Lost Planet: Extreme Condition Review (Xbox 360)

The Xbox 360 has established itself as being an excellent console if you like games that involve killing lots of things. Despite titles from other genres such as Viva Pinata and the upcoming Blue Dragon, the system is still best known for games such as Gears of War and Dead Rising.

Coming to join the party is a little Capcom offering known tastefully as Lost Planet: Extreme Condition. The basic premise is that in the distant future humans have attempted to colonize a frozen planet in the far-flung reaches of space. Only the resident insect monsters known as the Akrid aren’t too keen on the idea. Thus, you’ll have to kill them all. As a bonus, they drop gobs of thermal energy when they die – very handy for surviving frozen wasteland hunts.

As you may have surmised from the above, story takes second place to blowing up lots of stuff, and the game gives you a rather impressive selection of gear with which to accomplish said blowing up. The controls may take a little while to get used to, but in any case it’s customizable, so you should have little issues.

Another gameplay mechanic is that of the previously mentioned Thermal Energy. The gauge for it drains constantly as you fight your way through the area, and once it’s gone, you start taking damage until you die. Fortunately, killing Akrid (and space pirates) nets you a decent amount of Thermal Energy, so it really shouldn’t be much of an issue. You can also refill it at various stations along the levels. It’s a mild distraction at best.

The single-player game is rather short – an experienced player could easily plow through in 10 hours. However, multiplayer is a different beast. Supporting up to 16 players online, it’s immense fun and once again (as so often on the Xbox 360), is the real reason many people will buy it in the first place.

The graphics are great, but not especially stellar. The music is passable, if forgettable. As said before, the game focuses around killing lots of stuff, and it accomplishes that task remarkably well.

Overall, I’d say that if you want a good, recently released game for the Xbox 360, it’s probably a good idea to have this on your radar.

By: Jonathan Lau