Alter Echo (Sony PlayStation 2, 2003)

Alter Echo is a 3rd person perspective action game that puts you in the role of a man who obtains a suit of "EchoPlast". This suit allows you to transform between various forms, offering different combat moves and techniques.

Your normal form is human, with a sword as your weapon. You're also quick and agile in this form. The second form is a big, bulky gun form, in which you use, (what else) a gun as your weapon. Although slow, your punches hit hard, and you aquire a few new types of ammo as the game progresses. This form also allows you to take over gun turrents that pop up throughout the levels. The last form, which has you on all fours, is Stealth form. Not much faster then human form, but a better jumper. No weapons, other then you bare hands (bare feet? bare claws? bare paws), but it does have 2 special features. Stealth form lets you go invisible for a short time, as well as climb along marked paths on ceilings and walls.

Combat is lots of fun, and the triad of forms you can take helpful in mixing it up. As you progress, you can also unlock new moves and combos. The combos themselves are fun and simple enough to pull off. There's even special movs which are done as you shape shift from form to form on the fly.

You'll need lots of moves to choose from, as you'll be facing many enemies along your way. The game ensures you apply multiple strategies when taking out the various levels of bad guys, making sure that you're just button mashing yor way through all the fights with your eyes closed. At the same time, the design teams makes fighting techniques accessible enough for you to have fun. To add some variety, there are also some mini-rhythm-games for you to play, to rewire circuitry, and pull off some heavy damage attacks.

On top of some intensely fun action, the graphics are slick and stylish. The game has a unique look, making it hard to mistake it for another.

There's not much in the sound category. What is in there delivers, and is well suited, however there's not much variety. The voice acting is of mediocre quality. Not terrible, but not great. I also found the difficulty level very challenging in the later levels.

All in all, Alter Echo is definitely a solid game, and a great find.

I LIKE IT BECAUSE I USED TO HAD ONE BUT IT WENT MISSING AND I WANT IT TO HAVE AGAIN BUT I DON´T LIKE THAT IT DIDN´T COME WITH MEMORY CARD.

My son (13) rented this game at Blockbuster, and loved it!! We couldn't find it locally, so we were very pleased to find it on EBAY. He has played it for hours and hours and still loves it.