Most reviews for this title here are nonsensical because they were written by confused IMDB users who thought this is the film's and not the game's page.
This 3D action adventure from Kalisto Entertainment (a now defunct French video game company best known for their 1997 horror action game Nightmare Creatures, a cult hit on PS1), made seemingly in the same engine as Tomb Raider 4 (the one set in Egypt). is unfortunately another half baked movie tie-in game which no one except for the biggest fans of the movie or PS1 era nostalgiacs ever needs to play.
The game has 16 levels, although some of them need to be played twice, once with Leeloo and once with Korben since some areas can only be reached by one or the other character. Each level takes about 20 minutes to beat (unless you get lost, and you often will) except for a few timed levels which take much less. Leeloo's levels feature slightly more exploration. She can't carry guns, so she must fight enemies in Mortal Kombat light style or blow them up with standard or sticky grenades which the player can find in each level. Some areas (both regular and secret) can only be reached by blowing up the grates or fake walls blocking their entrance. Korben on the other hand gets to wield several cool guns including a lightning blaster which automatically targets enemies (the most useful weapon in the game by far) and the unique "multipractic" gun that the villain Zorg uses in the movie. Both characters also get to solve some awful find-a-switch-and-press-it or go-through-a-confusing-maze-of-almost-identical-corridors type puzzles.
The missions are loosely based on tasks in the movie and a short FMV clip from the movie plays before each mission. The mission objectives are presented in text form by the strangely silent but still flamboyant Ruby Rhod before each level. He sometimes allows the players to choose which character they want to play the level as first, Leeloo or Korben.
There are no game bosses in the game except technically for Zorg who the player gets to fight on several occasions as Korben in the opera level, although he's barely tougher than an average opponent. That makes the final level of the game extremely anticlimactic.
All levels are also based on locations from the movie but they still mostly end up consisting of endless samey corridors. The only levels that stand out in this sense are the rooftop levels and the Egyptian level simply because they actually have open spaces.
The levels contain many pickups including ammo clips for Korben (he usually gets plenty of ammo for whichever your favorite gun is), psionic blasts for Leeloo (annoyingly only triggered by an unnecessarily complex key combo), as well as force field shields, health packs and additional lives (like in a platform game). The game uses checkpoints during levels, and there is the usual save game option between levels.
The game is not difficult if everything works perfectly right, but nothing ever does. You will get lost in the game's repetitive locations, you will get bored by the often uninspired level design, you will constantly miss platforms while jumping, the enemies (Zorg's alien goons, evil scientists, security guards, security drones and eventually the pyramid aliens) will occasionally gang up on you or mercilessly gun you down with their sometimes overpowered futuristic machine guns one too many times to fully enjoy the action, you will be annoyed by the twitchy camera on occasion, and the controls will often lag. Not to mention Ruby's extremely long walking animation that you can't skip, and the fact that the characters do not actually talk. This is why the game fails to be anything much more than a simple cash in.
Having said that, the graphics are nice (for the time) and you will be able to recognize locations, items, characters and plot elements from the movie. Also, the gameplay is not that bad when everything works right, and that's when the game truly shows its wasted potential.
This 3D action adventure from Kalisto Entertainment (a now defunct French video game company best known for their 1997 horror action game Nightmare Creatures, a cult hit on PS1), made seemingly in the same engine as Tomb Raider 4 (the one set in Egypt). is unfortunately another half baked movie tie-in game which no one except for the biggest fans of the movie or PS1 era nostalgiacs ever needs to play.
The game has 16 levels, although some of them need to be played twice, once with Leeloo and once with Korben since some areas can only be reached by one or the other character. Each level takes about 20 minutes to beat (unless you get lost, and you often will) except for a few timed levels which take much less. Leeloo's levels feature slightly more exploration. She can't carry guns, so she must fight enemies in Mortal Kombat light style or blow them up with standard or sticky grenades which the player can find in each level. Some areas (both regular and secret) can only be reached by blowing up the grates or fake walls blocking their entrance. Korben on the other hand gets to wield several cool guns including a lightning blaster which automatically targets enemies (the most useful weapon in the game by far) and the unique "multipractic" gun that the villain Zorg uses in the movie. Both characters also get to solve some awful find-a-switch-and-press-it or go-through-a-confusing-maze-of-almost-identical-corridors type puzzles.
The missions are loosely based on tasks in the movie and a short FMV clip from the movie plays before each mission. The mission objectives are presented in text form by the strangely silent but still flamboyant Ruby Rhod before each level. He sometimes allows the players to choose which character they want to play the level as first, Leeloo or Korben.
There are no game bosses in the game except technically for Zorg who the player gets to fight on several occasions as Korben in the opera level, although he's barely tougher than an average opponent. That makes the final level of the game extremely anticlimactic.
All levels are also based on locations from the movie but they still mostly end up consisting of endless samey corridors. The only levels that stand out in this sense are the rooftop levels and the Egyptian level simply because they actually have open spaces.
The levels contain many pickups including ammo clips for Korben (he usually gets plenty of ammo for whichever your favorite gun is), psionic blasts for Leeloo (annoyingly only triggered by an unnecessarily complex key combo), as well as force field shields, health packs and additional lives (like in a platform game). The game uses checkpoints during levels, and there is the usual save game option between levels.
The game is not difficult if everything works perfectly right, but nothing ever does. You will get lost in the game's repetitive locations, you will get bored by the often uninspired level design, you will constantly miss platforms while jumping, the enemies (Zorg's alien goons, evil scientists, security guards, security drones and eventually the pyramid aliens) will occasionally gang up on you or mercilessly gun you down with their sometimes overpowered futuristic machine guns one too many times to fully enjoy the action, you will be annoyed by the twitchy camera on occasion, and the controls will often lag. Not to mention Ruby's extremely long walking animation that you can't skip, and the fact that the characters do not actually talk. This is why the game fails to be anything much more than a simple cash in.
Having said that, the graphics are nice (for the time) and you will be able to recognize locations, items, characters and plot elements from the movie. Also, the gameplay is not that bad when everything works right, and that's when the game truly shows its wasted potential.