Gamers kill a lot of Nazis. But, The Saboteur is the first time killing the endless goose-stepping horde of the Third Reich has ever looked this cool or copied the Grand-Theft-Auto play style so much.
The Saboteur is a stylistic third-person sandbox game where players take the control of Sean Devlin, an ex-racecar driver who’s taken on the duty of being the backbone of the French resistance and the pleasure of hunting down the occupying Nazis of Paris.
The story, for the most part, does an OK job of giving you the back story of our hero’s anger towards the Nazis, but after the first couple of missions it’s just like any other B-rate action story: predictable and nothing special with some pretty terrible voice work.
Devlin’s actions will seem awfully familiar to if you’ve played any other sandbox game that’s come out in the last 10 years. There will be a mix of carjacking, gun play, running around an open city and, of course, keeping the ladies at the local burlesque house dancing.
Saboteur’s carjacking differs from its GTA roots because the cars you steal can be taken back to a resistance garages where they can be stored and then upgraded. The problem is the all cars handle relatively the same. There are some faster models later in the game but by then it’s too late and you’ll be past the point of caring.
The same thing goes for the guns. There are a wide variety to choose from with a bunch of different upgrades that can be bought with contraband material that you’ll pick up from across the city. But, there isn’t a lot of difference in the weapon styles and the later guns carried by the elite S.S. troops are so over powered there really isn’t a point in spending your hard earned cash on an upgrade for the earlier models. Just save it for more dynamite, the game will be more fun that way.
The other side of the controls are the stealth mechanics and the Assassin’s-Creed inspired parkour movement. The game’s loading screen tells you that the easiest way to move about the city is by rooftop like an Irish ninja. What it doesn’t tell you is the controls for the climbing are clunky and slow.
The stealth game play is just as bad. As you infiltrate Nazi installations, like POW camps and zeppelin stations, Devlin can disguise himself as various guards and Nazi officials. But the guards can and will spot you if you get too close or do suspicious activities, like wiring the general’s car to explode shortly after he leaves for Berlin.
This so broken that the game is less of a headache to simply run through the game with guns blazing. The only downfall with this approach is you’ll need to run from the Nazis once the mission is over.
The majority of the game, from fighting Nazis Indiana-Jones style, to running odd jobs for the resistance and the occasional train bombing, will leave you vastly underwhelmed and there is only one true redeeming factor for this game.
That one gem is the black and white, Sin-City inspired art style.
When the game starts, before Devlin starts cracking skulls and when the Nazi occupation is at its highest, the game is almost entirely in black and white with the exception of certain accents like red swastika armbands, the gold glow of windows at night and the spilled blood of assassinated Third Reich leadership.
As you finish story objectives and wrestle control from the Nazis, Paris will explode into color from its black and white oppression. The problem is the game looks better in black and white than it does in color. Once it’s in color the city and the surrounding countryside look pretty boring by comparison.
Other than the early art style, the game falls flat because it hasn’t done anything new in a substantial way. The majority of this game has a been there-done-that feel. And if it wasn’t for the art and color scheme this game wouldn’t be note worthy at all.
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