The EADJ Crapcade Presents Largo Winch, Commando SAR

Warning: The video game reviewed here sucked so much ass that a longer-than-normal review was required. Feel free to stop in the middle of reading and stretch your legs. Maybe get a smoke.

The video game is an oft-maligned medium. It simply doesn't get enough respect because of either its association with mouth-breathing dorks or by nuns labeling it "The Devil's Pastime." And you know what? Maybe it shouldn't get any respect, judging by Ubisoft's Largo Winch, Commando SAR for the Playstation 1. Maybe it needs to get taken out back behind the shed and smacked on its fat thighs with a wet Wiffleball bat. Maybe with games this awful being released, it should be considered "Lucifer's Scroat."

Largo Winch, Commando SAR is apparently the video game extension of a popular German TV franchise, "Largo Winch," which in turn is based on a BELGIAN comic book, which was based on a series of FRENCH novels. I AM NOT MAKING THIS SHIT UP. "Largo Winch" is an action series about a jetsetting playboy millionaire businessman hellbent on avenging the murder of his father. So, think Bruce Wayne if he spent Euros and bathed weekly.

I tried to IMDb "Largo Winch" and it laughed at me. Then I looked it up on YouTube and had to close my office door, because the music from the clips made it sound like an episode of "The Red Shoe Diaries," which if you ask me would make for a much better video game.


So it was with great trepidation that I dove into the world of Largo Winch:


So imagine this thing translated from novel form to comic book to TV series to video game, crossing multiple languages and being released in a country that doesn't know about the franchise, and you'll start to get an idea of how awesome this game is. Here's one of the first cutscenes from the game. And, no, this is not that old Dire Straits music video:



One could argue that this video game was released for the Playstation 1 in 2002, so you can't expect the greatest of graphics. But 2002 was the year Grand Theft Auto: Vice City was released for the Playstation 2 and Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 came out for the Gameboy Advance and the Xbox. So your argument sucks, Largo lover. That was a burn.


Object of the Game: Save the Corporation by sneaking in and stopping the terrorist. Occasionally, you'll be confronted by boxy security guards or henchmen, who you're apparently supposed to sissy-slap into oblivion:

(Warning: Graphic Violence)



Gameplay: The response to controller input is amazing. Largo Winch responds to your movements almost a minute within you moving him! Also, I often confused the button for "jump" with the button for "attack" or "hit lightswitch" so I got this bit of jumping awesomeness in the heat of melee:



Difficulty: There's a certain training session where you have to sneak past workers in a factory. If they even so much as glance in the approximate direction of a particle of your shadow, game over! Yaaaaaaay!



So I would have to say that Largo Winch, Commando SAR is up there with Daikatana for the Nintendo 64 and ET for the Atari 2600. I had this game in my Playstation 3 for about a week and a half for this review, and now on occasion I can hear my console weeping in the middle of the night from the next room.

Overall Grade: 2/10