Nuthin’ but a G game

by ERIK LEIJON

And the winner of the most socially irresponsible game of the year is… Def Jam: Icon (PS3, X360/EA, EA Chicago)! I’m sure we’ve all, in our darkest days, fought someone to the death over a scuffed pair of Nikes, and there is no doubt a wrestling/fighting game involving the rap industry’s most colourful characters (such as T.I., Lil Jon and Ludacris) will appeal to many, but at some point while playing this hip hop brawler, it became apparent that some people could misconstrue this game as a glorification of violence.

Perhaps a sign of the generation gap, but a million alien-killing first-person shooters never affected my conscience one iota. About three seconds into Def Jam: Icon’s Build a Label mode, a fictitious up-and-coming hip hop impresario gets gunned down in broad daylight after giving an inspiring stay-in-school speech to some local youth. His blood splattered everywhere, his gold chain was sent flying and it only got more bloody and fashionable as I kept playing.

Icon hasn’t changed much from the previous Def Jam games, which used to be developed by the Japanese company Aki—famous for the N64’s WCW vs. NWO series. A decade later, the same slow, arbitrary, grapple-heavy gameplay has amazingly remained intact. The WCW games were guilty pleasures because of their simplicity and four-player compatibility. The authentic rappers are neat but the gameplay (now reduced to two players) has aged terribly; the fighting is unbearably slow and the timing of the attacks is so random it’s impossible to know which hits will even connect. It takes mostly luck and almost no skill to get close enough to perform a takedown on an opponent. The only welcome additions to the gameplay are the DJ moves, which allow you to use the background music to trigger painful explosions.

In Build a Label mode, your custom avatar is recruited as a hired goon for a successful rap label. You buy clothes and grills, and you beat up people who don’t stay the fuck out of Luda’s biz-nass. Your icon rating improves with every can of whup-ass you open, but what’s disconcerting is how often the rappers ask you to beat up their own fans. The non-fighting stuff, such as the cutscenes and shopping, fit the violent proceedings nicely.

Aesthetically speaking, the environments and colour palettes are suitably stylish. Every level is a different rap video cliché, such as dimly lit clubs, B.E.T. sets and rooftops, and they all bump and shake to the fully licensed soundtrack. EA also had the sense to keep all the swearing, gun and drug references intact, to preserve Icon’s street cred. The rappers closely resemble their real-world counterparts, and each stage contains traps that directly impact the action. There are no life bars—instead, the screen progressively becomes more monochrome as a fighter gets closer to losing.

Not unlike hip hop, Icon is more about keeping things trill than providing a deep gaming experience. The controls blow, but if the thought of buying a million-dollar grill and beating Mike Jones to a bloody pulp for jacking your best ho is appealing to you, then perhaps you can look beyond the antiquated gameplay.

By the time you read this, Eidos Montreal should be finalizing the paperwork on their new downtown location. General manager Stephane D’Astous says the company has received 700 applications and the plan is to have everything up and running, including an announcement about their recently green-lit project, in September.

Note: Ubisoft’s Enchanted Arms, one of the better RPG’s of last year for the Xbox 360, was recently released on the PS3. Check it out if you haven’t yet.