Largo Winch: Empire Under Threat Review

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Largo Winch: Empire Under Threat

Review by JenMarch 2003

Largo Winch is based on a French comic about a billionaire playboy who was born in Poland and adopted by an American business mogul. I’m not a comic reader so this matters not one whit to me. I’m just throwing it out by way of background and because it makes for a nice opening line.

In the game, Largo’s adoptive father, Nerio, has died recently, leaving control of multinational megacorporation Group W to Largo.  Cut to the present: Largo has just finished giving a keynote speech at a charity shindig, thanking all of the sponsors for financing a tanker full of milk to be shipped to the starving people of some fictional country that is supposed to represent somewhere like war-torn Serbia or perhaps war-torn Croatia. A bomb threat is called in, and Largo springs into action, a la James Bond.  Following the threads of the story will set Largo to trotting around the globe, from Mexico to the Mediterranean, from New York City to Siberia, and back again, all in an effort to figure out who is trying to sabotage his company and why.

I’ll just say right at the outset that Largo Winch is a game that, while ultra-cheesy, is a lot of fun to play. Okay, now with that out of the way, let me get straight to the nitpicking.

First and foremost, the typos! Oh, the typos! I realize that English is an evolving language, but the accessibility of the World Wide Web to anyone with a second-grade education and the wherewithal to post a home page has rather devolved the language into a veritable patois. I daresay the language has changed more in the past decade due solely to the influence of the internet (okay, maybe rap music is partly responsible too) than in the half-millennium since ye Olde English days. The possessive “it’s” is now so prevalent that a whole generation of children will grow up not knowing that their forebears once cringed at the very sight.  Must I now view myself as a grammar curmudgeon solely because I expect a modicum of proofreading and quality control in professionally published printed text in any medium? Well, I will take up the burden and stand as the last bastion between you, dear reader, and the anarchy of illiteracy, and decry such wanton article abuse and fanciful spellings whenever I shall chance upon them! Okay, to be fair, I can’t remember the last time I played a game that had printed text and no grammatical or spelling errors—I think proofreading is a lost art, a thing of the past. But I don’t have to like it.

Besides that, the printed text doesn’t always match what the actors are saying. Not only that, but the mouth movements don’t always match what the actors are saying. There are many instances where a jaw will be flapping and no sounds emitted, or vice versa.

The voice acting ranges from bad to worse, although not in the same league as The Watchmaker’s. The actors all too obviously are reading lines straight from a script into a microphone. Sometimes the cadence is way off, too, so I suspect the lines were not recorded sequentially, either. A big segment of the game takes place in Mexico. The Mexican nationals have Mexican accents. The action jumps to Siberia. The Russian nationals have Mexican accents.

There is one puzzle where you have to disarm an electrified booby trap to enter an apartment. To do this, you turn off the power.  Fine. You go into the apartment, and you can still use the answering machine … and the computer’s still on.

There is a puzzle where you have to use a mainframe terminal within the high-tech, high-rise penthouse Group W headquarters to hack into another computer. When you start the puzzle, you are treated to modem dial-up sounds. Surely a billionaire would’ve ponied up for broadband?

Okay, where was I? Oh yeah, I was going to review a game here.  I got a little sidetracked. I apologize for that.

Gameplay in Largo Winch is straight point-and-click. Well, not exactly, since you have to use either the keyboard or a gamepad instead of the mouse. The interface is similar to that of Grim Fandango, wherein Manny, I mean Largo, will incline his head toward something that he finds interesting. Fear not, gentle reader, in this not-so-subtle-by-half-as-the-sublime-Grim-Fandango game the item will also be highlighted so there is no mistaking the fact that Largo can examine it and maybe make some sort of comment or pick it up. Once in inventory, items can be combined with other items, or merely used in their unadulterated form.

Besides the standard inventory-type puzzles, there are minigames (their word, not mine). I hate minigames! I feared the worst, and from the outset I plowed forward in dread of some sort of ugly arcade bullpucky popping up just when things were starting to get interesting. It never happened. One of the minigames is a poker game … yep, you read it right, one of those big ol’ scary battles to the death with playing cards as the weapon of choice.

That only happened once. And I was just kidding about the battle-to-the-death part.

The other two minigames are computer hacking and fighting.

You have to do the computer hacking seven or eight times throughout the course of Empire Under Threat. It’s a logic game where you have to move across nodes and gather information before a virus (the opponent) catches up with you. This is actually a pretty fun puzzle, but there are two or three too many times you have to do it and it loses its charm after a while.

The fighting … oh yes, the fighting … Scared you, didn’t I? Seriously, it’s simplified, scripted, turn-based battling right out of the console RPG design manual, only easier. Largo and his cohort(s) (if any) always get to go first, and there’s always some tricky attack available that will disable one or more enemies right off the bat. There are about 12 or 13 fights in the game. I lost nary a one up until the final two, and then in both of those cases it was a matter of losing once to figure out what to do given the available options and reloading armed with a full can of whoop-ass, or rather a viable strategy for success.

Anyway, the minigames aren’t so bad after all.

There are many, many actions throughout the game that can lead to the untimely end of Largo. Fortunately these are all made readily apparent and you are always given fair warning and plenty of opportunity to “don’t do that!” Also fortunately, you can save anywhere, anytime.

Saving and restoring both require an inordinate amount of button- or key-pushing, but the controls are pretty straightforward and, while not exactly intuitive, relatively easily mastered, mainly, I think, because you really can’t make any mistakes by pushing the wrong button. Or key. (I played with a gamepad; I am always grateful for that option when it comes to non-mouse-driven games.  “My name is Jen and I am a carpal tunnel syndrome sufferer.”)

There are tons of locations, leading, since this is a 3D game, to tons of long load times in between each scene. There are also tons of cutscenes, which cannot be skipped even if you’ve seen them before.

The graphics are surprisingly pleasant for what is so obviously a B title, albeit a lovingly crafted one. Apart from the weird lip-synching discussed earlier, the scenes are quite well-rendered with plenty of polygons. And the cutscenes are very pretty, almost blurry-photorealistic if that makes sense.

The in-game music works well, but the loading music got on my nerves in a big way. Sound effects are believable and work well as well. (I need a synonym for “well.” Oh well.)

I guess that’s about it, so I’ll wrap this up now. Basically, all of the goofy and not-so-goofy things in Largo Winch blend quite nicely to make it fun, easy, light fare for the adventure gamer looking for a change from the more somber Dreamcatcher Experience. The End

The Verdict

The Lowdown

Developer: Dupuis Publisher: Ubisoft Release Date: September 2002

Available for: Game Cube Windows XboxPlayStation 2

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System Requirements

Windows 95/98/00/ME/XP PII 300 MHz/PIII 128 MB RAM GeForce 32 MB Direct X 8 4X CD-ROM drive 350 MB free hard disk space Keyboard or joypad

Where to Find It

Links provided for informational purposes only.  FFC makes no warranty with regard to any transaction entered into by any party(ies).

      Copyright © Electric Eye Productions.  All rights reserved.  No reproduction in whole or in part without express written permission.

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14 Responses to Fear Factor

  • Fear Factor | Tap-Repeatedly.com | Reality Topics Blog

    […] nobody@flickr.com (graftedno1) wrote a very interesting post today.   Here’s a quick excerpt:My greatest fear is to be trapped alone in a confined space with a blind human, in total darkness. They have a heightened sense of smell and hearing, and. […]

  • Matt "Steerpike" Sakey

    Lewis, you made me think of the scariest moments I’ve experienced in gaming, and we’re very similar people.

    Bioshock had two moments – the dentist and the flooded room filled with mannequins.

    Thief had Return to the Cathedral, which was terrifying to me. Thief 3 had Shalebridge Cradle, which is so scary it ought to be fined.

    System Shock 2 kept me on the edge of my seat, but it was more lonely panic than true fear.

    Korsakovia was so scary that I uninstalled it.

    And STALKER. Oh, god, the haunted labs in STALKER. The latter two games don’t have scares like that. Few games do.

    It’s especially rare for a game to have more than mere “moments” – for a game to be scary from beginning to end, that’s a triumph.

    Wonderful article. As if Gregg’s review wasn’t enough to convince me that Penumbra is not something I have the courage to play!

  • DPenn

    I’m with you Lewis … I’m a bit of a puss. I just have a hard time wrapping my head around the idea of dread as entertainment.

    Still, I’m drawn to dark stories when they have something interesting to say, whether it’s a game like Thief or a film like, say, Gaspar Noe’s Irreversible. So I’ll push through, sometimes peering through my fingers.

    The trouble with games, though, is that if you look through your fingers, you’re probably just going to have to play through the scenario again. :~)

  • Mike "Scout" Gust

    I wanted to play this game. I downloaded the demo but the controls were just too wonky for me to get my head around. I liked the atmospheric vibe a lot. I think I’m a bit desensitized from an overdose of horror movies in my youth so I don’t so much get the dread thing from these games as a nice creepy vibration. If only the controls were better…

  • Lewis B

    @ Mike, what’s wrong with the controls bud? As someone who despises poor control schemes, Penumbra’s is just like any other FPS, except to examine things you right click on them.  To use things you left click.  I’m not sure that can be considered difficult 🙂

  • Gregg B

    @Steerpike: Yeah my greatest shit-scared moments were with those games too. A few spoilers below people, so beware.

    Bioshock – Haha, I remember the dentist. I didn’t really find the game that scary overall but the bit where you go into the wine cellar and notice a mannequin facing the wall and after upgrading your weapon it’s stood directly behind you motionless and quiet just for a moment before attacking you. I shat a brick. I also missed that bit originally until Lew told me about it.

    System Shock 2 – same as you really, more unremitting tension all the way through rather than specific terrifying moments. Oh actually, theres a bit where you call a lift and it breaks then you realise a service droid is coming to fix it… I do remember having sleep issues after my first encounter with the cyborg ninjas though.

    Thief: The Dark Project – The Sword and Return to the Cathedral and Down in the Bonehoard and well, loads of them. The Sword made me break out into goosebumps though because there was a bit where you could hear this creepy giggling which seemed like it was following me about then it suddenly changed to this horrible throaty noise. What made matters worse was that the EAX (bless you Creative) made my foot steps sound like somebody else was there with me. That level was incredible, a bit too incredible as it seems I missed great chunks of it because I was so eager to leave.

    Thief II: The Metal Age – Trail of Blood where you end up in that opening with those damn tree beasts. God the first time I saw one of those hurtling towards me I actually died shortly afterward. Do you remember that Mechanist child walking around on one of the levels? That was a little creepy.

    Then there’s Penumbra: Overture – quite a few bits but I’m not mentioning them here.

    Oh and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. – The brain scorcher lab just because it was so damn quiet. My imagination seriously got the better of me there. Those stuffed animals and heads I’d seen in various buildings led me to believe that those creatures were lurking somewhere in the Zone, specifically that lab.

    @Mike: My control setup was perfect after some tweaking (as well as the simple weapon swing fix). If you ever fancy giving it another go, give me a shout and I’ll let you know my setup.

  • Lewis B

    I’m not sure why guys, but one of my starting paragraphs had gone missing, even though I copied it straight from the original source, and It was fine earlier. 

    Incase you missed it due to some technical issue you might want to re-read just after “Well no she wouldn’t in truth, but in Penumbra: Overture you don’t want to move anyway.” at the very start for those who’ve already read the article. Apologies 🙂

  • Mike "Scout" Gust

    Lewis, it was the weapon swing. It had this terrible, unresponsive feel to it, like trying to hit through molasses. I couldn’t stand using it. I tried the .ini fix as mentioned in the review but it didn’t seem to help. Of course this was the demo…but that shouldn’t have made any difference. I might try the second game instead as I guess they did away with the weapons thing.

    I’m see your first paragraph just fine. It’s the dialogue, right?

  • jdeuel

    I like the argument that weapons can remove fear, but even loaded to the teeth with ammo in AVP’99 the Marine missions were frightful because the enemy was anywhere at any time.

    As for Penumbra Overture, if the controls are anything like the original Penumbra they need to hack in some Wii-Remote 3d controls. I did not like using my mouse for 3d movements.

  • Gregg B

    @Mike: I’ve read that many people avoided conflict altogether in Overture which incidentally is something forced upon you in Black Plague. As somebody who has been renovating a house over the last 6 months with no DIY experience I can safely say that swinging a hammer is significantly easier in real life than it is in Overture without the fix. The fix balanced that for me.

    I’d highly recommend completing the first Penumbra because it’s one big build up to Black Plague which spoils the ending to Overture in the intro. And it’s a great ending too. Just so you know!

  • Lewis B

    @ Steerpike, those moments you mention are all my worst too!!  Do you remember the Robot labs in SS2? Absolutely terrifying, waiting for robots to burst out on you! 🙁 oh and have you ever player Condemned?

    @ Mike, The use of weapons in Penumbra is different to say HL2, where the player is physically holding the weapon, as in Penumbra it floats slightly infront of you.  However, if you change the control method to normal weapon swing, it’s no different!  Speak to Greggi and he’ll tell you what to do 🙂

    @ jdeuel, AVP the original and its sequal were scary however what type of fear do you think it is? I don’t think it’s anything more than sheer tension.  Having a Smart Gun makes you feel incredibly powerful.  I can honestly say in Penumbra the fear is sheer unrivalled terror, where you actually have to force yourself to play on.  It genuinly is that scary! 🙂

  • Jason Dobry

    It’s so true, an arsenal of weapons and ammo rapidly deflates any sense of horror or uneasiness in any game for reasons you already mentioned. Sakey, I thought Bioshock was more “lonely panic,” while I was pretty much always terrified in System Shock 2. I really, really, REALLY did not want to enter The Many’s nursery, and my weapons were so unreliable and ammo so scarce that I never felt safe.

    Silent Hill was terrifying for the same reasons. Ammo was rare and I frequently had to rely on my pipe for self-defense.  Even when I had ammo, the game mechanics prevented my character from being anything other than marginal with any firearm.

    Fear had one moment for me: I was climbing up a ladder, and as I reached the upper platform, my guy briefly looked down as he climbed off. As my perspective looked up again, that Ring-esque little girl was RIGHT THERE, reaching for me. I screamed and she was gone.

    What else…the original Aliens vs. Predator sent me into a locker room and I could only hear the facehuggers scurrying about somewhere within. I had to go in there. I advanced about three steps before the damn thing screamed and filled up my screen with its repulsive underside as it implanted me with its spawn. My roommate made fun of me for weeks for screaming like a girl child.

    Korsakovia–meh.  I was too annoyed and frustrated by the box rearrangement/jumping puzzles to be scared. I uninstalled it after an hour of play, I think. Maybe the scary parts were later, but I doubt it.

    As for Penumbra, I did play through about half of it before other games distracted me. I remember unease and creepiness, but no sweaty fear. I think I’m to blame here, or, more precisely, my daughter, who was still an infant at the time and generally allowed me only to play during the day for 45 minutes at a time. I was denied total immersion and the fear effect suffered. Maybe I should give it another go after I finish Call of Pripyat since she sleeps through the night now. With any luck, Penumbra will keep me from doing the same.

  • Gregg B

    I played the demo of F.E.A.R. but that ladder scare is the only bit I remember. Christ, that made me jump. I’m not too good with cat scares.

    Also I felt exactly the same about Korsakovia. It was creepy at first but then it began to irritate me far too much and it just soured the experience. I stopped playing as a result. Not to mention, when I realised I could bash those smoke-things with my crowbar they didn’t bother me nearly as much.

  • Online Up

    Great article. I look forward to reading more in the future.

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