The Shoot Review

Light gun rail shooters have been around for years and now PlayStation Move has brought us The Shoot. You play the role of an actor who is auditioning for a movie director and you have to shoot your way through various scenarios. Do you think you’ve got a career worth pursuing with The Shoot?

HERE’S WHAT’S GREAT ABOUT IT….

A PERSONAL NOTE…BUY THE GUN!

While it’s not included with the game, Sony has an official shooting attachment  (shown below) for use with PlayStation Move. It’s about $20 to purchase, and it’s beyond worth it. For games like The Shoot, and SOCOM, this attachment really adds to the experience and makes it feel much more accurate and more fun to play. It’s not required, but personally I cannot recommend this enough.

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DEAD-ON ACCURACY

I’ve spent a fair amount of time in the past with games such as Duck Hunt and Time Crisis so I felt at home right away with The Shoot. Comparing to past titles of this genre, the accuracy is simply awesome. If you calibrate the PS Move wand properly, you should be firing with pinpoint accuracy making for some deadly headshots and long-distance kills. Response time seems minimal to move the reticule from corner to corner so taking out numerous enemies in very shorts periods of time is very feasible.

WILD WEST, ROBOTS, MOBS AND MORE!

The levels in The Shoot are quite fun, and they increase in difficulty as you progress. Early levels will place you in the wild west, a robotic world, and in a futurist mob-infested city, all of which have truly unique level design. Deep Perils is one of the most impressive sets to play on due to the life under the sea and the very lush backgrounds though this adds to the difficulty of the game as well. The mob level is interesting as well because it uses a mixture of old and new for the style of its buildings, enemies, and general objects that you’ll encounter. Regardless of the scenario you’re playing, it always feels fresh and fun.

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LEAN! DUCK! DRAW!

Besides gunfire and general attacks, you’ll often find yourself under attack from dynamite, bombs, turrets and more. Holding your PS Move controller, you can lean side to side to avoid being hit, and in some situations you can duck behind cover. It’s perfectly responsive and if you judge the incoming objects properly, you can stay safe. In all scenarios, you’ll encounter some enemies that allow you to score bonus points by defeating them in a duel. You can place your ‘gun’ at your side, and draw when asked, and take out the enemy with a quick shot from the hip. Go for the well-timed headshot if you want a chance at a good score. Another quick note… if the enemies are getting up in your face, try pistol-whipping them, very effective!

EXPLOSIONS & SPECIALS

Sometimes you get have so many enemies on screen you won’t know what to do with yourself. All levels have items such as explosive barrels that can decimate nearby enemies on the screen helping to ease up the pressure. If you string combos without missing shots on enemies, you can earn special attacks such as Shockwave, Showtime, and a Rampage which add effects such as slow-motion and rapid fire for a limited time. Power-ups are usually helpful against masses of enemies, and sometimes the mini-boss style enemies that pop up from time to time.

NEED A CHALLENGE?

Besides the ‘Career Mode’, you can also play levels in score attack to get the best high scores, and there’s a challenge mode with some different style missions, plus you can play with a friend in this mode. Challenge missions must be unlocked though by finding poster pieces in each scenario and you collect them by shooting them. The pieces are often very visible and the edges glow yellow, but you sometimes have to take your focus off enemies to find the pieces and shoot them in time. Each scenario has 8 pieces of a poster to collect, and once you find them all and put the poster together, the challenge is unlocked.

AND THE NOT SO GREAT….

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GET OUT OF MY WAY, HUD!

I love having a HUD to help me keep track of combos and other pertinent information in the game, but sometimes the HUD just gets in the way in the game. It may block and incoming piece of dynamite flying towards you, or it may often be hiding some enemies giving them a better opportunity to see you before you see them. If you’re extra careful then it shouldn’t be a problem, but it helps to memories enemy patterns so you can shoot them behind the HUD as soon as they appear.

DO YOU HEAR WHAT I HEAR?

Voice clips aren’t always great, and I found them slightly annoying as you’ll hear the voice of your co-worker and director on the set telling you how well or how poorly you performed in each segment. There’s a very limited number of phrases you’ll hear so get used to hearing them over and over. Frankly, it comes off sounding very cheesy.

SLIGHT RESPONSE ISSUES

Maybe it’s the distance from the PlayStation Eye, but I did encounter some intermittent response issues with the “Showtime” special attack. To activate it you’re supposed to spin 360 degrees and you’ll enter bullet-time. Unfortunately, it seems to only work properly about 85% of the time. At times I would turn and nothing would happen, aside from me getting shot or attacked. Spinning the wand itself works but it detracts from the fun just a little.

LOAD TIMES

I’m a patient person, and I normally don’t complain about loading times as there’s a lot I can do. But, regardless of that fact, the load times are often atrocious in The Shoot. I feel like I’m often waiting a full minute to load into the game. It’s inconsistent though, and sometimes the loading feels relatively quick. If you have nothing to entertain you for the time it takes to load, you might be a little annoyed, but otherwise I suppose it can be dealt with.

LET’S WRAP UP

The Shoot isn’t a bad game, and I seriously enjoy playing it. It does have a few issues with responsiveness in the controls, the loading times, and some minor annoyances in the gameplay. But, the game is fun, and if you’re a fan of rail shooters, it’s a very entertaining game and you’ll find yourself replaying the levels to get the hard-to-reach gold medals. At $39.99, the game feels just a little overpriced, but with the holidays coming, you should be able to find it for $20-$30 which is the perfect range to add this gun-tastic title to your collection.