Overview:

Bastion and his Prime Sentinels have devised a way to destroy the mutants once and for all...and, they\'ve kidnapped Forge, a mutant with the ability to create any technology he imagines, to help create a weapon that can eliminate the mutant gene entirely! Now it\'s up to the X-Men to stop them, even if it means allying with their arch-foes: Magneto\'s Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.

Violence:

This is a comic-book fighting game, you can only K.O. the other player, not kill them. -SPOILER- In the very end, it seems like Bastion dies,( though with super-villians they usually find a way to come back or survive) and with all the sentinels you defeat in the campaign, I\'m going to give this a \'Killing non-human, fictional beings\' rating. -SPOILER ENDED- There is no blood or gore, though there are characters that say some violent things (Sabretooth: “Ah, the taste of blood”; Wolverine: “I\\'m gonna bleed ya!”. Out of 10 Killing non-human, fictional beings (Ex. Robots or Aliens): -3.5 No Blood: -0 No Gore: -0 Violence: 6.5/10 Language: There are only 2 swears used in the whole game (E.S.R.B. didn\'t give it a \'mild language\\' rating, though), and they were both uses in story mode. Cyclops says to Magneto “Magneto, what the h*** is going on?” and -SPOILER- In a goofy ending if you wait until the end of the credits, Juggernaut says “This s****”. It\'s not really the worst word in the world, but it\'s still offensive to some people. -SPOILER ENDED- There is no sexual dialogue that I could remember. Out of 10 Mild Swear Words are used once or twice: -2 No sexual dialogue: -0 Language: 8/10 Sexual Content/Nudity: Lady Deathstrike wears an extremely revealing costume, and her alternate costumes aren’t much better.They are so revealing in the upper chest area that I almost gave this game a partial nudity rating. You don’t have to play as her, and she’s not in the campaign, but be warned. Storm’s costume is revealing in the rear area, but thankfully some of her alternate costumes remedy that. Psylocke has some immodest costumes, and almost all of the characters, both male and female, wear spandex tights, but that is pretty much standard in comic books. There is no sex in the game whatsoever. Out of 10 Characters clothing is sexy or accentuates their sexuality: -1.5 No Sexual Content: -0 Sexual Content/Nudity: 8.5/10 Occult/Supernatural: There is magic in the game, as the Unstoppable Juggernaut gets his powers from the crimson crystal of Cyttorak, a magical crystal. Cyttorak is a false god in the Marvel Universe, and thus Juggernaut gets his powers from a false god. There is also the fact that some X-Men characters have \'mutant\' powers that are generally associated with the occult such as telepathy, telekinesis, mind-reading, astral projection, reality altering, and life-force/energy leeching. Also, Forge is capable of using mystical powers, as he was raised by a Native American shaman, but he doesn’t use them anymore because he knows from experience that the use of them does WAY more harm that good. He only uses his technological powers now, both in the game and the comic. One of the levels is in Apocalypse’s tomb, and it has a bunch of ancient Egyptian markings and statues in it. Nightcrawler is a Catholic priest, but they don’t seem to show any sign of him being one in the game. Pray before buying this game, as this is a matter of conviction. Some of my friends are fine with the X-Men, while others are not. Out of 10 Game takes place in an environment with minor occult references: -3 Borderline magic (hard to tell if occult) is used by player: -3.5 Occult/Supernatural: 3.5/10 Cultural/Moral/Ethical Not really much wrong here, in fact the X-Men are against racism as they are persecuted for being mutants. You can, however, play as the villians, and Magneto (a villian) is a mutant-supremecist who believes mutants are superior to humans. I also don’t recall any gross humor in the game. One thing is that superheroes in general are vigilantes that are operating outside of the law. I don’t really see much problem with it, unless they are the shoot first, interrogate later type. It’s just fiction after all. Out of 10 Game requires rejecting authority figures or laws: -2 No prejudicial bias in the game: -0 No instance of gross humor in the game: -0 Good value decision making is required to progress in the game. -0 Cultural/Moral/Ethical: 8/10

Gameplay:

The game can be very confusing, at least for me, as I got the game used from E.B. Games and they didn’t give me the game booklet (or even the safety booklet, for that matter). Combos are key to winning the game, so I had a bit of trouble. Thankfully there is a combos list in the pause menu. If you have fast hands, then you will be very good at this game. It takes a while to get used to, but once you are used to it, it’s pretty fun. The game is best for X-Men fans, as they will appreciate the 24 playable characters and the unlockable material (including Patrick Stewart narrated character biographies). The story mode has a pretty good storyline, and some pretty good battles (and if you look at the beginning, there is a reference to Arch-Angel, Iron-Man, the Thing, and Spider-Man). A fun part of the fighting is the interactive environments where you can knock your opponent from one part of the level to another (ex. Knocking an opponent off a building or down a waterfall and then jumping down to fight them). Some of those sequences look really neat (Like hitting a guy so hard they go flying off a building, slam into an electric sign, fall and landing on a car which gets totaled and makes an explosion). The main annoyance is that the characters move pretty slowly, making playing as speedsters like Beast, Wolverine, and Nightcrawler not as fun. Overall, the game plays like a 2D fighter in a 3D world as you cannot free run (you are always facing your opponent and can only strafe left and right. Running is only for forwards and backwards), but it is pretty fun especially for fans of the source material. Not to say that other people won’t enjoy it, but it’s far from the best fighting game out there. Gameplay: 13/20

Graphics:

The graphics aren’t the best in a Gamecube game, but I suppose for the first X-Men game made for the cube, It’s okay. Some characters animate better than others. The environments look good and there are 8 costumes per character (although most need to be unlocked). The special moves look really good and are well done. Overall the graphics are good enough to get the job done, but not the best. Graphics: 7/10

Sound:

The voice acting is a mixed bag. The game is narrarated by Patrick Stewart (playing Professor Xavier, yet again) who does a great job, as do some of the other actors, but some of the other ones are not as good (Toad is called the ‘terrible Toad\\' for good reason, as he sounds like a bad Gollum/Smeagol impersonation). Some of the script is somewhat cheesy, particularly Phoenix’s lines. (When I heard her say "feel the burn", it felt like Shark-Boy and Lava-Girl all over again) And most characters only have one entrance phrase, and one winning phrase, which gets repetitive. The background music is pretty catchy and fun to listen to. You don’t hear a lot of sound effects other than melee collisions, because although most of the objects are destructable, they can’t be picked up and thrown and thus are usually ignored. Sound: 6/10

Stability:

Glitches Galore. Image Nightcrawler teleporting, but not coming back, Sabretooth being able to throw you when he didn’t touch you, or knocking the Juggernaut of a cliff, but instead of falling, he acts as if there is an invisible floor of hard air where he is. that, coupled with passing-through wall problems, and you get a very glitchy game. Stability: 2/5

Controls:

They take some getting used too, but once you get used to them, then the controls are pretty decent. Just make sure you get the game booklet when you buy it. Controls: 3/5