Lost in Translation? – X-Men Origins: Wolverine

Welcome to Lost in Translation? – the Ready Up series where we look at the rocky two-way road of media adapted from video games and games based on films and TV shows, in a bid to decide whether the juice was worth the squeeze, or if what made the source material great in the first place got lost in translation.

Having cast our gaze towards the silver screen for the last few LIT? outings, here we’re returning to the no-man’s-land of film-to-game tie-ins and taking a look at X-Men Origins: Wolverine, another Marvel Comics flavoured adaptation. For those unfamiliar with the film or if you’re suffering from an amnesia-inducing adamantium bullet to the brain (seriously, WTF happened there!), here’s the trailer:

X-Men Origins: Wolverine was developed by Raven Software, who at the time were probably best known for making X-Men Legends and its sequel, along with Star Wars Jedi Knight II, Quake 4 and Marvel Ultimate Alliance. The game is the proud owner of a relatively high Metacritic rating, with 75 out of 100 for the Xbox 360 version and 73 out of 100 for PS3, and was the recipient of a none-too-shabby 8 out of 10 right here on Ready Up, courtesy of our own Martin. Released in May 2009, a couple of weeks after its cinematic counterpart, the game looked a little like this:

A linear third-person action brawler in the vein of God of War and the criminally underrated Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, X-Men Origins: Wolverine casts you as Hugh Jackman’s take on Marvel’s iconic clawed mutant.

Obviously taking its inspiration from the film of the same name, players undertake mostly the same journey as Wolvie takes in the film, seeing him join the Weapon X program, have his skeleton infused with the somewhat indestructible metal adamantium and seeking revenge against those who wronged him, along with a fair few diversions from the film’s plot to keep things interesting.

So did X-Men Origins: Wolverine deserve its seemingly good reputation? Did it buck the trend of videogame movie tie-ins and result in a quality title? Let’s review the evidence.

What it got right

For those who enjoyed the movie, all of the film’s key moments survive the translation more or less intact, with the slightly awkward romance from the film played down in favour of the game’s brutal action. Big set-piece encounters between Wolverine and his cast of foes all cross over into fairly satisfying boss battles. Admittedly these are very traditional in their learn-the-routine, strike-the-weakspot patterns, and liberties are taken to make gameplay varied and compelling (such as taking Wolverine’s fight with the Blob out of a boxing ring and setting it in a supermarket), but all in all the film’s events make the transition to the interactive realm without much issue.

Three members of the movie’s cast also reprise their roles, with Hugh Jackman, Liev Schreiber and Black Eyed Peas star will.i.am all lending their voices.

Where the game really triumphs though, is in its over-the-top action. Eschewing the film’s 12 rating (PG-13 in the States), the videogame version of X-Men Origins: Wolverine is 18-rated with good reason. As you’d imagine when playing a character with razor sharp blades protruding from between his knuckles, claret flows quite liberally from the moment Wolvie’s claws pop, more or less continually until the end credits roll. Put simply, this game is in no way suitable for kids.

As with many games of its ilk, combat is simple on the surface with button-mashing a very possible route through most of the game, but persevere with learning the variety of fighting moves available to you and the battle can become a bit more involved, requiring the player to pull off well-timed counters and use environmental death-traps to get the most stylish variety to the constant maiming and murdering of hapless henchmen. The bloody combat is mixed up by some fairly simple platforming and puzzles, but nothing that offers too much resistance to those craving carnage.

What it got wrong

Ultimately, the only thing wrong with X-Men Origins: Wolverine as a game is that it can get a little repetitive, with an over-reliance on a powerful move unlocked very early in the game – the clawed lunge that sees Wolverine leap great distances before plunging his claws into the chest of the unlucky sod on the receiving end of the attack. So all-conquering is this move that only a few of the enemies are resistant to it, and it quickly forms the staple move of any playthrough of the game.

Graphically, the game hasn’t aged too well, and was hardly the top of its class back upon its release. Cool touches do permeate through though, with Wolverine taking damage quite visibly before healing in real-time.

But as an adaptation, there is little here to fault. Fans of the film will find everything they expect to experience, fans of the genre should have their thirst quenched by the brutal combat and those who are more familiar with the comics that spawned the title character should have some of their self-referential itches well and truly taken care of.

The Verdict

A bit of a guilty pleasure, X-Men Origins: Wolverine is, for me at least, a preferable way of spending some time than the movie that spawned it. By no means a classic game, there’s a lot of fun to be had from the (quite literal) hack and slash gameplay. A solid adaptation.