Indiana Jones: The Emperor's Tomb (Review)
Keeping up with the Joneses.
By Libe Goad

PLATFORM: Xbox

PUBLISHER: LucasArts

DEVELOPER: The Collective

GENRE: Action/Adventure

ESRB: Teen

SCORE:

If you expected Indiana Jones and The Emperor’s Tomb to be the Holy Grail of the long-standing game series, better hold onto your hat. While the Xbox game will make an ideal way to wait out the last weeks of winter, its many technical issues keep the adventure title from being more than a diamond in the rough.

This time around, our favorite hunky archeologist takes up arms against the most evil of evildoers (Nazis and Asian gangsters) in an effort to keep a supernatural artifact, the Dragon's Heart, from falling into the wrong hands. Mr. Jones’ journey takes him though the Ceylon jungles, Hong Kong and the underwater palaces of Istanbul, all the while avoiding booby-trapped locations and well-armed baddies with the itchiest of trigger fingers. In true Indy fashion, he is eventually joined by the elusive Mei Ying, who will accompany him to the heart of the matter. Pun intended.

If you like to get physical, you’ll experience double happiness while utilizing Indy’s fantastic fighting moves. The Collective, the development team responsible for the Buffy game, pumped up the action in this action/adventure title by using the same fighting engine. Now, as Indy, you can delve out beatings only seen in the back alleys of the Bronx. Instead of relying only on firearms, Indie can use his whip to disarm goons and keep them at a distance, a machete to dice up competition and his manly fists to beat everyone else into submission.

Emperor’s Tomb sports some of the more impressive AI seen in a while as well. As Indie finds creative ways to delete human obstacles, they don’t stand still and take a beating like a wobbly punching clown. Instead, they fight back dexterously. If you disarm them, they will often pick up another weapon off the ground and use it against you. If you fight one of their pals, they’ll refrain from shooting until their buddy is safely out of the way. Their reactions aren’t flawless, but there’s enough detailed intelligence that it makes it easy to overlook the occasional cranky baddie running in place behind an invisible barrier.

As expected from an Indiana Jones title, the gameplay revolves around collecting artifacts located in well-guarded destinations. So in addition to delivering numerous knuckle sandwiches, Indy is subjected to swinging blades, poison gas, collapsing floors and ceilings. Each offers its own challenge, but after a while the whole process fighting and evading traps makes for a lesson in repetition. Granted, the varied environments help quell actual boredom, but the gameplay would have benefited from a few more innovative segments.

Mix the repetition in with a heaping pile of un-dynamic lighting, washed-out environments and numerous clipping problems and this potentially stellar game starts to look like another PS2 port that doesn’t take advantage of the Xbox’s capabilities. There’s also an unforgiving auto-save (once per level) and a myriad of camera problems on top of that. Too bad, because many a respectable pop culture maven would love to get her hands on a perfected dose of Indy.

Ladies who can bear with the game’s faults will still most likely enjoy their time with Dr. Jones. The solving-puzzle and avoiding-obstacle scenarios will warm the hearts of any adventure gamer, and the one-two punch fighting system will appeal to people who want a little more danger. Aside from a few scantily clad lady ninjas, there's a pleasant lack of cleavage, gratuitous lesbian scenarios and strippers -- a refreshing change of pace in the current gaming climate. Plus, Mei Ying can kick serious boo-tay.

Diamonds may no longer be a girl's best friend, but it's still worth the trot over hot coals and swim through infested waters to acquire your own copy of LucasArts' imperfect gem.