X-Men Origins: Wolverine
Written: Thursday, June 18, 2009
Submitted By: Ed Tartaglia Jr.

I’ve been a fan of comic book games since the early days of Wolverine on Nintendo. Since then, countless adaptations were created trying to recreate the ultimate comic book experience ranging from Batman on Nintendo to Spiderman and the X-Men on Sega Genesis. Still, m ost were lacking…something.

Then X-Men Origins: Wolverine hits the stage. Adamantium claws, battle scenes, the voice of Hugh Jackman. How could the video game possibly compete with three amazing X-Men movies and a spin-off? Three words: Blood, Gore, Dismemberment.

Wolverine plays much like a cinematic film. The level sequences are broken up by short features, most which add another depth of plot to the game. However, they don’t take away from the pure enjoyment of killing everything in Wolvie’s path. Button mashing killing combos earns Wolverine rage points which he can unleash at any time in a variety of ways ranging from glowing red claws to spinning claw attacks. Yet, even the simple hack-a-foe method is rewarding when Wolverine‘s enemies squirt blood from their torsos.

What separates Wolverine from other Marvel games is the amount of blood/violence in this game. When I say each enemy spews blood when maimed, the amount could be collected by the Red Cross and shipped to Tsunami ridden countries. Wolverine can dismantle limbs from his foes, causing them to hobble around with one arm, drag themselves across the floor from broken legs, and slicing heads off. And don’t forget the lovely, slightly tricky move of impaling your enemy on an object in the environment varying from a tree limb to a spike in the floor.

The drawback of this game is that it’s not entirely difficult. You can play on Easy or Normal, but Hard remains locked until you beat the game. A gamer could sit down and beat this game in approximately 7-9 hours. The TRUE enjoyment though, is the visually appealing environments--the beautiful colors of the jungle, or dark winter scenes of Canada.

Is the plotline a little disjointed? Yes. Will you want adamantium claws at the end of this game? Hell yes! Will it be the most difficult game you ever played? No. But, watching Wolverine’s skin get cut apart to the skeleton and re-heal, leveling up to learn more combination moves, gutting your enemies, watching them curse (Yes, Curse..Take that Teen rated Wolverine Games!) and die, and engaging in cinematic fight scenes gives this game nothing but pure enjoyment for anyone. Wolverine’s come a long way since the G-Rated X-Men on Sega and he’s greeted this new façade with blood stained claws and an adult edition for all the grown-up comic book fans.