GoldenEye: Rogue Agent bears a similar name
to Rare's Nintendo 64 first-person shooter, GoldenEye 007,
which was a first-person shooter take on the Bond movie,
GoldenEye . GoldenEye 007 is remembered as a
classic, as one of the best early games for the platform. Yet
this new game has absolutely nothing to do with that game,
apart from belonging to the same genre, and it only has
passing references to the film (namely the inclusion of the
character Xenia Onatopp). By resurrecting the name, but not
referencing much of the GoldenEye material, the whole game
feels like a cheap attempt to cash in on the nostalgic
feelings that many have for the Nintendo 64 hit. It's perhaps
the most "evil" thing about GoldenEye: Rogue Agent.
GoldenEye's single-player campaign spans
across eight missions, putting you in the role of a former
secret agent that has been booted out of her Majesty's secret
service for being too ruthless for the job. This sends you
into the waiting arms of Auric Goldfinger, who takes you in
and fixes an eye injury you received while fighting Dr. No by
giving you--wait for it--a golden eye! The story then pits
Goldfinger against Dr. No. However, the cutscenes that feed
you plot points don't really keep you in the loop very well,
and the menagerie of returning Bond villains make the whole
"what if?" scenario feel like second-rate fan fiction.
Playing as a bad guy is meant to be the
main focus of GoldenEye's gameplay, but the extent of your
evil deeds is pretty much limited to grabbing stunned guards,
using them as human shields, and then tossing those same
enemies into other guards. The storyline has you performing
some objectives that aren't really something a good guy would
be doing, but the fact that the game pretty much plays out as
Goldfinger versus Dr. No in a "who is the evilest of them
all" competition keeps the game from feeling any different
than your average Bond game. If the developers truly wanted
you to be evil, you'd be kicking puppies and taking actual
hostages, not merely defending yourself from other evildoers.
To prevent you from getting lost or, really, from ever having to think about what you're doing, the game gives you an onscreen arrow that points you in the right direction. This works pretty well, though the level design is straightforward enough that you'll never really wonder where to go next, as there's only one way to go.
Perhaps the worst part about GoldenEye is the fact that EA had successfully transitioned the Bond series out of the first-person shooter genre not even a year ago with the release of Everything or Nothing, which was a great action adventure game. Now, the company is right back to making substandard shooters with the Bond license, and this one even takes the name of the game that made Bond and first-person shooting such a great mix back in the day and drags it through the mud. Don't be fooled: This isn't the GoldenEye you remember playing on the Nintendo 64. Rogue Agent is competent at best, but mostly it's a subpar first-person shooter that fails to stand out in any way.
