Dead to Rights: Reckoning Review

In Dead to Rights: Reckoning you play as Jack Slate, a cop whose new charge is now to find and rescue an important informant in a trial against a major crime lord. Reckoning continues the Dead to Rights franchise’s style of fast-paced, straightforward action.

We hadn’t played a straight-up shooter in a long time, so we were expecting to have some real fun with this game. Fun, however, was not in the mix. The gameplay is a horrendous mess. The controls are bad, the camera is erratic, the targeting system isn’t very good, and the graphics are merely “okay” and also randomly cause buggy glitches to appear. There is a four-player multiplayer option, but we were unable to decide which is less fun — the story mode or it. We don’t like dissing games, but there really wasn’t much in the way of redeeming qualities to write about.

Review Round-Up

Cheat Code Central Platinum: 4.0
“Imagine an aging Max Payne with debilitating rheumatoid arthritis, failing eyesight and prone to fits of epilepsy. That’s what you can expect when you play as Jack Slate in Dead to Rights: Reckoning…This game gets no points for trying. Dead to Rights: Reckoning, in no uncertain terms, sucks.”

IGN: 5.0
“Dead to Rights: Reckoning is plagued by sloppy controls that constantly force the player to fight for control of the character. Along with that comes a debilitating camera that can’t seem to show the threats on the screen when needed. Between the controls and the camera, playing this game is an utter chore. The two problems successfully eroded any hope I had of enjoying this experience.”

GameSpy: 5.0
“The problem is that the flaws in the game can become so blaring after a while, it overwhelms the rest of the game. It’s a shame that this game has the problems that it does. If Namco just spent another month or two polishing the camera and targeting, it could have had a rock solid action title under its belt.”

GameSpot: 5.7
“Straightforward games can often be entertaining. There’s something to be said for basic action gaming, provided the different aspects of the game are absolutely nailed. Dead to Rights: Reckoning doesn’t nail any one portion of its design. From the nearly useless multiplayer to the dull single-player gameplay, there’s not much worth seeing here.”

Aggregate Rating: 5.0