Knight Rider 2 – Review

I loved Knight Rider as a kid, I’d tune in every week to watch the adventures or misadventures of Michael Knight and his fabby car KITT. I wanted a car like KITT, he was the ultimate in luxury items and I was pretty convinced that the future would hold many KITT like cars for me to drive around in. Little did I know at the time that I’d be 29 when I first had the opportunity to drive KITT and I’d be doing it on my games console which plugs into the TV.

I wanted to like this game so much, I think there’s a lot to be said for retro titles and it’s nice to be reminded of your childhood every now and again. You can imagine my disappointment when my long anticipated go of KITT turned out to be a dull, uninspiring drive around desert towns and industrial complexes, however, I digress because I’m jumping the gun a little, let me explain to you the good and many bad points of Knight Rider 2.

Having not being blessed with playing Knight Riders original outing on consoles, I wasn’t sure what to expect of this sequel. Obviously I knew I’d be playing with Michael and KITT and hoped that there would be many grand driving levels and outstanding crime solving to be done. In a time where Burnout 3 is rarely off my TV screen, I was hoping another driving game could give me something interesting to try out. I was sadly disappointed. When I first loaded up KR2 I was happy enough, the opening sequence seemed fine and there were a few options such as a Knight Rider quiz, Behind The Scenes info, clips of some of the greatest driving stunts from the TV show and of the choice of Story Mode or Mission Mode. Not bad for a budget title you’re thinking, however, story mode is simply the same 11 missions as mission mode except in mission mode you can play them in any order. Wow. Groundbreaking. Sigh.

Ok so, on with the show they say and therefore I chose story mode to get a feel for the game and I was thrust into the first mission which sees Michael and KITT being attacked by missiles all of a sudden. There we are driving along and wham, missiles start flying at you trying to blast you off the road. Now, this is where my first intense concern for this game arose. I attempted to avoid the missiles but since the car is actually driving towards the screen, this is not easy. Seriously, this was the first level and already I was dying all over the place, it was very frustrating. You swerve all over the place trying to avoid them and attempting to make the most of the terrible driving controls which seem overly sensitive, always at the wrong time. This level also introduces you to your weapons and special abilities. Mainly you’re required to use your laser to melt ice blocks in the road, use turbo boost to jump over trees and enter ski mode to drive on two wheels. Now, these all seem pretty cool but they quickly become boring because at the end of the day you’re simply doing the same thing over and over again. The backgrounds don’t give you much to look at either and are generally a bland blend of deserts, industrial complexes and very little else. You are at times attacked by a helicopter (which requires you to fire missiles at it that simply fail to lock on most times), mad robots (which again you simply find yourself driving around in circles and firing indiscriminately at) and so on and so forth. You have the opportunity to recharge throughout the levels which is good because then you don’t die but is also self-defeating as it makes the levels too easy.

One of the worst aspects of this game is the voice acting. It’s embarrassingly cringe-worthy and at times made me laugh. Some of the lines are bad, ok, a lot of the lines are bad but it’s more general than that, the voice acting just seems amateurish and rushed. It doesn’t help you become absorbed in the game and will most like put you off it. Don’t get me wrong there’s a few good points such as the slow motion camera angles when you boost over things but these are just not strong enough to sustain the game, The lack of a varied and atmospheric soundtrack doesn’t help either and you’re likely to finish this game in around 5 hours which is probably a blessing.

Overall, I was greatly disappointed in this game. I wanted it to be fun. I wanted it to be full of driving missions that were engaging and gripping. I wanted to feel like I was Michael Knight and I was in control of KITT and all of our adventures would be filled with fun and excitement. I just didn’t have that experience with this game. There is nothing here for the female gamer, but then there’s not much here for the male gamer either I’m afraid. If you’re the biggest Knight Rider fan around you’ll buy this game, but I’m not sure that the rest of us will follow suit. Sorry.

Review by Tracy

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