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 James Wallis
WDS Article Author, Frontiers Nerd, Star Trek Geek, Console Inventer Wannabee...
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Review:
James Bond: 007: QUANTUM OF SOLACE WALKTHROUGH & Cheat Codes GAME STRATEGY GUIDE is now available for you right in your members area and compatable for the SONY Playstation 3 PS3, XBOX 360, PC AND Nintendo Wii Platform. GameGuideDog.Com is dedicated to helping gamers through games. We are confident our support and guides are absolutely the best gaming resource anywhere!
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Here's a bond game that I found genuinely interesting, like a good set-piece. Having to guide a drugged-out Bond out of Casino Royale itself is a particular highlight, as is the Venice level set in the crumbling building and the one set on a train. But these bits are far too rare to elevate the overall quality of the experience and distract you from the mediocrity surrounding them, and for the most part you're funneled through corridors instead, dispatching brainless enemies and wondering whether EA would have done a better job after all.
To give Treyarch credit where it's due, Quantum of Solace does at least look presentable throughout, although it's a dinner jacket rather than a dinner jacket. Daniel Craig's likeness is genuinely excellent, and the seamless way the game employs the cover system is a useful (and convenient) means of ensuring the star gets enough time on-screen. The levels are also reasonably detailed, with a good deal of variety ensuring the Call of Duty 4 engine is given a run for its money, with over-the-top explosive effects and loads of destructible objects throughout, so you won't be complaining much about the way it looks, or the way it sounds either.
In fact, the audio chaps can skip detention entirely, with an array of excellent voice talent contributing to slick mission briefings, mid-mission chatter and plenty of incidentals. The soundtrack's great too, so in certain respects the game does its job of creating a suitable atmosphere. It's just a shame the core gameplay's so vapid and uninspired, and not helped at all by the utterly confusing way the narrative flits around the timeline of both Casino Royale and its sequel. If you're not a student of Bond, you will neither know, nor probably care why, in the middle of the game, you're suddenly thrown into flashback, or playing bits of the Casino Royale timeline which didn't make it into the film.
And while we're not ones to complain too much when games are short these days, in this case Quantum of Solace is unacceptably brief. Clocking in at around the five to six hours even for cack-handed old grumps like me, you could clear the single-player campaign in a single evening without breaking a sweat. Sometimes it's great for a game to be on the short side if it's crafted and poetic (ICO, for instance), and massively replayable (Portal), but that's never the case here. Some of the Achievements (like taking out a posse of snipers with one bullet each) are a nice touch, but enough to make you want to play it again?
Inevitably at this point there's always a chance for the multiplayer to help save face, and Bond does passably. Among all the standard modes are a couple that stand out - there's Bond Vs, for instance, where one person plays as 007 trying to disarm bombs placed by players representing the 'Organisation' - and the popular Golden Gun mode also makes an appearance, giving one player Saruman's one-shot-killer and everyone else the rank-and-file. Meanwhile, Bond Evasion mode is pretty good, with players trying to escort a VIP between locations. The weapon upgrade system, meanwhile, gives the multiplayer side a bit of longevity, with cash-based unlocks allowing you to customise weapons with a series of attachments, and improve reload times and damage levels. It's all too little, too late, though, and struggles to escape the stigma of the rest.
That's because in a genre as super-competitive as the shooter, it's easy for minor elements to prove to be the deciding factor, but when it comes to Quantum of Solace, the problems are blatant and fundamental. As a piece of interactive merchandise for the masses, it does its job: it's polished, intuitive to control, and approximates the Bond Experience, albeit with about as much subtlety as Vesper Lynd's neckline. For everyone else though, it's brainless, dull, and ridiculously easy. Rather than giving the Bond game its Casino Royale moment, Activision and Treyarch have simply carried on in the joyless tradition of dumbed-down shooters designed for thickos, and GoldenEye has never seemed so far away.
CRITICS CORNER:
90VideoGamer
This is "GoldenEye" for a new generation. And praise doesn't come much higher than that.
89PGNx Media
With Quantum of Solace, Treyarch absolutely nailed the James Bond experience.
85MS Xbox World
There's a very solid game here and with the impressive AI and the basis of a good game here, means that any future Bond games can improve on what's already been established. This is well worth playing – for an afternoon or two.
85GamingTrend
While the game may not completely capture our wildest dreams about playing Commander Bond, it does do a great job of capturing the atmosphere.
80GameZone
Quantum of Solace is a fun and exciting Bond title that has some truly engaging situations and pretty production values. However, there are some ugly issues, like poor AI and a buggy cover system, that keep it from truly being a truly great shooter.
79WonderwallWeb
A decent enough game, if not a little predictable. Certainly worth considering if you are a fan of all things Bond.
77Console Monster
James Bond: Quantum of Solace is like a Bond girl. You'll either love or hate her. The game's story mode is short yet thrilling and the online capabilities are to a high standard though unfortunately, the title will get overlooked under all the bigger titles releasing in the run-up to Christmas and therefore not getting the recognition the game deserves.
76Cheat Code Central
Quantum of Solace won't be up for any "game of the year" awards, but it is a solid title that offers a satisfying, though elementary, single-player campaign and a strong, but perhaps niche, multiplayer experience. It's not a total return to form for the Bond franchise, but it seems to be headed in the right direction.
75Xbox360Achievements
I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy Quantum of Solace because I did, but this is coming from a huge Bond fan. The single player campaign was entertaining and boasted intuitive and responsive controls; our only grumble is its length.
70Kikizo
Relentlessly unoriginal but well turned out.
70360 Gamer Magazine UK
Relentlessly packed full of gunfire as well as requiring duck-and-cover defensive play Quantum of Solace blends a balls-out shooter with modern sensibilities to create a game that's refreshingly fast paced and therefore swift to complete. If played on its highest settings you'd be better served by Rainbow Six and if played on lower you're paying for just a few hours of entertainment. Thankfully multiplayer promises much, and we'll tell you how it delivers once we're all online and you've seen Mr Bond die several times.
70Ferrago
Its playable, its easy, its simple, its entertaining, and its got a bit of good multiplayer; but it wouldn't challenge an amateur gamer and it'll most likely be back in the box and filed away as "done with" faster than a day in the office.
70IGN
If you're looking for a game to reveal the plot of Quantum of Solace before the movie's release, this is not it. If you're looking for the answer to GoldenEye, this is not it. Instead Quantum of Solace is a respectable shooter with little that sets it apart from the rest of the field.
70Team Xbox
As a whole package, Quantum of Solace doesn't quite cut it. It's a decent game held back by the constraints of its license, which should be the thing that elevates the product. Treyarch did their best with what they had, but it's not enough to elevate this game to superspy status.
70GameSpot
Quantum of Solace will leave you shaken and stirred, but not entirely satisfied.
70GameDaily
Multiplayer isn't bad, but it lacks depth, so while Quantum provides some exciting moments, its developers failed to catapult it to greatness.
70Kombo
This is the best Bond game to hit shelves in a long time.
69IGN UK
A true blockbuster of a game, Quantum of Solace is loud, dumb but sadly all-too-forgettable. The Bond licence goes a good way to hiding the game's lack of ideas and for the four hours the single-player campaign lasts there's no denying it's a solid blast, but ultimately there's better ways to spend your money this autumn.
67Game Chronicles
Quantum of Solace isn't a terrible game but it is certainly not the game I expected it to be. Treyarch spent too much time trying to convert a WWII engine into something viable for a secret agent game, and we end up with a gun-toting thug in a tux rather than the sophisticated secret agent we all love from the books and the movies.
60Giant Bomb
A passable shooter in a world that's filled with much, much better ones.
60Boomtown
Quantum of Solace is a pretty slick, well presented and polished product. The gameplay is rather simple, but the game is aimed at the simple end of the market. Yet I feel that James Bond deserves more than this, more than a cheap and very short punt into the cheap seats.
60X360 Magazine UK
This is an unexpected game. Everything points to the fact that by all accounts it should be awful. Licences like this hardly ever work, but amazingly it comes off feeling like a fun, throwaway shooter with a workable shooting mechanic and some quite enjoyable moments that, while strictly not very Bond in nature, make the game well worth a look if you're either a Bond fan or even just enjoy a good shooter.
581UP
GoldenEye's heyday is long gone, and Solace relies too much on nostalgia and imitation to be anything close to the next shooter milestone.
56Gamer 2.0
Quantum of Solace will give you enough of a Bond fix, but you'll be jonesing for something better.
50Variety
It's a decent action game, but doesn't remotely capture the spirit of its source material. Moreover, it falls well short of the year's best shooters, meaning it's unlikely to shake many gamers or stir 007 fans.
50GameSpy
Hopefully Bond's next foray into the gaming world will deliver an authentic and compelling Bond experience, not just a decent but too-short shooter with some fancy window dressing.
50EuroGamer
As a piece of interactive merchandise for the masses, it does its job: it's polished, intuitive to control, and approximates the Bond Experience, albeit with about as much subtlety as Vesper Lynd's neckline. For everyone else though, it's brainless, dull, and ridiculously easy. Rather than giving the Bond game its Casino Royale moment, Activision and Treyarch have simply carried on in the joyless tradition of dumbed-down shooters designed for thickos, and GoldenEye has never seemed so far away.
40Official Xbox Magazine UK
Quantum of Solace never manages to be a Bond game: at the tiniest of nudges, it panics and starts unleashing gunfire. It's clumsy, it's messy, it's not much fun and most of the time, it's not even the right film.
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James Bond 007: Quantum of Solace: The Game by Activision is released across all platforms.
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