Upon picking up this title I had faith that it would turn out to be something good. Despite its mediocre reviews and the fact it was made by Ubisoft, I felt that XIII would turn out to be a fun game. And while this game won't win any awards, it is just that: a fun game.

The plot line is basically like that in "The Bourne Identity." You wash up on a beach with no memory of who you are or how you got there. All you know is that everyone is out to get you and you need to protect yourself. Slowly throughout the game you begin to remember things, often carried out in "dream sequences" which are basically rooms filmed in old black and white where you witness events from your past. It turns out there where twenty conspirators in a plot that you have yet to find out, and you are number 13. For some unknown reason, the other conspirators are trying to kill you. This makes the game interesting for you are always striving to find out just what happened before and what the other 19 conspirators were up to. Plus the voice of David Duchovny is used for the main character.

The gameplay feels like a cross between GoldenEye and Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six. It's the first FPS to actually require you to use stealth as a way to beat the game. You can walk silently, take out guards quietly by hitting them over the head with chairs or broom handles, and even "hear" daredevil style when someone is around the corner. There are also a variety of silent weapons including a sniper crossbow and throwing knives. And like time crisis you can duck behind objects when reloading. The comic like cell shaded graphics add a nifty look to the game, which doesnt effect gameplay but is fun to look at.

Multiplayer also proves to be entertaining, surfacing memories of the Goldeneye matches of yesteryear. Deathmatch, capture the flag and a variety of other
options are available, including 8 player with four human and four computer. Alledgedly the PS2 and Xbox versions will have online play.

An interesting single player game with an entrapping storyline, entertaining multiplayer, I would say this game is an overall good buy. Especially for us Nintendo fans who have been starving for something like this since Perfect Dark on the N64.

Graphics: 7
Gameplay: 9
Music: 4
Replay Value: 9
Overall: 7