XIII—Downloads

Ubisoft's action conspiracy thriller XIII is based on a comic book of the same name from Belgian author Jean Van Hamme, and it feels like a gritty graphic novel come to life. It offers a lot of unique features that make it stand out from the traditional first-person shooter genre, not the least of which is the unique cel-shading graphics don't so much render as illustrate the game.

In addition to the shading are comic-style action pop-ups and voice bubbles that describe the scenes that you walk through and interact with. And you'll need a lot of description to find out what's been going on in the crazy world you find yourself in.

The single-player game is broken up into the obligatory 13 different chapters and unfolds as it should: like a well-drawn comic. You wake up on a desolate beach, sans memory, with only a tattoo--XIII, naturally--a bank key, and a frame-job of presidential assassination to clue you in to what happened. As you learn more about your past, you'll discover skills that you literally didn't know you had--and can now use.

These skills include a "sixth sense" that lets you know when enemies are approaching, the ability to use the bad dudes as human shields, and a variety of covert infiltration capabilities. In addition to melee skills, there are a variety of weapons that can be used in the game, from crossbows to sniper rifles to harpoon guns, each with their own alternative fire. The game lets you wield mundane items as weapons as well, tossing chairs, bottles, and ashtrays at the heads of your enemies, for example.

The multiplayer modes across the range of platforms are also quite novel. XIII will be available for PC as well as the big three consoles, and each platform will have its own style of multiplayer gaming. In addition to the standard bearers of CTF and deathmatch, there will be unique games such as Power Up, which delegates pick-ups according to need--the leading player gets the worst power ups and vice versa.

The game will be playable online for PC, Xbox, and PS2, and split-screen for GameCube. In fact, it's the first online FPS available for the PS2. We took the multiplayer PC demo of XIII for a spin and it looked sharp and felt just as crisp--like a mix of Duke Nukem and Half-Life.

Audio's no slouch either, with actors David Duchovny, Eve, and Adam West lending their vocals to the characters. And the ambient score follows your character's action, changing tempo as activity changes. All in all, XIII looks to be several Roman numerals ahead of the traditional brand of first-person action game

http://download.nvidia.com/downloads/nZone/demos/XIII_SPDemo.zip