GODZILLA: THE VIDEO GAME for PS4 came out 2 years ago. By this time, Godzilla (2014) had already came and went and any interest in Godzilla was dying down. So when this game was announced there were mixed feelings and not a whole lot of interest. Survival games like Far Cry Primal and Fallout 4 were more popular back in 2015. People loved the idea playing as Godzilla and destroying buildings like he does in the movies, but it was too reminiscent to two earlier Godzilla games on the SEGA Dreamcast called Godzilla Generations and Godzilla Generations: Maximum Impact based on how the game is played. They even called this game Godzilla Generations 3 for the similarity to the other two games. What brought most attraction though is that you could play as the 2014 Godzilla. When Godzilla (2014) came out, it got the short end of the stick when the movie only got a mobile game. In Godzilla: The Video Game, people were finally given the option to play as the 2014 Godzilla. But how do the rest of the game hold up?
Review:
Godzilla The Video Game has a large roster of monsters to play as. You can play Anguirus, Space Godzilla, King Ghidorah, Mecha-King Ghidorah, Jet Jaguar, Mothra, Rodan, Destroyah, Battra, ALL of the Mecha-Godzilla variants (74, 75, 93, and 02), Gigan, Hedorah, Biollante, and FOUR different versions of Godzilla (94, Burning, 64, and 2014). TWENTY MONSTERS IN TOTAL! But guess what? If you want to play as any of these then you have to play the story mode part of the game. That doesn't sound bad at all, right? But what if you want to play multiplayer? Sorry, the only monster available to you would be Godzilla 94! So unless you play story mode a GAZILLION times just to meet specific requirements to unlock your favorite monster to play as you're out of luck! Also, the controls are so clunky! To control Godzilla, you use the D-pad or the left joystick on the controller, but that is just to get him to move. What if I want to change direction? Do I press Left or Right on the D-pad? No! How about the joystick? No! It's L1 and R1! Why L1 and R1?! Are the other directional buttons on the D-Pad or joystick not to Bandai/Namco's liking?! Oh wait, it's for sidestepping....Why would you add sidestepping on the directional buttons?! That is like if in Mario Kart you want to turn left or right you use the left or right shoulder buttons and if you want to drift then you use the joystick or D-pad to drift left or right! It's confusing as hell! If I want to turn, then I should be able to use the joystick or D-pad, not the shoulder buttons! When you play as Godzilla or any of the other monsters you walk so freaking slow! Sure Godzilla walked slow in the movie, but this a video game! If I want to watch Godzilla slowly trudging through Tokyo at a snail's pace then I watch the movies (Most likely Shin Godzilla since that is all he does most of the movie)!
This game has six different modes. God of Destruction mode is the game's story mode. In this mode, you are playing as the 94 Godzilla and your mission is to destroy reactors that has Godzilla's energy called G-Energy and to grow bigger. The stages has a split path for you to choose from and each path has a different difficulty, some are easier and some are harder. Some stages will have you on a time trial mission, which is beating the stage before the time runs out. While playing through these stages you will come across the boss or bosses of that stage. Basically this is all you do for every stage. You destroy reactors, kill the monster, rinse, repeat. After playing through the story mode, it gets really repetitive because playing through story mode is the only way you unlock the monsters in the game and some require you to meet a certain amount of time or task just for those specific monsters to appear. The game even requires you to collect as much G-Energy as possible to grow to a certain height just to play the true final ending and fight the final boss of the game, which is the Godzilla 2014 version. If you don't meet that certain height, then the game will cut to credits and you will have to play story mode all over again! Be prepared to play through it TWENTY MORE TIMES JUST TO GET TO THE FINAL STAGE! Some bosses can appear bigger than normal. These bosses are the legendary bosses and their increased size makes them stronger and more difficult to beat. There are some that are smaller than you and they become sort of a nuisance. You can't punch them or hold them because of how small they are. You can just barely kick them. On top of that, since you move so slow it leaves an opening for the other monster to attack. You don't even have time to dodge or block. If you miss even once or break your pattern of your attacks then you could be stuck in an endless loop of attacks quickly sending you to a game over. So some strategy is needed, which I don't mind.
The second mode of the game is King of the Monsters mode and this is the game's boss rush mode. In boss rush mode, you choose any monster that you want to play as and you play six stages fighting monsters. The first stage starts you off with an easy monster and as you progress in each stage the monsters get stronger and tougher and each monster in every stage is different depending on which monster you chose.
Online Multiplayer mode basically says what it means. You play online with other people in the game and you fight each other with your chosen monster. As fun as this mode is, this was sort of a let down for people that like to play regular multiplayer because there is no regular multiplayer mode. What if you have a friend that doesn't have the game and wanted to play the game with you? That means that he would need to buy the game and console just to play the game. It really shows that times are changing and playing with your friends on the same TV is slowly becoming obsolete.
Evolution mode is where you want to upgrade your monsters. You can unlock new abilities and make your special attack stronger for each monster. In order to upgrade your monster, upgrading requires you to collect energy and items in the game that are exclusive to that monster. To collect the amount required to upgrade you will need to play through God of Destruction mode or King of the Monsters mode. Once your monster has been upgraded, you can bring your upgraded monster into God of Destruction mode, King of the Monsters mode, or Online Multiplayer mode and have them duke it out with other stronger monsters. This is actually a really neat idea that I liked because you can enhance how you want to play and try new abilities that you never used before. On the other hand, it just makes the game easier when playing any of the single player modes and it felt pointless playing afterwards.
The other two modes are Diorama mode and Kaiju Field Guide mode. Diorama mode just allows you to build dioramas and take pictures. Nothing special. The Kaiju Field Guide mode gives you info on all of the monsters both in the game and outside the game of which movie they came from. This is sort of neat if you aren't a fan of Godzilla movies, but would like to know more about the series.
Final thoughts:
It's not a good Godzilla game at all. It is mediocre at best. It is fun when you start playing, but after a while it gets tedious very quickly. I don't recommend this game to anyone expecting it to be good, but it could be a good game to waste time on. If I were to recommend any Godzilla game, it would be one of the fighting games like Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee for GameCube/PS2/Xbox or Godzilla: Save The Earth for PS2/Xbox.