Video Game Review: Mediocre ‘Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters’

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CHICAGO – You may have seen the Ryan Reynolds superhero vehicle “Green Lantern” and want to bring the adventure home or see how it translates with a controller in your hand. The movie disappointed most critics and fell short of box office expectations? How does the game compare?

Video Game Rating: 2.5/5.0

Most gamers know this routine by now. The number of quality movie tie-ins can be counted on one hand, maybe two if you’re feeling generous. And movie tie-ins based on superhero games somehow fall even flatter than average (I still have nightmares about the “Iron Man” game). It really makes NO sense. These movies often play like video games on celluloid but they just don’t translate to the small screen. Why? Honestly, I think it comes down to the biggest problem facing all creative ventures — laziness. The developers of movie tie-ins know that they are appealing to an audience that already has inherent love for their product and they figure that’s all that matters.

Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters
Photo credit: WBIE

To be fair, “Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters” is far from the worst movie tie-in of the year. Heck, it’s not even the worst one of the summer. The game was clearly built on a foundation of love for the “God of War” series and you could be reminded of a lot worse games than the adventures of the legendary Kratos. The core mechanics of the game are sound but the graphics are mediocre and the story simply isn’t interesting. Worst of all, like so many superhero movie games, it’s remarkably repetitive.

Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters Photo credit: WBIE

The game is relatively simple and works off the DC character’s ability to create weapons from his ring power. As the game progresses, like Kratos unlocking abilities, your hero will be able to do increasingly interesting things with your power like creating giant bats, Gatling guns, enormous maces, and more. Combining the right ring powers for each enemy is the key to the game play but it’s basically just a button masher — dodge, hit, dodge, hit, and so on. It’s a simple game built around clearing one area of enemies, moving on to another area and clearing that one, and so on and so on with a bit of puzzle-solving and a few flying chapters to try and keep the gameplay reasonably fresh.

What works about “Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters”? Well, the game veers from the movie and, in a rare case, that’s a good thing. It almost feels like a spin-off since the developers coaxed Ryan Reynolds into doing the voice work, giving it an air of legitimacy that a lot of movie tie-ins fail to have. They also wisely developed their own story but stayed within the universe of the DC character, telling a story of the Manhunters, villains that may appeal to fans of the books. I’ve played dozens of movie tie-ins that features almost no creative spark, at least “Rise of the Manhunters” put in the effort on a conceptual level — to appeal to fans of the movie with the work of its star and appeal to fans of the comic book as well.

Sadly, while the story of the game may feature enemies familiar to fans of the book, it’s just not that engaging. It’s really an excuse for the aforementioned “room-cleaning” level design. It begins to drag by chapter 4 and it’s pretty much repetitive from there on out.

“Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters” is one of those games that doesn’t do anything particularly wrong but just being “not bad” isn’t good enough, especially in a crowded season like we’re in right now.

Therefore, the game will really only appeal to the most diehard fans of the movie or comic book. It also helps if you love “God of War”.

By BRIAN TALLERICO Content Director HollywoodChicago.com [email protected]