What do bananas have to do with first-person shooters, you ask? Well, nothing, if you don't count the wonderfully rendered tropical fruits in Crysis (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCY_q-ytk2M for five million percent of your reccomended daily dose of digital potassium). However, after thoroughly watching various promotional materials surrounding the new "Halo-killer," I can't help but associate this game with bananas because it's so goddamn YELLOW. I can understand having the costumes feature strong yellow accents, but Free Radical just had to beat the motif into your skull by making the "nectar," its molecules, the protagonist's iris, your helmet's HUD display, etc all a ferociously cornea-raping shade of lemon yellow.



Okay, so maybe I'm being unreasonably harsh on a game that simply has a crush on green's next-door neighbor. Haze's unique gameplay features are really the star of the show, right? Unfortunately, after looking through all the cinematics, gametrailers.com previews, tv spots, and an interview with Jonathon Davis, I found myself hard-pressed to give a damn about anything but my sudden craving for bananas.

Let's start with Gametrailers.com's preview (http://www.gametrailers.com/player/32587.html). "Haze...proves that perception and reality can be two very different things." Woah. Excuse me while I have a Keanu moment here. Once you get to the gameplay footage, one thing really stands out. Or rather, doesn't: the muddy color palette we've come to expect from every "gritty" current-gen action game like Resistance, Killzone 2, Gears of War, and even Metal Gear Solid 4. This makes the yellow (and red) come to the fore in a rather obnoxious way, as though someone had spilled mustard on a dull Persian rug. Next we're introduced to the gimmick of Nectar, which allows you to see enemies glow bright purple (just kidding) to enable easier fragging. But honestly, who wants that? Half the challenge of an FPS is finding your enemy before she finds you. This feature doesn't look fun or exciting, and instead feels like something you'd conjure up from a gameshark.

The preview drops another bombshell when we find out that the rebel underdogs are the REAL heroes of the story. These guys must have hired Shyamalan to write the plot or something. However it's also revealed that the gimmicks of the Mantel are short-lived, and that after switching sides you'll be without those toys, though you will be able to administer overdoses to the mantel soldiers. A crack insinuating an anti-drug message gets a groan not because of its corniness, but because the previewer's probably right.

So what's left? Vehicles, such as a jeep-looking thing. Computer-controlled AI. 4-player co-op and online multiplayer modes. Namely, everything we've come to expect from the genre. Between these standard features, the nearly pointless "unique" features, the drab graphics, and the facepalm-inducing frat boy dialogue, what really stands out about this game is its use of the color yellow. Even Korn's theme song sounds uninspired and muddy, like Davis is just going through the motions to produce another cash-in (it's not like anyone could tell the difference anyway after Untouchables).

What bothers me about this whole bamboozle is that people actually seem to be falling for it. I guess it just goes to show that slick marketing can accomplish anything. Although I'm afraid in my case they seem to have targeted the wrong audience, because instead of considering purchasing a PS3, all I wanted after seeing Haze in action was a nice, big, juicy dickfruit.