By Cody Webb

With all of these big name titles coming out, gamers’ wallets must be screaming for a break. Unfortunately, however, it’s extremely hard to find a good budget title (game released at a price of $20). Veteran and casual gamers alike know that budget titles tend to have poor gameplay and an even worse story, negating the low price. Luckily for our wallets, fellow gamers, a budget title has surfaced that manages to stand on its own, if shaky, legs: Deadly Premonition.

Remember gamers, this is a budget game; and as a result, the gameplay and graphics are largely unpolished. In fact, if it wasn’t for the decent story and quirky characters, I wouldn’t mention this game at all. Basics first, however: Deadly Premonition is rated M for Mature, and is available for the low price of twenty bucks.

Let’s start with the biggest crime of the game: it’s ugly. From the environments to the character models, these graphics better suit a last generation game. The textures are, quite obviously, dated; the animations are rigid and are reused constantly in cutscenes; and the cars will make your eyes ache for a dose of Need for Speed. The characters themselves manage to look halfway decent, which seems out of place amongst the poor environments.

The environment itself deserves a little bit of praise, however: it’s a large open world consisting of a small rural town and the surrounding countryside. You’re usually free to roam about the area, which is surprisingly big for a budget title. To top that off, Deadly Premonition runs on a real-time clock; meaning that hours tick by just as they would in real life. The various characters and stores operate by this clock, being open and closed at certain times of the day, or by going about their own schedules. There are day-to-night cycles, and there are even weather cycles; this is one rainy little town.

The gameplay is a little better than the graphics, though it still plays like a sluggish Resident Evil 4. The camera is incredibly touchy, making the view swing wildly from left to right when you flick the right stick. The gunplay is playable, but don’t expect to win any sort of marksman contest here. And that big environment I mentioned before? There are cars to traverse the large landscape, though don’t expect a Grand Theft Auto level of driving. Vehicles control like brick-filled bathtubs and only seem to perform decently on straight roads.

Now we’ve reached the good parts: the story, characters and the various things you can do in this “small” town. The story puts you into the shoes of one FBI Special Agent Francis York Morgan, sent to the small town of Greenvale to investigate the murder of a local teenage girl. Shortly after his rather amusing arrival in the town, he finds himself caught up in a slowly expanding web of murder. More people are being killed while he investigates, and he has to put a stop to it quickly to prevent the loss of life.

The many characters, i.e. suspects, you’ll meet are incredibly diverse: from the rocker dad who runs the local grocery store to the card-collecting gun storeowner. However, none of them made as big of an impact on me as Agent Morgan himself; this guy is just as unbalanced as the serial killer he’s chasing. From his love of cheesy B-movies to his obsessive taste in food and coffee, York stands out as one of the more memorable characters that most people won’t see. On top of everything else, he even has a dual-personality named Zach who he often converses with … even in front of other people!

You’ll find all sorts of activities to distract yourself with in the town of Greenvale: like spying on the various people or fishing the time away on the lake. There are many side quests you can undertake to learn backstory and gain rewards, though be careful: if you drag your feet for too long, you’ll miss your chance to do some of the more important side missions. Agent Morgan will even come across various trading cards scattered about the areas you’ll wander through, which you can show to the gun storeowner for rewards.

So, if you enjoy a campy, creative story with interesting characters, you’ll get your twenty bucks worth here. However, if you’re looking for a highly polished experience like Modern Warfare, you’re better off just playing that. Come here if you want to hear the main character discuss various actors while shooting imaginary zombies, otherwise, don’t bother. Deadly Premonition gets a C; I hope one of the bigger publishers or developers gets in touch with the team behind this one. I’d love to see what these guys can do with somebody big backing them!

Cody Webb lives in Live Oak.