XIII (video game)



""I can't remember a thing...""

- Protagonist/Steve Rowland, XIII

You wake up on a deserted beach. You have no memory, no identification, and a pounding headache. Your only clues to who you are and why you're there are a blurry flashback, a key to a bank, and the number XIII tattooed on your neck.

Within about two minute, your lifeguard rescuer is shot to pieces. You discover an incredible proficiency with weapons and, after wiping out about a dozen Mooks, proceed to go about discovering who you are. Unfortunately, as you appear to be a long-dead Army Ranger with a history of heinous crimes and a wife who is a secret spy and who may have betrayed you, fighting for the side of good is no easy task. Especially not with multiple armies of baddies chasing you every step of the way.

Notable largely for its atmospheric Cel Shading - XIII was originally a Belgian comic book (by writer Jean Van Hamme and artist William Vance), running from 1984 onwards. It keeps the bande dessinée style -- cutscenes are often divided into 'panels,' footsteps make visible 'tap tap tap's on the screen, people plummeting off cliffs leave a long 'AAAAAAAH!' trailing behind them, and devastating combat gets alternate camera angles through inset panels. Also in general a tightly plotted game, though a bit goofy at times.


 * Authority Equals Asskicking : The XX Conspiracy Leaders are all capable of taking an inhuman amount of bullets before dying. General Standwell and The Mongoose in particular verge into That One Boss territory, due to being able to cut you to pieces in seconds while requiring several clips of bullets to die themselves. Unfortunately, this does not apply to your unarmed, easily killed ally General Carrington (see Escort Mission below).
 * General Carrington (when not unarmed) is a bit of a badass in cutscenes, however.
 * Badass Grandpa: The Mongoose (the XX Conspiracy's The Dragon) is an evil version of this, being a supremely skilled assassin and the game's very difficult final boss.
 * General Carrington and Steve Roland, too.
 * Big Bad:
 * Cutscene Incompetence:
 * Depraved Dentist
 * The Dragon: The Mongoose
 * Escort Mission: Protecting Carrington out of Emerald Base.
 * Eyepatch of Power: How the one-eyed Standwell is a perfect shot with the least accurate gun in the game is beyond me.
 * Franchise Killer: Dead on arrival, unfortunately.
 * Hey It's That Voice: Besides the obvious one of XIII/, several of the SPADS are voiced by Crispin Freeman.
 * Not to mention Adam West as Carrington.
 * Hostage Situation: If you sneak up on an unsuspecting individual, you can grab them and shuffle around with them. Enemies won't shoot at you if you're pointed right at them with the hostage, and you can even shoot past your hostage.
 * At one point, a nurse tells you to take her hostage to get past the guards, since she found out about Johannsenn (and was locked in a room with a zombie to die. Okay, so it was a retarded patient, but...)
 * Immune to Bullets: The Attack Chopper boss is vulnerable only to RPGs.
 * Indecisive Medium: The main gimmick of the game is that it's like a comic book.
 * In Love With the Mark
 * Made of Iron: The Mongoose. And not just in the game, but in the comics as well.
 * Morally-Ambiguous Doctorate: Johannsenn.
 * No Ending: The game adapts the first five volumes of a 19 volume comic so it has a Cliff Hanger ending to lead into the sequel that never came due to disappointing sales.
 * No Export for You: Averted, thanks to Cinebook. To date they have the first eight volumes out, with the 19th to be released in 2013.
 * No Flow in CGI: The game developers had to cut the Afro-style major Jones' hair.
 * No Gear Level: Escaping from Plain Rock Penitentary.
 * No Sidepaths No Exploration No Freedom
 * Slap Yourself Awake: XIII slices his palm while drugged on a sinking ship to stay awake.
 * Spell My Name With an "S": Prior to the game's release, someone from a review magazine once asked a developer for this game in an interview, "How are you supposed to pronounce the protagonist's name: 'X-I-I-I', or 'Eight'?" The developer's response was to blink a few times and reply, "You're supposed to pronounce it 'Thirteen'."
 * Standard FPS Guns: Although there are a few changes, including the harpoon gun for fighting underwater, and the bazooka's secondary attack (bonking people over the head with rockets). The rest stay the same, though you can dual wield pistols and sub-machine guns.
 * Stealth Based Mission: Too many to count, including infiltrating Emerald Base, infiltrating the Sanctuary (which is actually 3 consecutive stealth missions), infiltrating the Patriot, and infiltrating SSH 1.
 * Stillborn Franchise: Both the game and the television series.
 * Tap On the Head: Ashtrays, bottles, chairs, brooms, just about whatever came to hand knocked out anyone good.
 * Boom Headshot: A comic book-style freeze frame insert panel will pop up whenever you get a one-hit-takedown (ranged or melee.) Especially satisfying if you stick something through their head like a crossbow bolt or glass shard.
 * Thirteen Is Unlucky: Well, his life ain't easy.
 * Timed Mission
 * Extreme Graphical Representation, Hollywood Hacking, Magic Floppy Disk .. all surprisingly averted in the live action adaption, which contains a surprisingly accurate IP renewal scene, use of Opera as a web browser, a micro SD card... however it does have a Highly Visible Password, subverted a bit in that the card with the password is actually a trap with no useful data on it, and would destroy itself after 3 failed login attempts. The Password Is Always Swordfish is lampshaded, in that the password is Cuttlefish.