Asylum-style side missions.
It's a bit of an oddity, and feels a little like Eurocom has crammed in a constant reminder that - no matter what the teen inside you wants to believe - this is a modern-day Bond, for a modern day gamer.
"Given the track record of 'hardcore' Wii exclusives, I would bet that sales are underwhelming. It's a funny thought to resurrect a 10 year-old brand - maybe longer - and keep it a Nintendo exclusive. It is unlike Activision to do an exclusive, and I am particularly surprised that they would do it with Goldeneye. I completely agree that most of the original audience is pretty hardcore, and think a Rare game on the 360 would have a better chance. Perhaps this is all due to the James Bond license, but... a Wii exclusive is odd." - Wedbush analyst, Michael Pachter
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The optimist proclaims we live in the best of all possible worlds while the pessimist fears this is true. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ |
Agnates said:Any videos of the single player level played? That's all I wanna see... How the AI behaves and how stealth/allaction works out...
None that I know of. Some of the previews make is sound like the single player was demoed by an Activision guy and only watched by press, but some make it sound like they played it.,
From the nowgamer preview:
"The question really is whether, in a Call Of Duty world, there is any legs in such a classic approach to multiplayer. Our answer is a wholehearted yes.
It has X-Factor. It has indeterminacy. Our experience was no doubt also enhanced by the sheer ease with which we trounced the opposition. The gameplay moves at a frightening pace, but classic N64 elements are there to ensure that it never gets on top of you. For one thing, you can see the position of your enemies at all times using the minimap; easily read even as a small part of one quarter of the screen. This means that there will be no surprises in terms of other players creeping up on you. It is pure for this reason and there’s pretty much no reason why the guy with the best aim and/or most powerful gun won’t always come out on top."
Worthplaying preview
"At the bottom, they find themselves forced to confront a group of guards head-on. This shows off another interesting new mechanic, where Bond has the ability to "breach" the door with a button press. This seems to slow down time and give him a few moments to shoot the stunned guards in the head before they can sound the alarm. Failing to do so would trigger yet another firefight. This seems pretty context-sensitive, so it's difficult to tell how useful it will be in the long run, but it's yet another example of how different the gameplay is. "
Gamespot
"Destructible environments are a blessing and a curse, providing realistic-looking structures that crumble as they take damage but also making it necessary to keep moving, lest you take a bullet to the face as your protection disintegrates around you.
Our time with GoldenEye left us feeling a sense of freshness and familiarity. The choice to deviate slightly from the main story of the original game while still maintaining many of the fan-favorite features means it has potential to appeal to two very different audiences: those who were around when the first game was released and a new generation of Bond fans."
G4TV
"The new GoldenEye treats the classic shooter as a source of inspiration rather than a strict template. Games have changed immeasurably since 1997, and the new GoldenEye will reflect this with modern trappings like destroyable cover, atmospheric weather effects, and a cell phone with augmented reality display capabilities (this'll serve as your main info screen).
So far it looks like they're succeeding-I was pretty impressed by the E3 demo. For starters, it looks great for a Wii game. It has a bit of that full body awareness thing going on, and the fluid first-person camera movement really sells the idea of physically sneaking around the stormy environments. The rain effects are very believeable and the atmosphere is appropriately tense. The developers are aiming for high production values, and look to be well on their way to achieving them."
Activision's demo player snuck capably up to a Russian guard tower, taking out key patrols with stealth takedowns and silenced headshots. Eventually a guard spotted Bond and triggered an alarm, prompting the arrival of a squad from another checkpoint. Bond
returned fire with an AK-47 as the enemy plinked away at the guard tower's metal wall, eventually degrading it to the point that Bond had to run for his escape vehicle, which lead to an excitingly staged on-rails shooting sequence. This, in turn, lead to a very familiar-looking dam complex. I'll be honest, I was smiling by this
point.
Likewise, I'm certainly going to try this game the next time I get the chance. While GoldenEye 007 might not be the exact remake the fanboys wanted, I'm getting the feeling that it may well be better for it."
gamingeek said:
Woo hoo! Pachter thinks it's stupid. Success assured!
I'm thinking this will be the best selling shooter on the wii. I like the fact that they are keeping mission objectives and allowing options for stealth or more shooter type gameplay.
My concerns are how many multiplayer maps there are - there better be more than 5 like it sounded in one article. And controlling with the mote and chuk - they better have that working well.
angrymonkey said:gamingeek said:Woo hoo! Pachter thinks it's stupid. Success assured!
I'm thinking this will be the best selling shooter on the wii. I like the fact that they are keeping mission objectives and allowing options for stealth or more shooter type gameplay.
My concerns are how many multiplayer maps there are - there better be more than 5 like it sounded in one article. And controlling with the mote and chuk - they better have that working well.
Couple of the COD games are 1.35-1.5 million. It would be nice to see this reach 2 million.
gamingeek said:It's a contemporary FPS design: no health pick-ups. Instead, you take cover to get your health to regenerate.
Crap, I just lost all interest.
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Tell me to get back to rewriting this site so it's not horrible on mobile
*pops in Quake for nostalgia*
Foolz said:Heh, when Pierce Brosnan was bond I wondered how they could possibly have a worse one. Then Daniel Craig came along.
I'm not sure whether to praise you for your disparaging of Daniel Craig, or deplore you for knocking Pierce Brosnan. Brosnan is by far my favourite Bond, and Daniel Craig by far the least.
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Tell me to get back to rewriting this site so it's not horrible on mobile
Foolz said:Heh, when Pierce Brosnan was bond I wondered how they could possibly have a worse one. Then Daniel Craig came along.
The only bad thing Pierce Brosnan did as Bond was not shoot the writers. He was perfect and GoldenEye was a damned good movie. And then Tomorrow Never Dies came along and wasn't so good. And then the next two movies were straight up awful, and even Sean Connery in his prime couldn't have saved those.
General rule about Bond movies is if the song is good the movie is good. If the song is bad, the movie is bad. Shirley Bassey singing Gold Finger = awesome. Sheryl Crowe or Madonna doing the theme song = scary bad.
And yeah, Daniel Craig is awful. Just... awful.
Ravenprose said:I miss health packs.
That could just be a rule for the gamemode they chose to display at E3. Same for the lack of weapon pick ups. When they say they have enough rules for 200 combinations then hopefully some of them are about these things.
Anyway I'm liking the sound of the destructible cover scenery stuff, so long as that's more than crates and barrels dumped all over every single level. It at least shows they wanna do a little more than just COD Bond with it.
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The optimist proclaims we live in the best of all possible worlds while the pessimist fears this is true. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ |
angrymonkey said:I think it's got the best chance of any shooter that will come out on the wii- as long as it's a good game.So many positives - nostalgia factor, more family friendly than many other shooters, local multiplayer, online multiplayer, popular Bond brand and hopefully good advertising. It just screams win to me.
"As long as it's good" is the main part.
Yodariquo said:Foolz said:Heh, when Pierce Brosnan was bond I wondered how they could possibly have a worse one. Then Daniel Craig came along.I'm not sure whether to praise you for your disparaging of Daniel Craig, or deplore you for knocking Pierce Brosnan. Brosnan is by far my favourite Bond, and Daniel Craig by far the least.
Roger Moore owns them both.
Some things I noticed that are pretty cool.
Activision are pushing the production values here, they got the Bond movie writers writing the script, they got the Bond movie actors doing the voice overs. They have the Bond movie set designers doing the art. They have the Bond movie composers doing the music.
They are doing full Dead Space Extraction style facial mo-cap and animation. Activision are treating this as a premier product and not a cheap money grab.
Unfortunately the Treyarch COD guys are busy doing COD, but Eurocom have done a couple of decent bond games.
What can you say about this game? Not a strict remake, not an entirely new game. A Battlestar Galactica style reimagning of the Rare classic due for November release. Said to run at 60 FPS, made by Eurocom of Dead Space Extraction fame.
TRAILER
GoldenEye 007 Screens
IGN GoldenEye Reimagined for Wii
IGN E3 2010: GoldenEye - Wii vs. N64
Goldeneye CVG preview It's Activision, it's current and it's an FPS.
GI hands on Goldeneye multiplayer I just returned from the Nintendo booth at E3, and I’m surprised at how much fun the new GoldenEye is.
Goldeneye Gameinformer single player GoldenEye 007 looks very promising at this stage of development
Kotaku Goldeneye preview They are doing the reinvented-for-modern-times thing. Let's hope that is the right thing.
OLD ARTICLES
Rare: Goldeneye revival is dead Long past dead in fact
Goldeneye Gametrailers tribute
Rare talks Goldeneye licensing issues