Twisted Metal: Small Brawl

Written by Chris Reiter  on April 02, 2002

Review: You'd think a destructive car combat game like Twisted Metal would turn out to be anything else but a kid friendly game.

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The Twisted Metal series has always been about strategy from a vehicle angle. During the gameplay, your main goal is to achieve victory by competing and taking out all the others on the battlefield by using offensive and defensive methods. To aid the character you're using, an on screen map pinpoints important elements in the vicinity of your position, such as weaponry, enemy locations, and even health to provide service to the player's need. One thing about each of the cars is that they all have their strengths and weaknesses. Some are faster than others, some have better armor, and some have much more powerful special attacks. Each vehicle is equipped with its own unique special ability that utilizes a feature allowing them to pull off feats, such as Hammerhead's power to roll over cars and pop spikes out of his tires, Slam's power to grab cars with his front claw on the vehicle and crush it, or Outlaw's power to generate an electronic beam from on top of his car, fazing anything it touches. With different status points, and many different cars with specials all of their own, players will eventually find a favorite driver, and can experience longevity in experimenting with each and every car available.

Amongst three various gameplay modes, there's much action to take part in. With those modes being Tournament; survive 8 levels of Twisted Metal in order to beat the game, Multiplayer; separated into three different sections, you can either duke it out with a friend, battle against a friend and the AI included, and complete the story mode together with a friend against the computer, and Challenge; practice your fighting skills by selecting any battleground and any enemies you wish to pit up against -- the game offers about as much features of the previous games, which is quite a bit. Most of the time, you'll find yourself tracking back to the Tournament mode in order to see the interesting tales behind the many characters. But, since there is a good amount of multiplayer options, the game stays on the same level of single player and multiplayer greatness it always has with a fair amount of replay involved.

Deviating somewhat from the previous gameplay, Small Brawl also carries on its back even worse graphics compared to any of the titles. Everything on screen is overloaded in jags and pixels, which kind of makes me wonder if it's just because it's been too long since Incognito worked on the PlayStation Twisted Metal series. If you're able to withstand the rough visuals, you'll notice that it isn't so bad when the actual battlefields are blaring with mounds of interactivity. The kind of variety seen in the new game levels have attractions that pertain to what might go on and react to a car of such smaller proportions. For example, one level is a football field, and in it, a sleeping driver riding a cart loosely moves about the area randomly, which is one objective you have to steer clear of. Another example is a kitchen level, in which you'll see a giant plumber bent over under the sink, while on the counter, you'll need to avoid confrontations with the stove's flames, and the opening microwave door. Other than that for the graphics, there's also the consistency of flames, explosions, and sparks that affect the vehicles and are known best in the game, and aren't all that bad. Even with all the life built into the levels and the on screen demolishing of cars, however, the graphics just don't make the grade.

And just like the graphics, the sound of the game has not only changed, but is also slightly downgraded to a lower means. Although some of the game music is a resemblance from the second Twisted Metal, while the rest is new -- done with guitar riffs and weird techno music -- it's been given a remixed effect, and overall sounds rather sloppy. As for the in-game effects, they're still the same as always, which kind of exaggerate the evidence that when a heavy truck runs over you, it immediately plays rock music, or if a rocket unleashes from your vehicle, it would screech throughout the air. Sometimes the sounds don't even react to what should make noise, though. For example, if you were to slam your vehicle into a wall, you'll hear absolutely nothing, while the same effect is handled differently when crashing it into a car, since it will then produce a noise. Sure enough, the inadequate sounds and mediocre music aren't well enough to write home to your parents about either.