Haze Hands-On Preview

May 20th will finally see the release of the much anticipated, Haze for the Playstation 3. This time developers Free Radical have gone towards a more realistic and deep setting instead of the playful comical styling’s of previous title, Timesplitters.

In Haze you’ll make use of Nectar, a drug that improves performance, to out do your enemies although be warned Nectar can also have some serious side-effects if you overdose, everyone will look like an enemy. This can cause some serious havoc so its best to apply Nectar in short doses but this doesn’t stop your team mates occasionally energizing up, one too many times. Luckily you’ll be able to tell because their masks will turn red. Then with the help of Nectar (but not too much) and the large amounts of weapons and vehicles at your disposal you fight as a Mantel solider working for Mantel Global Industries (who make Nectar).

The story and background is solid and has some serious depth to it but recently I got to play an early build of Haze in London and noticed a few minor flaws. After playing a few levels I found myself having to complete the same section over and over due to the lack of checkpoints. It’s not that they should make the game really easy with points every five seconds but a few more checkpoints would help speed the game up.

That and sometimes I’d get caught chasing after my team because they got lost, this happened a lot in the larger outdoor environments.

Talking of which they look lush, you have to applaud the excellent visuals that Haze offers but it has to be said that Haze looks a lot better outdoors than indoors. While adventuring around those outdoor areas you’ll get treated to some, quite frankly awkward, driving controls but that might have been me getting distracted by the graphics again.

With the game getting its release next month you should expect a few of the aforementioned problems to be patched up. It’s clear that they have spent their time polishing over this game otherwise we would have been playing a half finished version for a few months now.

Luckily the version we got our hands on was a September build and we have word that the final retail will be running as smooth as possible. Haze is really starting to look like a must buy for Playstation 3 owners if a few problems get ironed out.

Haze is coming to the Playstation 3 “only” on May 20th, Worldwide.