Customer Reviews

MDK 2

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The first MDK introduced three innovations: the sniper view, the third-person shooter, and Shiny's gorgeous and imaginative alien cathederal-like spaces. Today the first two are relatively common, but the last still stands out as a memorable style in a crowded genre. Now MDK's back and this unique world is taken to even more breathtaking levels.

The gameplay for the main character, Kurt, is much as in the first: shooting, jumping, sniping and sneaking. But two more characters from the first MDK--a robot dog and a scientist--are back as playable roles, with very different gameplay characteristics. The main job of the scientist is to try combinations of weapons that may be even more powerful, while the dog's four arms (don't ask) make it virtual tank on legs.

As usual it's fun and sometimes even silly, a great change from shooters such as Quake that take themselves unbearably seriously. But for me, the best part is that it just looks so fantastic. Sometimes after killing all the baddies, I just romp around the massive spaces, feasting my eyes on the arching alien curves, luminescint textures and lighting, and layers of smokey transparencies. If you're sick of corridors and dungeons, the lofty heights and wide-open spaces of MDK2 are welcome relief. My only gripe: the weapons are pretty much unchanged from the original, and there's no rocket launcher!

MDK2 appears at first to be a third-person shooter with some jumping and puzzle elements thrown in to make your brain feel occasionally involved. Once you scratch the surface, however, you find that MDK is actually primarily a console-style puzzle solving/jumping game with some blast-everything-that-moves action elements thrown in. You play primarily as three different characters who each take different parts of the fairly entertaining story about alien invasion and who each have very different play styles. As "Kurt," who is wearing a specially made suit, you do a lot of alien blasting with a machine gun and you use his jump parachute and very cool sniper rifle to solve a lot of puzzles. Your first clue that it isn't a real "shooter" is the very limited variety of weapons and the ease with which you can defeat the aliens (they don't do much damage to you when they hit you, for example).
As "Max," the six-legged robot dog, you do more blasting and less jumping, though there is a rather too-long jump segment involving a jet pack that constantly requires refueling.
As "Doc", you revert to almost entirely jumping and puzzle-solving, where even the occasional combat is a puzzle-solving effort as you assemble weapons from various things you find around the station. For example, Doc's primary weapon is radioactive toast he fires from a nuclear toaster.
If you are like most PC gamers (and unlike console gamers) even one jumping puzzle is one too many, and though the ones in MDK2 are frequently very clever and innovative in their design, forcing you to interact with the world in order to set up the "steps" of your jumps, they are PLENTIFUL and can get very irritating the 100th time you've fallen off a steel girder because you couldn't peg a landing on just the right pixel. The game earns forgiveness points, though, for having a very handy quicksave/quickload hotkey setup, so you can quicksave your game prior to each jump and quickload after each failure without too much effort. But, does a gamer really need to be subjected to that sort of activity?
Nonetheless, the game isn't overly challenging, it lets you save anywhere you like, it sports a simple interface allowing keyboard or joystick control with customization, and its comic book-inspired visual style, hip music and good sound effects create a game world that's interesting and entertaining to play in.
At its best, MDK2 lets you vent frustrations as you run and blast critters, gives you a sense of accomplishment as you solve a puzzle or set of jumps, and entertains you with a tongue-in-cheek back story furthered by in-engine cutscenes with decent voice acting.
At its worst, however, MDK2 is a tedious, frustrating console jumper disguised in a PC CDROM. If lots of jumping puzzles and fairly light "action" appeal to you, this game may be right for you.

This game isn't a far cry from the first MDK. There are some improvements however, such as the gameplay. Its easy to move around and use all the functions. And for those with a sick sense of humour this game is quite funny to play and see what happens. There are tons of new weapons and gadgets to find. If you liked the first MDK this wouldn't be a bad one to checkout.

I am about 80% of the way through the game and I love it! This game offers a lot of things that others don't: a combination of shoot-em-up, logical thinking, coordination skill, and humor. I find the alternating use of the three characters refreshing and eliminates getting tired of the same-old action level-after-level.

I am a Doom/Quake/Unreal Tournament player and enjoy those for the player vs player action, but I find that playing this game by myself is very entertaining. I plan on tracking down the original game and playing it when I'm done with this.

Although rated Teen, the violence is non-graphic (more comic-book like) and is more of a thinking game than a run-and-gun. My kids enjoy this game as well (ages 12 and 8).

This game is fun, a lot of fun. It has humor, action, puzzles, and 3 quite diverse playable characters. What more could you want? Actually, a few things...

Having not played the original, I picked up the storyline from the opening cinematics displayed comic book style. The game has 10 levels, three for each character, and the last playable by all three characters (with slightly different endings). The boss battles are quite cool, usually requiring you to figure something out about the boss or have an eye for that special orb you have to snipe. The level design is nothing short of spectacular, with innovative use of all of your gadgets, weapons, or coils. I had much fun playing it.

The graphics are quite Shiny (pun intended), the programming is sheer genius. I found no detractings such as pixilated characters or blocky models, and I thoroughly enjoyed the graphics despite being spoiled by games like Oblivion.

Now the complaints. With only 10 levels, I found the game quite short. It was saccarine while I was playing it, but after it's over, it's over. The replay value is small, and there is no multiplayer, hence the 3 stars.

But, with the game being as cheap as it is today, I would recommend buying this jewel just for the short blast of fun. It's something that's very unique and probably will never be duplicated. Buy it and pay tribute to the great team that produced this.

I definently love this game because it's action and a shooting game. I love to play Max,(the dog) because he can shoot with 4 guns at the same time. and at someplaces there aer unlimited uri guns. I hope everyone tries this great game!

I'm not going to say anything new about what's so great about this game. The three players, the weapon variety, the immense levels! The colors, the slap stick humor and the nice story line make this a game that stands out. All of this with an impossibly low system consumption. A very very impressive feat no doubt. And yet... I can't help that but notice that this game could have been so much more.

I never played the original MDK so I had no real idea of what to expect other than what was given on the box. So this is what I was given to expect. The ability to "choose" (This is the keyword here) between Max, Doc or Kurt. In reality, the game alternates between the three characters (in no seemingly specific order) through out the game. It isn't actually till much later in the game that you actually do chose between the three characters. But by then it's a tad to late and you simply want the game to be over. This, in all honesty, is the major killing point for this game. It seems useless to have three characters to play when playing them is not done by choice. yeah, yeah, I know about all of the good stuff the game has, all the stuff I mentioned above but still, Gamers today want more, a whole lot more. How many of you are going to be satisfied playing Pong when you know that there is something better?

This game is a cool buy but it's missing so many crucial elements. Buy only to expect this game to collect dust after a few months. Scratch that. Go to Zshops or auctions, the game will be worth it then.

i bought this game for my 7 years old kid. He learned to play this game from his cousins, now he is in love with this game. I know it has violence but it is against aliens. You can customize your controls for any key on keyboard, and combine the controls with the mouse buttons. So you can run, turn around, look around and fire at the same time. It is a great game. I don't like the episodes where doctor Hawkins has to deactivate bombs because is some boring, but it is part of the game. i recommend it, i just bought MDK 1.

Graphics, controls, gameplay, creative ideas....are all very interesting and the game really draws you in. Very much an action game, a little stealth, but mostly action. And funny too! A unique game. I just bought it brand new in box, Feb 2010 believe it or not. What a great investment!

This game was decent enough. It was pretty fun at first, and had pretty good graphics, but got boring and repetitive as it went on. Certainly not as fun as the first game, and I don't know why. Playing the dog was fun, but for some reason mouse movements slower to a crawl. You find yourself having to pick the mouse up at least one time just to turn 180 degrees. The professor's levels were okay. Decent puzzles, but too boring. In my opinion, they should have done away with the professor and dog levels, and just had the sniper guy (I don't remember any of the names...). Those levels were pretty fun. So-so game overall.