The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction
PlayStation 2 (also GameCube and Xbox), £39.99
Radical Entertainment/ VU Games, ****
In Radical’s first outing with the big mean green one they tried to mix up the gameplay, giving us the opportunity to play not only the Hulk, but take on stealth-based action as Bruce Banner. This time, they have kept things simple and gone for Hulkish shenanigans the whole way, a level of purity that serves the game well.
The main part of Ultimate Destruction involves story-driven missions where the Hulk is used to help find a cure for Banner’s condition using a mind-controlling contraption built by his friend Doc Samson. There’s also the opportunity to take on side missions and earn more of the smash points you need to buy new moves.
And there are an impressive number of ways to reduce everything to rubble — from breaking cars in two and using them as giant metal gloves to smashing up the scenery into a source of deadly projectiles.
There are only two main mission areas — the city and the badlands — and after a while you yearn for new things to break. But as you pound down the street, smashing your way through enemies, leaping on to buildings and knocking helicopters out of the sky, you get a great sense of what it is like to be a walking wall of green muscle.