Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters – Review
Platform | Release Date
PS3 | June 7, 2011
X360 | June 7, 2011
Developed by Double Helix Games
Published by Warner Bros.
The Pitch:
Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters is inspired by the feature film, which brings the enduringly popular DC COMICS SUPER HERO to the big screen for the first time and which stars Ryan Reynolds in the title role as HAL JORDAN, the newest member of the GREEN LANTERN CORPS. In the video game players will utilize over a dozen constructs and take flight across the deepest parts of the Universe to restore intergalactic order by wielding the ultimate weapon: the Green Lantern power ring.
If there’s any type of videogame I’m cautious about picking up off the shelf it’s the super-hero movie tie-in title. After a litany of disappointments, from Iron Man through to The Incredible Hulk, this particular sub-genre has a bit of a bad reputation. Thor, the most recent outing from Sega, was declared passable, and despite its separation from the Japanese publisher I wasn’t hopeful that Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters could end up being much better.
At its core Green Lantern is a God of War-style action adventure. From the game’s outset you are dropped into spacious arenas and tasked with dispatching enemies with quick and strong attacks. Opponents range in size and shape, some coming with shields or resembling dungeon-crawler classics like the mini-boss or spawn-points that must be quickly destroyed. None stand out as particularly creative, but the Manhunters are a versatile opponent who take just enough forms alongside other location specific enemies to ensure that the battles rarely feel repetitive.
The combat system itself, while bearing a huge resemblance to God of War, has an ace card in the form of Hal Jordan’s energy constructs, as willed forth by the power ring he has been gifted with. These strike me as a bottle-neck for the game’s developers, a difficulty found in properly exploring the possibilities within a limited combat system played on a limited pad. A good job is done here too though, with plenty of different constructs making themselves available through the game’s upgrade system. From mini-guns to baseball bats and onward to a giant mech that can be piloted anywhere in the game, they all serve a strategic purpose and are used well both as a basis for puzzle solving and special enemy encounters.
Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters also has a surprisingly meaningful story for a movie tie-in. Admittedly, that might not be immediately obvious to all who have not read the comics, but it involves a surprising betrayal from within the group of stakeholders belonging to the Green Lantern Corps. Perhaps more significant than that is the appearance of the Star Sapphires, an similar group of ring-wielding warriors driven by love, the first group of non-green Lanterns to appear within this fledgling franchise. Their presence demonstrates that Warner Brothers are keen to explore the full emotional spectrum – a promise of exciting things to come in future movies perhaps.
This story takes you on a trip through space, never landing on Earth, giving the designers some room to flex and come up with interesting vistas and a generally good-looking game. Oddly shaped buildings and land-masses can all be enjoyed with a friend, drop-in-drop-out co-op available for the game’s entirety with a second player taking on the role of Sinestro. Unfortunately it appears there is no automatic difficulty balancing should you play part or all of your journey alone. The game isn’t overly challenging for the most part, but some boss health bars definitely seem to have been stretched in favour of the offline-only co-op play. This may lead to you dropping the difficulty down at certain points if only to overcome the last few bosses.
Combat and puzzle solving is definitely at the heart of the game, platforming restricted to a single button press, but Green Lantern offers up a completely separate game mechanic to keep things fresh. At story-critical points in the game Hal Jordan will launch himself forward into Starfox-esque shooting sections through the depths of space and the 
bowels of alien planets. It’s the first place you’ll get to conjure up the huge F14 construct, and also the place where the game’s rage mode (although it goes by another title) has the biggest impact on your success. The waves of enemies are well co-ordinated and despite the controls being just slightly off these sections too are satisfying.
Where does it go wrong then? While the core gameplay is mostly fun, and the story meaningful, the overall design does bear the humble ambition of a licensed title. There’s not an awful lot that it gets wrong within it, but beyond the combat system and shooting sections there isn’t really anything else to comment on. No particularly grand bosses, no unique game events, no true diversity in the construction of your fight arenas. These are not mandated by it’s genre, nor am I suggesting that Double Helix should have thrown in God of War tropes for the sake of it, but a few ‘wow’ moments might have really set the game off and tipped it into a category of quality that super-hero titles sparsely populate.
All things considered though, Double Helix have done a good job of creating a tie-in game that stays faithful to the source material while still carving out its own unique and meaningful story. Fans of the character will thoroughly enjoy it, and the two-player local co-op is reminiscent of the brawlers of old. As a purchase it would perhaps be ill-advised, but should you leave your local multiplex with a hunger for more Green Lantern, or are perhaps just interested in how a game based on him might turn out, then Rise of the Manhunters will likely exceed your expectations. A bit better than just passable.
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