Superman Returns

Written by Troy Matsumiya  on June 20, 2006

First Impressions: If you can believe a man can fly, then maybe you can believe in a Superman game that might not suck.

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The Man of Steel is arguably the king of superheroes, with no other caped crusader so universally known and loved around the world as a symbol of peace and justice. His tales of adventure have been wildly successful, from comic books to Saturday morning cartoons, and from the original black and white George Reeves TV series to the current hit Smallville, fans just can't get enough of Krypton's most famous refugee. And naturally, any discussion about Superman can't go without mentioning Christopher Reeve's iconic films (well, the first two anyway) which have set the standard for the hero's modern day mythology.

But when it comes to video games, that's a totally different story. For some strange reason, video games and ol' Supe mix about as well as Kryptonite and prune juice, because every Superman game in existence has been super crap.

EA developer Tiburon is hoping to break that dubious trend with Superman Returns, based on the upcoming summer blockbuster. Sports fans know Tiburon as the brains behind the lucrative Madden NFL, NCAA Football and NASCAR Thunder franchises. It might seem odd to have a sports developer tackle an action game but one thing's for certain: Tiburon sure knows how to make fun games.

As potential evidence of that, the game was originally scheduled for release at the same time as the movie, June 30. However, that has been postponed until the holiday season Ц which is probably a good thing. Gamers are fed up with wasting their money on buggy products rushed out the door to meet marketing deadlines or quarterly revenue targets to appease greedy shareholders, so if it takes a few extra months to polish up the gameplay, I'm all for it.

And early indications are this game could definitely be worth the wait. No, really. As stated earlier, the game is based on the upcoming movie and will feature voice performances from the film's stars, including Brandon Routh (Superman), Kevin Spacey (Lex Luthor) and Kate Bosworth (Lois Lane). Yes, I know that games based on movies usually suck like a turbocharged Hoover, but the story won't stick rigidly to the film's plot. Instead, it will incorporate events from the movie with over 60 years of Superman mythology, which means we will encounter characters and villains never before seen on the big screen. Cool! More importantly, Tiburon is following the same successful formula used in the recent Spider-Man and Incredible Hulk games by creating an open, free-roaming sandbox world where you can do almost anything you want.

Needless to say, the game will take place in Metropolis, which will be absolutely HUGE. The city streams in real-time and is approximately 80 square miles; in fact, it's so big Tiburon claims that it takes several minutes to fly across it, even at super speed. And it certainly looks impressive, with towering skyscrapers separated by wide streets, and a monorail system snaking its way between gleaming glass towers overlooking lush green mountains and shimmering water. The city is fully interactive, which means you can break off light posts and use them as bats, rip off a water tower to douse a fire, blow cars around like toys, or even pop off the giant globe atop the Daily Planet building and play soccer in the streets.

But sooner or later, you'll have to deal with the bad guys. There will be over 50 missions split between story missions and sidequests, which the developers claim will provide at least 30 hours of gameplay. And don't worry, the missions won't be menial tasks like catching purse snatchers or finding some kid's lost dog; instead, you will be responsible for solving problems worthy of a true superhero's attention, like protecting blimps from giant flying lizards, saving people from a collapsing bridge and as seen in the trailer, beating the crap out of a missile chucking, 60-foot tall Metallo.

To save Metropolis, you will have to rely upon your superpowers, which will include heat vision, freeze breath, super breath, super speed (which allows you to fly at bursts up to 800mph, complete with cool motion blur effects) and something called УThousand FistsФ, a special melee attack where Superman moves at blinding speed to pummel an enemy from all sides. He can also hover in the air and seems to automatically avoid colliding with buildings, a good thing when you're flying past the speed of sound.

Not surprisingly, the graphics are quite impressive. Superman is highly detailed right down to realistic muscle tone and cool fabric physics in his cape. Enemies are quite detailed as well, but the cars and pedestrians on the street are very plain and basic. Given the massive scale of the city, this isn't surprising since some compromises have to be made to keep the framerate from stuttering to a halt; but don't worry, there's still plenty of time to pretty things up before the release date. In any event, this is still one nice looking game.