Scarface: The World is Yours

Format Nintendo Wii

Developer Radical Entertainment

Publisher Vivendi

Genre Action

6 Comments

Warning. The following preview contains chainsaw beheadings, women pushed around, Canadians insulted, a shotgun blast to the nuts, more gauche '80s excess than you could shake a Phil Collins-shaped stick at, and language rude enough to make Ozzy Osbourne blush.

What's wrong with the previous paragraph - other than the notion of a Phil Collins-shaped stick? Swearing. Killing. Malice. It's a brand of anti-whimsy that might upset readers of a Nintendo disposition. Scarface's appearance on the Wii is akin to a particularly foul-mouthed tramp lurching into a children's birthday party, roaring obscenities whilst pawing at his groin with macho efficiency. But instead of dialling 999 or hitting him with a broom we would beseech readers to spend some time with this intruder, to get to understand just what Tony Montana means for the Wii and what the Wii means for Tony Montana.

Released in cinemas in 1983, Scarface was a cocaine-spliced reworking of the Icarus tale - with the white stuff substituting wax wings and Tony's greedy power-grabbing ending with too many bullets left in places where not even one would be welcome. A bloated corpse does not a good game make, and so developers Radical rewrite Tony's final moments, saving his skin and beginning his climb to power afresh.

Navigating the sandbox-style city of Miami, the game has a distinct step-by-step structure that nicely mimics Montana's iconic 'money = power = women' mantra. Business is a methodological process; charm the sellers, buy the product, sell the product - going from one to the next involves a lot of footwork, but every aspiring drug overlord has to start somewhere. This back and forth is broken up with story progressing tasks. Escaping a nightclub ambush, killing a gang terrorising a drive-in cinema, chasing down crooked accountants trying to leg it in a speedboat; it really plays like Grand Theft Auto, right down to the colour beacons that mark objectives.

In fact, it's tempting to affix 'Grand Theft Auto-ish' to most of Scarface's features. Wide open city, car nicking, gun buying, rozzer dodging and an official soundtrack of over 100 songs; it's been done before, albeit never on a Nintendo console. However, this comparison isn't to suggest that we can only appreciate Scarface in the absence of a GTA Wii instalment; it's very much its own game thanks to Montana's hulking performance.

First you get the console
Just as memories of the film revolve around Al Pacino's sneering caricature, the universe of the game gravitates around the sweary sun that is digitised Pacino. Radical don't actually claim to have made a GTA rivalling pedestrian-hurt-'em-up - Scarface is more akin to a Montana-sim, allowing gamers to see life through the eyes of a shameless man, but a man not without his own moral code. With such a bravado-fuelled central performance it seems insane to have ever mapped this brand of testosterone-dripping action on to button presses, as in 2006's PS2/Xbox versions. Tony's histrionics demand more than tapping plastic. Full-bodied behaviour calls for a literal full-bodied control scheme. Enter the Wii remote.

As a physical being Tony is all about a triumvirate of macho ideals: getting his hands dirty, shouting his mouth off and obsessing over his balls. It's no surprise then that his dullest attribute, his general movement and walking around, should be mapped to the dullest part of the control set-up: the analogue stick. Which leaves the remote waving freed up for some creative theatrics.

Shooting - a key part in most missions - is mapped on to the remote pointer, with players able to direct the aiming reticule around the screen, leaving a trail of Miami dead in its path. Moving your hand to direct Tony's gun while your body remains still captures Montana's steadfast mentality perfectly, that stubborn determination to stand his ground - an anchor with an AK. Montana's mindset is one of such single-mindedness that only a mind-focusing device such as player controlled remote aiming could do it any justice.

The perfect example is the opening ten-minute prologue to the game - the climactic mansion shootout of the film. The famous filmic image is of Tony standing in his office doorway, legs wide open, determinedly bolted to the floor with his "little friend" the M16 held firmly in his hands. On the Wii, players will be able to adopt this pose, spraying bullets as one with Montana - gaming and filmic iconography merged into one. Melodramatic. Ridiculous. Very Scarface.

Precise remote directed firing also compliments one of Scarface's more blackly comic features - a running on screen text commentary informing you exactly what damage is being done. Heads, arms, legs, kidneys, groins - either one of the individual, ahem, 'baubles' - all can be targeted with surgical precision. On consoles not blessed with fancy motion sensor jiggery-pokery this was achieved with a decent enough button holding lock-on and aim tweaking - a feature still available to Wii users - but you can look forward to precise remote controlled shotgun vasectomies.

And what would Scarface be without that very implement that left said face scarred in the first place? If Resident Evil 4's bag-wearing chainsaw jugglers got your gore-loving synapses firing, wait until you rev Scarface's flesh munching baby into action. Chainsaw waving is directed with the remote, lopping heads clean off with a high swipe, or using more choppy motions to re-enact everyone's favourite Monty Python and the Holy Grail Black Knight arm-putation moment. To add a cherry to the viscera flavoured cake, the remote speaker will even growl like a saw so as not to bring you out of the moment. Lovely.

Every dog has its day
While Montana is ultimately flesh and blood, he can boost his fighting chances by feeding his monstrous ego, represented as a 'rage meter'. Taunting his defeated foes and performing daring verbal acts add to the meter, which, when full, allows him to enter blind rage mode - a first-person killing spree in which Tony is invincible. A generous auto-aim takes out most foes for you and each death adds to your health meter.

Taunting in battle is a very visual act. Tony adopts a macho gait, stomping around as he delivers foul six or seven word character assessments of the recently departed. While players can use button presses, these taunts are also controlled with hand motions - with players gesturing wildly to get their 18-certificate hand puppet to begin his vile torrent of abuse. A logical development for greater player/character interaction.

Outside of fighting, Montana is placed in numerous different situations where his motor mouth can either benefit or hinder him. Buying drugs, selling drugs, negotiating bank handling fees, intimidating members of the public that badmouth him, sweet-talking the cops - all these and more are controlled with a similar timing minigame in which Tony has to nail that perfect response or else risk blowing it and losing money, respect or even his freedom. Again, it makes sense that a man who uses his swaggering body language to get his point across shouldn't be confined to a timed button minigame - and we expect remote and nunchuk gestures to feature heavily in this day-to-day rough-arming.

It's clear that with these new controls we can expect the best gaming incarnation of Scarface: The World is Yours yet. But its presence on the Wii goes far beyond mere rival console comparisons. That Scarface is even appearing on the white box is an important step forward for Nintendo and Nintendo fans alike - a sign that in the Wii developers have finally found a Nintendo console with enough unique allure to outweigh the off-putting kiddie friendly image that would have scared them (and other GTA-ish games) away in the past.

The Wii is special, it does offer developers that special something extra - and it looks as if Radical are about to return the favour. Scarface is coming - and it'll grab you right where it counts.

NGamer Staff