Too Human Reviews

Originally, I did not intend to write a review for Too Human as some of the other views summarized my feelings about the game. The game is under-rated, there is no doubt about it. When it was released it was critically panned by everyone out there. I believe the major complaint about the game was the camera. This review will discuss the camera and combat controls in a later section of the review, but to get back to introducing Too Human – it is a solid game with so much wasted potential. This game has a variety of concepts within it I will try to break into categories and rate.

Story – 2 out of 5
Too Human is a story, that apparently, adheres to Norse Mythology very tightly. You play as Baulder, a Norse God of… well… Silicon Knights sort of forgot to explain what Baulder’s exact role is within the Too Human setting. A quick look at Wikipedia tells me that Baldur is a Norse god of light, beauty, love, and happiness. The Baldur of Too Human exhibits none of those qualities. Sure you get the sense at the end you are fighting for good (light) but Too Human’s story seems to imply treachery and heart-break. As someone who is unfamiliar with the Norse Mythology, I felt very lost within the story line. Sure, you can see Odin (not the Final Fantasy variety), Thor and Loki (not the Marvel Comics variety), and Hel (not the Satanic king), but beyond that I felt lost and forgotten for the story of Too Human.

Graphics – 4 out of 5
Too Human’s graphics are stunning. They are some of the best I have seen, but they are not the best. Silicon Knights did an excellent job of providing a vibrant world to adventure in. I thought enemies were easy to identify before encountering. I found the set pieces to be amazing. I also enjoyed the character customization and let me keep my Baldur fresh. I never saw framerate drops due to the enormous amounts of enemies and projectiles on the screen or graphical tearing. There was some texture popping and occasionally areas of the game seemed to be flat, but over all the game were very stellar with its graphics.

Sound – 2 out of 5
The voice acting in this game is bad. Down right horrible. One scene in particular that sticks in my mind is (I guess this is considered a spoiler, but not really) is a pillar falling on Thor. Baldur is convincing at times but a bit overdone. Cutscenes don’t feel “flat” because of the graphics but because of the lack of sound and sound engineering. I really feel like at times I’m playing a beta. The sound just wasn’t there.

There is a lack of variety in character dialog when exploring or if you are buddied up with another God. Thor says the same two lines over and over again in the third level (World’s Serpent) and the commandos you lead around same the same lines over and over. The music is a bit flat, very repetitious; the only shinning spot (enough so to bring it from a 1 to a 2) is the secret area music. They needed to bring more of the metal sound from the secret rooms into the game itself. That music really made me feel like kicking ass.

Controls – 4 out of 5
I know that people want to critize the camera and the Geometry Wars-esque attack stick, but once I really sunk my teeth into this game the combat system is very deep. There is no tutorial and the instruction manual does not quite do justice to what you can really do with your character. The attack stick is very easy once you get used to it and the camera is just like what you would find in Ninja Gaiden 2 (I like that comparison!) or most other action titles. Sure it can be a little tricky at times to get it to co-operate but what game doesn’t have those issues? The combo system that allows for special moves for each class is nice as well, but overall the controls are not as bad as people want to make them out to be.

Character Customization – 4 out of 5
The character customization is the bread and butter of Too Human. Between the classes, which are all unique for their strengths and weaknesses, and a robust item system, there really are hundreds of thousands of ways to dress up Baldur. The charms and runes system is very unique, and I like it a lot, but it is so small that I feel like I can never capitalize on what it can offer for my character. You can only activate two charms at a time. That includes any you are currently trying to finish the quest for (kill X amount of Y creatures, get Z combo B times, etc) and once you finish it you might as well prepare the next charm to help build up to that tier 3 charm. You can also only have 20 charms in your inventory, this seems like a large number but with the emphasis on building up to higher charms you need a variety of lower charms. It should’ve increased to 40 or 50 charms to carry and maybe 3 or 4 charms active at a time. Overall, the customization is very well done – but not perfect.

Multiplayer -- 3 out of 5
I was surprised at how active (2 years post release) the online is with Too Human. The players a very nice and accommodating. Dropping in and out of random games, I found a lot of people willing to help me out with co-op achievements and just good ‘ol fashioned grinding out. There are a few leechers out there but overall they are an excellent crowd. The co-op achievements are super easy to acquire and it makes the game an overall better experience chatting it up with people while slaying robotic goblins.

Achievements – 5 out of 5
Too Human’s 1.5 TA Ratio is deceptively low. Some of the higher end achievements that are tough to acquire on your own (perfect level runs without dying, epic armor sets, etc) are really challenging. You could probably acquire 600-700 GS on a single run of Too Human. Those final 300 GS are true grinds though (kill 10,000 and 20,000 enemies, collect 7,500 items etc). I blame it on a low pool of players for the game and a high number of completionists, which isn’t a bad thing. The achievements are right down the middle of the road between challenging and easy.

Conclusions
I know this review sounds similar to some of the others post but it bears repeating, this game is an underrated experience. Once you really delve into the game you can see where people get turned off of the game and the wasted potential of this series makes me die a little on the inside. I believe that if there ever is a sequel (this was a planned trilogy) that Silicon Knights should really look at tweaking the formula instead of a complete overhaul. The framework is there, it just did not get the polish it should have gotten.

I wanted to write a different review on Too Human as I feel this is a game that gets bashed and overlooked more than it should.

Let me get the criticisms out of the way. Many people complaign about the camera being completely comptuer controlled because the right stick is used for combat. The camera does occasionally do wonky things that can be annoying, but for the most part, I felt it did a good job. It doesn't detract from the action often but it occasionaly frustrates. Overall, there were way more people whining about the camera than I felt it deserved, I had just as many problems with the Ninja Gaiden camera and nobody complaigns about that.

The voice acting is pretty bad, and the story overall is fairly uninteresting. If your familiar with Norse mythology, you'll know what to expect and if not, you probably won't care much about the story like me.

Graphically, there's some clipping glitches here or there, but overall it's pretty good. Especially when you consider how many enemies are on screen at once. I rarely see framerate issues.

The other big complaint is that death is basically meaningless, you just respawn and go back to where you died. Yes and no, you do lose durability on items when you die but often overlooked is the fact that your combo meter (which powers all your skills) is also reset to 0. This can be frustrating as depending on your class, your combo meter can give you lots of boosts to speed and/or power. But in the end, yes, there's little penalty for dying.

Now what I like about this game

I really enjoyed the right stick combat experience, the sliding around ping-ponging from one enemy to the next was a lot of fun, popping enemies up in the air and jumping from enemy to enemy up there was a lot of fun too. The game lacks a tutorial so make sure you read your manual and look at the advanced options in the menu. Overall, the combat experience was very rewarding, if difficult at times. Sometimes there's so much going on at the same time that it's hard to keep up with it. Missles can be flying at you while other creatures are swarming all over you.

The fact that there are 5 classes provides some differences in how you play, there's the bioengineer who heals himself (and a partner in co-op), the berserker who is all out offence with little defense, the defender who is the opposite of the berserker and focuses on defense. The champion who is the jack of all trades and excels at air combat, and the commando who is the gun master. They all have different skills and skill trees to specialize in and tailor to your style.

Add to that all the loot you collect to build up your character and adjust different skills and you have a lot of variety and variability. Plus charms and runes, there's loads of status effects and a lot of depth to the game that you can easily miss if you don't give it the time it deserves.

In the end there's a lot of fun things about this game, but also some drawbacks. If anyone is considering buying this game I'd suggest the demo you can play 3 of the classes (and glitch to play the other 2) and get a feel for how it plays. Give it some time, a lot of people really dislike the right combat stick but with a little practice it's easy to get used to and starts to feel intuitive.

Too Human is a sci-fi retelling of ancient Norse mythology. You play as Baldur, the most favored of the Aesir. Popular with both the other Aesir, and remarkably, with the humans they protect.

After a war with the Children of YMIR both pushed humanity to the edge of extinction and threw the world into a permanent nuclear winter, the last bastion of humanity rests in the sanctuary of Midgard. But with sudden disappearances, and the discovery of mangled bodies, the people of Midgard are fearful, and it seems as if the rest of the Aesir are withholding information from you, both regarding past events, and the death of Baldur's wife.

Story
The story of Too Human can be confusing at first, but typically adheres to Norse mythology pretty well. Instead of gods, the Aesir are cybernetically-enhanced humans. The enemies of myth - trolls, goblins, elves - are all robots.

Having already read up a fair bit about Norse mythology, the story of Baldur himself did not impress me. If you are not familiar with Norse mythology, Baldur is killed through Loki's deception, and due to further deception, tricks the god's into failing the task set out to bring him back. In essence, Baldur dies, where as in Too Human, he is brought back to life.

Other then that, I was quite glad with how they put a sci-fi spin on Norse mythology, and the only thing that let me down is the obvious cliffhanger. I remember hearing that Too Human was intended to be the first in a three part saga, but have not, nor do not expect to hear of a second.

Combat
The combat system is pretty good. From the get go you have a bunch of different attacks at your disposal, some altered by the type of weapon you use. One thing I really liked was the inclusion of "slide" attacks. A slide attack is pretty much a slide into range of the enemy, followed by an attack. Given the potential of great range with this attack, you can still fluently take out a group of enemies, even if they are spread out.

You also have a bunch of ranged attacks, including attacks based on the type of firearm you have (handguns, rifles or cannons) and the type of ammunition (slug, plasma, laser). Although, in my experience, not as efficient as getting up close and personal to dish out some damage, the attacks are indispensable in the right situation.

Enemies can easily get the jump on you if you are not keeping your wits, and each enemy requires a different approach in defeating them, including application of particular tactics for taking out enemy types (as an example, enemies sometimes exhibit a polarity trait, easily identified by a bright illumination of various colors. When they die, they explode and deal a particular status ailment such as damage, poison or freeze to anyone in the radius of effect, and thus should never be taken out in melee combat.

At times, the combat system can be overwhelming. You will be fighting a group of enemies, some polarity, a few elites, and a leader capable of hitting you for a decent part of your health bar. Enter a freeze polarity Troll, with a cannon. With one hit, the Troll freezes you with an un-dodgeable shot, at which point the leader takes the opportunity to kill you in your frozen state. But if you look past the few instances of pure bad luck, and get into the habit of knowing when to shoot, when to run, when to slash and when to roll, the combat is easily the best part of the game.

Controls
The controls of Too Human have so much more potential, and the first thing that is probably going to get you is the camera scheme.

The left analog is mapped to movement, with the right mapped to attack direction. As a result, there isn't much left for the camera. You have a button to look in the direction Baldur is looking, with the ability to aim it temporarily that is inefficient in combat, and the d-pad maps a bunch of different camera styles that appear to change at random, including with or without various interface additions.

Some attacks are mapped to the same button. For example, double tapping attack in a direction is suppose to perform a juggle attack, throwing the enemies in the air. I have personally died several times, and many more been close too because instead Baldur simply performed a single attack, leaving me open to a flurry from a leader. Your finisher combo and your 'fierce', a ranged attack performed with melee weapons, are both mapped to the same button combination, and are suppose to be triggered based on range, but with melee range being hard to judge (considering the fluent sliding capability), I have often killed myself by triggering a group of polarities, when all I intended was setting them off from a very safe distance.

You definitely want to look up the controls in the book or online, I personally have been playing for at least two playthroughs before figuring out some of my abilities, merely because through the combination of my screen and the control screen, it was not made very obvious how to perform various abilities.

Finally, the aiming can be a bit clunky. You will commonly find yourself firing just to the left of where you actually intended, or in fact, just below or above.

Difficulty
The game can be difficult and frustrating at times. As I have earlier stated, the enemies can easily overwhelm you. But once you figure out the combat controls, and the tactics towards taking out the different enemy types, the difficulty tends to be greatly overshadowed.

On the other hand, the game can be quite unforgiving. Being a game developed with the intention of co-operative game play, some of the classes are intended for co-operative game play, and in single player mode can be difficult to solo with. You will probably not know what classes will work better in solo unless you have experience with PVE MMOs or otherwise look it up.

If you do pick up this game, take it from me. A healer is a class structured towards healing. This is so another class can go in and take all the heat, and not be torn to pieces. As such, a healer is usually not the best class to be rushing into the heat of a battle with.

Customization
Too Human offers a great degree of customization. To start off with, you have five different classes to choose from. A quarter of the way into the game, you are also given the option to specialize in being human or cybernetic, all of which offer their own skill trees (three paths per class, two paths in each specialization).

You also have a wide range of items, including armor, and weapons. Weapons themselves also offer different tactical standings with different types. Dual-wielded swords are especially fast, while dual staves provide greater swing range. Two handed hammers offer an area of effect juggle, while handguns offer quick fire rate, and rifles offer greater range and a grenade ability.

You can further customize your items with many of the different runes and color modules found throughout the game, as well as equipping up to two charms which provide a greater benefit, but require being fitted with a series of runes and the completion of a task before becoming active.

There is a lot of specialization and customization in Too Human. Perhaps it is too much. I could easily see it becoming too much for someone and becoming overlooked.

Online
The game supports online co-op, however it only supports another player. This disappointed me, as the first question I asked myself was why co-op was not available over split screen. This would be a great game to sit down with one of my mates, have some drinks, and play through for fun.

Further more, the classes available are structured around online co-op. There is a Healer, a Tank, Ranged DPS, Melee DPS and an all rounder. This works great online, with the healer and the tank being especially sought after for their great supporting roles. My only quarrel is that these characters are a lot harder to play offline.

Re-playability
The game is very re playable, and believe me, if you are going for the achievements you will be re playing a lot. There are four stages split up into 3-5 levels, all which can be accessed and played through again from the map, and once you beat the game you have the option of initiating the end by seeking out the final FMV, and starting the game over with the same character build and experience.

You are also given the option to create and manage up to 6 characters, all of which keep a continued progression throughout play through.

Achievements
The achievements of Too Human are some of the most difficult and time consuming achievements out. One achievement requires you to complete a Tier 3 Charm. Two play-throughs in, I have only found a single Tier 2 Charm, with many required just to complete the Tier 3.

This is not a complaint. In fact, I am fond of these achievements, because they provide a challenge, and give me something to work towards when I have nothing to do. My only question is why there is a single achievement that requires online play - destroying a Troll using a co-operative take down.

That said, it could be argued that although this is the only achievement that truly requires online, various others (such as completing the levels without dieing) are that much more difficult without a partner.

Crowning Point
The best aspect of Too Human would easily be the battles. Although they can be overwhelming at first, there is a sense of achievement in sliding through a group of goblins, timing each slide to move out of range of a barrage of missiles coming from the back, before juggling a leader up in the air, giving you time to finish off the missile launchers, before engaging a leader in a series of well timed attacks and dodges.

Final Straw
Easily the worst and most annoying part of Too Human is the death scenes. If you die, your character falls to the ground, and a Valkyrie lowers from the sky, picks you up, and rises back up. Shortly after, you respawn, with everything exactly how it was before you died, and no penalty.

The death animation goes for several minutes. It is unskippable. If you die a lot, these few minutes will become very irritating and annoying.

Recommendation
I recommend this game for one simple reason. It is cheap. I picked up my copy for five bucks, and it was not on special. There is a chance this game will be one of the best game you have ever played, and for five bucks thats a good gamble.

If it is not, expect to throw your controller at your screen.

On a side note, if you want to play this game, and are not familiar with Norse mythology, I highly recommend researching it. Pick up the Big Book of Norse Mythology from your local library. Not only will you understand the story better, but there are so many aspects of the game that you simply won't get without an understanding of Norse mythology.

Story
In a time when Humanity flourished, machines known simply as the ‘Children of Ymir’ emerged from the depths of the Earth, bent on the destruction of all sentient beings and have waged war on the Human race for the past thousand years. This war has left the planet icy, cold and nearly inhospitable resulting in the death of all but a few million humans. These humans prayed to the Aesir and worship the ODIN (Organically Distributed Intelligence Network) and were blessed by the Gods, who sheltered the few remaining humans in an enclave known as Midgard.

Graphics
The graphics in Too Human are what you’d expect from a game that came out half way through the consoles life, they look good but aren’t hyper realistic like Halo, Call of Duty or Elder Scrolls. They relate more to Dead Rising, Crackdown or Saint’s Row. All in all, the graphics are standard, nothing special, nothing good or bad.

Controls
Usually controls are tough to talk about due to them usually being so generic, Too Human is different in this way. The left thumbstick moves Baldur around, but to attack, you lean the right stick in the direction you want to attack and tapping to launch enemies with melee weapons. Guns can be tough to control, especially if you’re using two at a time so practice is needed with them. Rifles are capable of launching grenades which is very helpful against groups of enemies. If you can adjust to these controls, you’ll have a lot of fun with the game, just give it some time.

Music/Sound/Voice
Sadly, there is little of all of them in the game, in-between fights you’ll be listening to little or nothing at all. Only when in combat do you hear anything, and honestly, the music is nothing special. Sound effects seem to be repeated after a bit, but switching what you do can alleviate that issue pretty quick (don’t use the same move over and over and over and over).

Other
The game can be very difficult at times, especially on higher difficulties; enemies will have various immunities at all times on tougher levels, making strategy mandatory. So mastering this game can be tough, but is very rewarding as you’ll get some of the best armor and weapons.

The one thing that REALLY stands out is the ability to customize Baldur after a certain point, you can change his armor color, bonus stats and weapon effects, as well as a few other things I won’t mention.

The multiplayer is pretty well done as well, I never had any issues with players joining my game and it is always fun to play hack & slash games with a friend. This can either make the game tougher or easier, depending on the skill of the players.

There are a few classes you can play as, each offering a small bonus. Better regeneration, more defense, different skills and what weapons can be used.

The game is very cybernetic-y, the 'Gods' are less god-like and more highly advanced in technology (you'll know what I mean, the 'leader' of them has some awesome looking glasses (reminds me of Google Glass)). At one point you can even gain Cybernetic hardware, which is awesome.

Achievements
A good chunk of the achievements will come naturally, some of the others will require skill (beat the 4 levels WITHOUT dying), patience (obtain 10,000 drops) and luck (complete a full set of Epic gear). With time, you should be able to get them though.

Overall
Too Human is a fun game if given a chance, best played with a friend and not for the weak of heart.

8.5/10.0

Pros
- Norse Mythology driven story (kinda)
- Ability to customize is great
- Tough game that’s rewarding

Cons
- Steep learning curve
- Will give many players a headache
- Bland musical score and voicing

I had played the demo for this. I had played the demo A LOT. I had discovered how to play as all the characters and played the demo 75 times at 45 minutes a time. And I loved it. This was the first game I have ever pre-ordered in my 25 years of gaming. It was THAT good. Even my friend was convinced to pre-order on the strength of the demo. And then I read the review and wondered if these chaps had played the same game as I had, because Too Human was SUPERB!

Let's focus on this for a few paragraphs. Superbness. I liked the visual design, the graphics, the background, the character models... All superb. I didn't have any sort of problem with that. Oh, other than despite being a God, your squad wouldn't move out your way and on occasion would rudely go all invisible, but not allow you to move through them or push them out the way. But still, it all looked good. The fighting looked phenomenal with goblins a-flying and trolls getting a-stomped with quite the light show in the background. Su-PERB!

The sound too was excellent, all clashy swords and shooty guns and explode-y goodness. Top voice acting as well it has to be said. Rather odd that all these NORSE gods spoke in faux OLDE ENGLISH in AMERICAN ACCENTS. Forsooth, methinks someone was at ye olde cracke pipe the day they wrote ye scripte, verily! It was a shame that they decided to copy Marvel's Thor with the script and styling, but still, the voice actors really got the job done well, especially the hot Norn lady. Nice. (Just quickly though, for reference, telling a god not to stare at a being that is "three distinct personalities in separate bodies" is the stupidest thing I've ever heard - "three distinct personalities in separate bodies - that would be, erm... three women then?" "Essentially, yes. Yes it would.") BUT STILL! SU-perb.

Gameplay felt fantastic with all but the bioengineer class, which would only really come into it's own at higher levels I would imagine, but the other classes worked very well. The mechanics work wonderfully, if erratically. Sometimes Baldur will slide four postcodes to gently tap a goblin about the face and neck, while on occasion, he will wildly hack away at thin air with gay abandon as a bemused goblin stands barely out of reach with a look of sadness in its big glowing eye. Also pumping round after never-ending round into thin air with your off-hand pistol on occasion could get old, but the satisfaction of cleaving through more goblins than my dad in nightclub was... SU-PERB.

The loot promised many things. It made me covetous and desirous and a great many things frowned upon by religious groups. Armour with 10% Soothing!!! WOW!!!! What's soothing? Is it in the manual...? No. In a journal entry? Not that I could find... 15% Aggression? I feel aggressive enough thank you... I can only assume that this is to do with the "Aggro" system, similar to the World of Warcraft. I guess that Soothing stops enemies hitting you, Aggression makes them, well, hit you. But then, when playing a role playing game with so many stats and bonuses you need to be able to weigh up the pros and cons of each piece of armour without having to guess. +15% to dexterity! Wonderful! How high is my dexterity anyway? I don't know, I couldn't find that stat anywhere, never mind what it actually did. But still, never mind the quality, feel the QUANTITY! But STILL, I loved the game. Like a tiny electronic son made out of videogame.

And then I hit level 2. Sweet. Merciful. Heaven. A game has NEVER unravelled as quickly as Too Human does. The mostly smooth control system stops working when "mostly" becomes the difference between life and death. Having got through the first stage with no problems at all (not one death!), fighting against the slightly harder Dark Elves was A LOT harder. Especially the ones that fire unavoidable beams of icy badness at you, or green poisonous streams of frustrating inevitable death. There is no running away, there is no guaranteed hope of healing and a few deaths will occur. Fair enough. The Valkyrie swoops down to some sad CELTIC music (seriously, did they reckon, "WOW! Norse is European, and Europe is where Vikings came from, so well just jam in European style stuff and NO ONE WILL NOTICE or CARE! AWESOME!” Yes, actually, and they were probably right.) and in a poignant scene showing the finality and tragedy of Baldur's passing, he... wait for it... Appears a bit further away from where he died. Genius.

After the eighth time of being frozen by an ice troll's area affect attack while a fire troll hits you with a lingering burning attack and a thing that looks like a Drider from D&D hits you with a green poison attack and you can only sit helplessly and watch as this GOD gets his buttocks handed to him on a silver platter, you begin to get angry. But then it gets worse. In level 4, you face hordes of the undead, some of whom explode when killed AND do lingering damage, and some of whom fire streams of bullets at you. The inaccuracy of the controls shows itself more starkly here. You can only watch helplessly as Baldur slides inexorably towards an exploding zombie when you were aiming for his friend slightly to his right. While nine of his other friends simply stand around shooting you. Watching your health bar constantly deplete is demoralising to say the least. In this level, I died 90+ times, compared to 12 in level 2 and 3 in level 3.

I usually hate boss fights, but I found them very easy in Too Human. Too easy, as a matter of fact, except the last one. At least it meant not coming up against an impassable wall, but the fight at the end of level 2 is so boring as to be coma inducing.

The story maintains momentum, but you end up feeling that Baldur is the second most stupid god ever. "Hmm... I can't remember how got my hideous facial injury. Hod's eyepiece shows him shooting Loki through the face, yet Loki still lives..." Colombo this fool isn't. The human squad Wolf squad is handled very well, bringing a human perspective to the battles, with quite a touching end for one of the characters at the end of the game, but there is some bizarre dialogue where they sound more than a little disrespectful of Baldur and the Aesir in general when Baldur is stood right beside them. Not exactly awe inspiring godliness, then. Not as bad as Thor, though, who comes across as incredibly thick because the makers couldn't be bothered putting more dialogue into level 3, so frankly having Thor say "Come out and fight me Loki!" and then have Loki explain (quite patiently, I feel) that he is not there a total of NINE times in the course of the level isn't just annoying and lazy, but also very stupid.

Also very lazy is the co-op. I don't know why, but both players playing as Baldur is a bit, well... Rubbish. It would have been quite cool to see the other player as one of the other Aesir, even if they saw themselves as Baldur and you as someone else. If you know what I mean... It feels somewhat empty and sterile when playing with another player, ironically because you lose the humanity brought to the game by the Wolf squad, so the game becomes more mechanical and less emotional.

It is a great pity, because the game starts of very, very well and could so easily have been scored very highly. And one of the easiest ways to remedy this would be to have either health potions or stat antidotes that could be used when required, or have every enemy drop a health orb that returned a tiny bit of health. A very simple solution that would have rendered what becomes a completely unplayable mess of a game into a near classic. Which makes the game very hard to score. With a good patching, it would have been superb, but this never happened.

Despite having used the term "Unplayable mess", I do have to point out that levels 1 and 3 are both very good as the game comes into its own by handing you a big sword and scores of weak enemies and telling you to beat the tar out of them. Tempering this, however is the frustrating direness of the other two levels and the shockingly infuriating last boss battle.

It must be said though, that having fairly recently sat down and played through again as both bioengineer and commando, it WAS terribly compulsive. I freely admit that I came online and checked out some guides as to what the stats do and took some advice. And the game was bearable. In fact, due to the loot and having a high level character, I'd even say it was compulsive so on top of my original 60 hours, I put in another 140. And bear in mind that the game only has 4 levels.

In summary, this was the biggest disappointment I had faced in a long time, but with a little bit of research it can be good game. I can only hope that Silicon Knights take the criticism of detractors on board because the Too Human trilogy isn't sunk yet, apparently, and it with so much potential it would be sad not to have a shot. "Too Human 2: Even More Human Than Previously Suggested" will either be superb, or destroy this fledgling series.

Too Human is an excellent experience for the first 20hrs....after this....the game tends to lose it's luster. The combat is like nothing that's been done in a dungeon crawler. It's targeted towards your right analog stick. This is tricky for the 1st 5 hrs...but you should be able to pick it up in no time. There are numerous characters to choose from. You have an offenseive player, defensive player, healer, balanced warrior, and a gunner. I found the gunner to be the most enjoyable to play with as he allows for killing from a distance. The menu layouts also take some time to get used too as you have to figure out what runes do and what charms do as well. You have different colors of weapons/armor that you will have to become familiar with as well.

If your an achievement whore, this game will frustrate you to no end. If you want to obtain the 7 pieces of elite armor/weapons....and don't want to get it the easy way (have someone donate it to you), or you can't find anyone to loan you their armor, you have to continually play levels and hope that these pieces appear. It's like going to the casino and playing the slot machines. I have played this game for over 100 hrs and still no elite armor. Tier 3 charms are also a pain to obtain....only the most dedicated will strive to obtain this ach.

There are 4 levels...the 2nd being the most difficult. These levels pose a challenge, but you can continue from the point of death. The BIG problem here is the death sequence. The death sequence lasts for about 3 minutes and cannot be skipped. Very frustrating, if you ask me, however, there is an ach. for dying 100 times...which you will easily do. The co-op is fun and believe it or not, there are still some people playing this game. The HUGE problem here is most players don't use a mic and communication between combatants is lacking.

The story is your basic norse gods tale...but set in a cybernetic world, missing the sprawling green valleys and blue skies of old....which was the way the world used to be. You will see these lavish lands through wells, which you will gain access to open new paths in the cybernetic world.

Overall, I did enjoy this game, but I'm missing 2 ach.'s and this really bothers me. After playing through level after level I became bored and wanted to play some music while mindlessly killing the many enemies, however, there is no way you can balance the in game sound effects with the music, thus leading to the in game sounds blaring in your ear with your music..not good. If you want a challenge and you love games where you can customize your characters, this game is for you, however, don't destroy your controller in the process.

Too Human


Norse mythology with a techno flair

Xbox 360
Played to completion with Defender class



Too Human is a game 9 years in the making. First concepted as a Playstation game in 1999, It's come a long way for a release on Microsofts Xbox 360. Is this first entry in the Too Human trilogy worth the wait?

Too Human starts with a rather stylish intro video that throws you into the tech flaired world of Too Human. You are Baldur, son of odin and resident of Asgard. As an Aesir it's your job to protect humanity from the machines that plague the modern world. Without much fanfare you are thrust into the first level of the game and meet your first machine.

The world of Too Human is extremly well realized. The blend of Norse mythology and Cyber technology is surprisingly well utilized and lends itself to the best part of game, the story. As Baldur you must hunt down the robot GRNDL. Of course the story doesn't end at GRNDL and soon begins to lead you toward your ultimate enemy Loki. Unfortunatly the story is just set up for the now defunct Too Human trilogy and thus feels like the opening to a story that will never be finished. In the end it is a well told story accompanied by stylish cutscenes and solid voice acting.

The meat of the game is of course the gameplay. You choose between 5 playable classes that each empasize a certain playstyle (i.e. rushing, tanking, healing, etc.) No matter what you choose you will end up using a combo of melee weapons and guns to dispatch your foes. Your melee weapon is assigned to the right stick which will be used to slide towards enemies for basic melee attacks or to pop them up for a quick air combo. The choice of the right stick as your melee simultainiously works well and frustrates. It seems somewhat randomly Baldur will not slide corrctly or will end up targeting an enemy you don't want it to. Guns will help you thin out the horde before they descend upon and do there job well, but once again you will encouter some fairly janky targeting that could leave you out in the cold. Also at your disposal are ruiners which are essentialy AoE power moves that are useful for getting out of a tight spot or taking out a large group of enemies. Too bad the level design and enemy types completly ruin the experience. Most of your battles consist of large waves of machines that can either be rushers or long range spammers. Enemies take a surprising amount of punishment and also frequently come with exploding, poison, and freezing death AoEs that can severly screw you up. It seems like the game sometimes sets you up for failure as when you die you just come back with all the enemies at the same health as they were before. The only punishment you get is an infuriating 20 second cutscene of a valkyrie descending from the heavens and carrying you up to valhalla. It's cool at first but after 2 or 3 deaths you'll switch from mild interest to anger. For a loot driven game its surprising that the developer would make the game so difficult. Loot driven games are known to be kind of mindless but in Too Human you die so frequently you start to lose interest. Not to mention you'll be wrestling the camera constantly. The only thing that make it bearable is the fact that left bumper will center the camera, expect to be hammering that alamost as much as your melee attacks.

Graphically, Too Human is the definition of mediocre and would probably fit in as an Xbox 360 launch title. On top of that the framerate is prone to chopiness and glitches are frequent. Sometimes enemies will suddenly stop moving or even become invisible. I personally lost about 10 minutes to an unopenable door which was only solved by reloading the game. Artistically the game remains consistent with it's sci-fi vibe with solid charecter design and and consistent enviorments.

Too Human is a flawed game that tried to create a new style loot grind and failed spectacularly. The only somewhat reedeming quality of the game is it's narrative and even that isn't specatcular, just well told. The game itself is a boring grind punctuated by an annoying death animation and absolutly absymal camera control. With only four levels and about 10 hours of gameplay in the main story the game will end fairly adbruptly and leave you hanging with only the grind of the same 4 levels for mostly useless loot to keep you going. When I finished this game I didn't feel any accomplishment, I only felt like I wasted 10 hours of my life.

Presentation: 7
Gameplay: 3
Value: 6

Overall: 5.1

since i've completed this game, i'd thought i would share my view on it, so here goes.

it's pretty good for the fact that you can have 3 types of melee weapons and 3 types of ranged weapons that differ from speed, damage, range. (still do not see how a staff can be slower then a hammer, but there you go). there are many armour and weapons that give different bonuses. the charms and runes are ok, the basic goal in each level is to go from start to finish killing everything that looks robotic enough or a zombie, then go to this base and go to different area's every time. the story is set on norse mythology, which was ok for a story.

the camera angles were ok, but sometimes not helpful, the right thumbstick attack is ok, but i've had times where i wanted to attack an enemy with one style of attack and it does another or would hit a different enemy.

the classes are good considering that they are all different with different abilities (like diablo 2) but you will always have to choose between human and cybernetic once and have to stick with it. the co-op online is good, but is limited to just 2 people and would be better if there was 4 players max.

if you're thinking of trying to get the full 1000gs, be prepared to waste several hundred hours getting it, one achievement requires you to get the full level 50 red epic weapon and full armour (7 items) for that type of character (5 class types times 2 body types = 10 different sets) and they can be a pain to get unless someone can give you that set to borrow.

overall, it was pretty good mindless violence, better then some games out there.

Too Human isn't THE most anticipated game in the world but i think a lot of people love this game (me being one of them).....It is very highly underrated and doesnt get the praise that it should.
Sure the weapos sound like amazingly ridiculous pet names a 4 year old made up but for the huge amount of weapons....who would bother to name them all.

I also love the choice of of having your own style of fighter....and choosing your gear and weapons.This gives everyone a unique fighting style....and preference.So in other words, No 2 characters will be the same, some might find this as a disadvantage but if you think about it. If everybody is different then it differs competition and battles.

I love (and im sure other people do) the levelling system because this gives you a goal....I think that because of the levelling system players dont get bored.....without levels the only goal is to get the best weapons and armour and this would be a hugely time consuming task because there are millions of weapons and armour.

Soo overall this game is highly underrated but amazing...and also very very cheap.........you can pick this game up for around £3 - £5 which is hardly slightly expensive.

Overall
Love it

Most of the reviews are lengthy and didn't tell me whether I should have started this game. With well over 300 hours invested, here are some brief opinions which might influence your decision to start or not start this game. I've broken them into two sections depending on how achievement crazed you are.

Short Haul

Interesting game if you are going to do a few runthroughs without caring about completing all the achievements. The art is good and the story is interesting. The camera being out of the players control is quite annoying, although I probably didn't die too many times because of it. You get a lot of loot drops which are useful as you character levels up.

Long Haul

This is one of the most aggravating games I have ever played. I'm truly sorry I ever picked it up.

Dying constantly is ridiculous. It amazes me that with all the effort that went into this game that some idiot at Silicon Knights decided to make it so frustratingly difficult to get through a level without dying. Probably the same idiot who decided to claim that Unreal Engine 3 didn't work and tried suing. You can look up how well that turned out for them.

Loot system turns into boring weeding through crap. Majority of drops are garbage to be thrown out. Unfortunately, one of the achievements is based on getting rare items, and is just the worst, stupidest excuse for grinding. Charms? I can't believe how much time I wasted sorting through through them to see which quest was done, which was most appropriate for the next room, which needed other charms that weren't completed yet, etc.

Reaching the maximum level is extra frustrating because the game becomes harder than ever.

Frame rates issues. You can see the frame rate lag at times. maybe it didn't on earlier Xbox operating system releases, but it does now. This is a real problem at times because you can feel the controls become so sluggish that you can't re-target.

Well at first i though the game was very weird. The right analog stick is the attack instead of the typical A,B,X,Y buttons. Also there are no potions to heal myself unless you find Health Orbs in containers and enemies. The story is ok since it has the Marvel Comic character Thor. You will die alot and i mean ALOT. When you die you have to watch the same scene of an Angel type of person come down and bring you to the heavens. The scene lasts maybe 10 seconds. It wouldn't be so bad if we can skip it but you can't. You die hundreds of time and you have to watch it all the time. I give this game a 2 Star.

Too Human is you standard Style Diablo 2 clone. You fight hordes of monsters for money, or as they call it bounty, and items. The use of the right analog stick makes it interesting new feature for melee combat and the fact you can build your character based on your preference by buying skills and choosing witch class to pursue. Other than that the game is pretty much a grind with a very very generic bland story, though I haft to give props to the fact that they follow Norse Mythology rather well. Voice acting sucks and the greatest feature is you can skip most of the cut scenes to get back to the action and level grind. If you enjoyed Diablo and it clones and hordes of pointless monsters to kill this game is up your ally. If you looking for the next new innovation in the hack and slash genre you will be disappointed.