Meet Rubi Malone. She makes Lara Croft look like Punky Brewster.

Last week, I was thrilled to find a copy of Wet, the latest release developed by Artificial Mind & Movement (A2M) and published by Bethesda, sitting in my mailbox. It was hard not to be excited. I enjoyed the demo, adored the brilliant viral “Shot At Love” video, and have a crush on Eliza Dushku, who voices the main character. Awesome.

Wet tells us the story of Rubi Malone, a mercenary-for-hire who finds herself wrapped up in black market organ trades, underground drug cartels, back stabbing mob bosses, and murder. Over the course of her adventure, she’ll leap and dash over buildings like the Prince in Prince of Persia, dodge bullets like Inspector “Tequilla” Chen in Stranglehold, and wield double pistols, shotguns, and sub-machine guns in slow motion like that dark tortured detective in Max Payne.

Wet shows off some gorgeous scenery

And she’ll do all this with the visual flair of a Quentin Tarantino film, complete with the soundtrack to match.

So? Has the studio who gave us the masterpieces that are Oblivion and Fallout 3 gifted us by publishing another piece of brilliant gaming? Or has A2M managed to disappoint, continuing their track record of titles like Indiana Jones & The Staff of Kings?

Read on to find out!

Someone is about to get sliced

First, let’s talk about Rubi.

In my opinion, Rubi is one of the best leading female characters to grace the video game world in the last few years. She’s my favorite since Jade in Beyond Good & Evil. She’s independent, incredibly violent, lacks mercy, and wasn’t drawn out to be this oozing-sex-appeal character like many other modern female characters. Heavenly Sword, X-Blades, the upcoming Bayonetta… believe it or not, sometimes guys don’t want to be sold a sex icon. Rather than skimpy clothes and heaving Soulcalibur IV breasts, Rubi wears an outfit that fits. She speaks in a rough voice, swears like a trucker, and swigs whiskey out of a bottle to regain her health. She even rolls her eyes at the hypersexual body guard of the game’s leading antagonist. Thank you A2M. Not all men want  Soulcalibur IV women.

How does controlling this character work? Wet delivers easy, fluid controls. Despite the high action and wild gunplay, the gameplay is simple, fast, with a low learning curve. You can shoot 360 degrees, dive off walls, run along said walls while blasting away… and it’s all so easy. Don’t get me wrong, pulling off some of the more wild combos (ie: jumping through the air, sliding under a pipe, shooting behind you, all in one motion) takes a little bit of practice, but you’ll be handling it in no time.

You can PLAY this!

Wet offers up some incredible action scenes that you’d expect to be ‘quicktime’ events, a la God of War. Instead of making these simple ‘press the button when we tell you’ sequences, Wet lets you experience some truly awesome scenes, with just a few of those quicktime-esque button presses thrown into the mix. Navigating through the wreckage of an exploding plane and some absolutely insane car chases (one pictured above) that put the Matrix’s epic tractor trailer scene to shame… well, at this point, it’s as though the Wachowski Bros and Quentin Tarantino had a baby. Only instead of the inevitably ugly mess that would be their spawn, you’ve got this gorgeous game.

SLICE!

Another great highlight is Wet’s “Rage” mode. Comparisons to Madworld are justified. The simple colors, bright red, black, and white. Makes you think of the black and white battle in Kill Bill, complete with some of the best music in the game. Rubi racks up points for kills, and these points can then be exchanged for upgrades. Powered up guns, larger health bars, more bullets, etc. Gives the game some serious replay value, for you achievement whores out there.

As if excellent playable cinematic events and a highly stylized ‘rage’ mode’ weren’t enough, Wet delivers ‘challenge rooms’, where you have to close ex-amount of doors and kill all the enemies, with a limited amount of health, unlimited amount of baddies, etc. These increase in difficulty as the game goes on, the scenery varying and changing with each level, helping make this element of the game less tedious. It certainly could have been a repetitive, boring stage of the game. However, the developers managed to keep it fresh with each level.

She won’t stay caged for long!

However, Wet is not without its flaws.

While the game managed to pass on dishing out entirely ‘quicktime’ events for its major action scenes, they opted to keep this for some of the more intense boss battles, creating some epically disappointing final fights. The sort that make you groan and hurl your controller afterward. The leading antagonist’s bodyguard is one of the coolest, wildest looking enemies I’ve seen in a long time, an albino woman with gunblades, and has the worst boss battle ever. A waste of an excellent character.

Also, the awesome Grindhouse effect of the game is utterly RUINED by the game over screen. What would be an otherwise awesome effect, is tarnished by a two second delay between your character’s death, and the burning out film. It’s a simple thing that really shouldn’t have been ignored. Those two seconds really hurt what would have been a really cool moment. It’s a shame.

All in all, despite its handful of flaws, I’d say Wet is definitely worth purchasing the first week it’s out, and I seldom can say that about games I play. With its over the top action, wild story, and characters smack out of a Tarantino film, it really is a must have, and one of my favorite gaming experiences of the year. This is an EPIC step forward for A2M, and a smart move by Bethesda.

Other Stuff You Might Wanna Know:
Available for: Xbox 360 / PlayStation 3
Price: 59.99
Rating (Buy It, Don’t Buy It, Rent It): Buy It