Introduction:

XIII ( or Thirteen), came out at a time when I was looking for something new. At first I was completely not interested in it. The unique look of the cel-shading certainly set it apart from all the other games. It was based off of a long running French comic book with the same name.

When I irst got it and played through the new game I was still excited. That is till a month later I realized what a disaster this game was. At the time it was the train wreck of gaming. XIII had more wrong with the MP than was right.

Going back now after almost 3 years and playing it again, I have had a bit of a change of heart.



XIII Vital Stats:

Minimum System Requirements:

• Operating System: Windows® 98/Me/2000/XP (only)
• Processor: 800 MHz Pentium® III, AMD Athlon™ or equivalent (1 GHz recommended)
• RAM: 128 MB of RAM (256 MB needed for XP users and recommended for all others)
• Video Card: 32 MB DirectX® 8.1-compliant video card that supports Hardware T&L (64 MB recommended); ATI® Radeon™ family (models 7000-9800) and NVIDIA® GeForce™ family (models 2-FX) supported
• Sound Card: DirectX 8.1-compliant 16-bit sound card
• DirectX Version: 8.1 (included on disc)
• CD-ROM: 4x or better (not recommended for use with CD-RWs)
• Hard Drive Space: 1.2 GB free space needed to install and play
• Peripherals Supported: Windows-compatible keyboard and mouse
• Multiplayer: Internet connection at 56 kbps or better

Original Release Date: November 2003

Developer: UBI Soft Entertainment

Publisher: UBI Soft Entertainment

File Information: SP and MP demos are available, map tools and one (1) game patch are available for download.

XIII Homepage

Setup & Install:

This was the first game I purchased that had 4 CDs for install. What a pain this is, and completely unnecessary, but with the 4 CDs you did get two options for the install. The minimum install is smaller, and leaves some of the game content on the CDs. The full install still has to have some CD swapping between levels, which can also be inconvienant. This is due though to the prerendered cutscenes in the game remaining on the disks.

To run the game my screen was set for 1280x1024, and I had no problems with the game performance or frame rates.



The movement and key setup on the game is the standard with nothing that cannot be changed to suit your personal tastes. For me I use a gamepad for anything that my mouse cannot do.

Graphics & Sound:

Cel-shading is a type of non-photorealistic rendering designed to make computer graphics appear to be hand-drawn. Cel-shading is often used to mimic the style of a comic book or cartoon. This is a very distinctive style for a FPS video game, on PC platform.



When the decision was made to convert the comic book series to a game, it was a wise choice to keep the same look. I think without keeping this the game would have lost something in the translation. To me it made it even more desirable, and unique. Even though it is not as finished looking as some of the games I had played to this point and even now, it still was a high quality looking game.

The sounds were fun, and fit the cel-shading atmosphere. The voice of XIII was done by David Duchovney (of X-Files). He has a sexy voice so that was a pleasant addition for the games appeal. Another familiar name to the list of actors voices was Adam West, the Batman from the old television series. Which also fits because when you hit or shoot sometthing you get the BAM, BOOM or other expressive word balloon pop over the area. Just like from Batman.



The music which helped to set the tone for the funky FPS game even produced a soundtrack all it's own. If you go to the home page posted above, I think you can still download a sample of it there.

Story:

Singleplayer

With 34 missions, and 13 chapters the singleplayer provides you with plenty to keep you occupied for a good while. It took me a total of about 12 hours to complete this portion of the game, and that was the second time playing through XIII. As with all games the SP has to follow a particular direction, and is not very forgiving on how you get to the end.

The weapons are not real plentiful, but this is where you find out how to use items around you in your environment. Things like chairs, shovels, bottles, knives or most any object you can get your hands on.





You can save anywhere while playing with the quicksave feature, but when you go back the game will start you at the closest checkpoint to where you saved. Kind of pointless to have the quicksave, but it just made me more aware of where I was when I stopped playing.

The weapons are pretty even across the board on damage. Just remember though to use short firing bursts, and not long auto-fire rampages. The sniper rifle in XIII is still the best I have seen in any game to date. The accuracy and precision have not been matched. Oh, and did I mention the crossbow?



Multiplayer

The online play in this game was loads of fun. That is as long as you played on a server that could handle the load. If you were unfortunate enough to get on one that could not, the lag would kill you. In some cases it would be so bad that it could cause your PC to shut down the game.

Thought the servers still run the game online there are few players. Maybe enough to get on servers worth of players. Should you try to go to MP check the UBI Online Servers , and that will tell you how many players are online in the game at any given time. Just scroll down till you see XIII. When the games were plentiful online though, using two pistols was most definately the best!

Conclusion

When I first bought XIII it was a HUGE disappointment to me. Going back and playing it through this time though I have seen all the good points in it. This is one game you would get solely for the SP aspect. Although it does have MP it is not the main attraction.

When the game was first released was somewhere in the neighborhood of $40.00, and now it can be gotten for $9.99. I'm glad I kept my copy out of shear stubborness, because now I can appreciate it much more than the first time around.

In the GameApex world of Do Over or No Do Over, XIII is definately a worthy Do Over!

Great review, Foe! The cell shading looks totally trippy! I'm seriously tempted to add this to my "to buy" list just to check out the sniper rifle

That sniper rifle looks... interesting...

Not sure I can appreciate the comic book graphics, but it's pretty damn unique, compared to games that keep getting more and more realistic.

Nice do over Foe.

I completely agree on the first time around i thought it was crap i mean honestly your responsible for killing JFK for crying out loud and the comic based theme was nice but it wasnt a comic book so i thought i blew. Though after reading this i may rent it for the ps2 again. Good work Foe.

I loved that game , I thought the graphics were cool, the downside was the bad guys running around saying the same things over and over, ALERT !!!!!. Just like in FEAR " he's trying to flank !!!" Gets old.
But I enjoyed the SP never got into the MP.

Again, another great article from a great writer.

Keep up the great work, Foe.

Rob

I had a massive "clean out the closet" sale a couple months back... I think I might have sold off my copy of XIII... Dangit!!! The article made me want to go back and play it again once or twice...:dopey:

Next game sale you have GPN you should post it here!

I can do that... Probably get more traffic, move the goodies faster (at least the games, I should)