PlayStation Basement #26 - The Incredible Hulk: The Pantheon Saga

This review was originally published on the Console Purist Facebook group on February 23rd, 2019. It has been edited slightly for formatting.

As we finish up February, there’s still time for one more tangentially related game for Valentine’s Day here at PlayStation Basement. As with every Saturday, I’ll be reviewing an odd or obscure game for the original PlayStation. My reviews are intended to de-emphasize the standard point system you see in a lot of video game reviews, so I use a nine-point scale where 9-7 is Good, 6-4 is Neutral, and 3-1 is Bad. The emphasis is on the word used, not so much the number.

This week, I am thinking back to a funny Valentine I got from my friend Ocasia that featured Marvel’s The Hulk. I thought it was really funny, thoughtful, and I still have it. Here’s a game that isn’t really funny or thoughtful – The Incredible Hulk: The Pantheon Saga. This game was developed by ATD, who seem to have only this on their record, and published by Eidos Interactive. The game was released in December of 1996 in Europe and on February 28, 1997, in North America. The game is based on the stories featured in The Incredible Hulk comics series from the early 1990s featuring a group of characters called The Pantheon who were all based on Greek myths.

The cover art is pretty similar between both versions. It looks like they were edited a bit from each other in terms of rubble and coloring but both feature The Hulk busting through a wall. I think the North American version is composed and colored a little better than the European one with a cool effect of rocks flying off of the cover.

The in-game graphics do not have a cool effect of rocks flying off the cover. The in-game graphics of The Incredible Hulk: The Pantheon Saga combine 3D backgrounds with pre-rendered 2D sprites, but this is no Donkey Kong Country. The sprites here are blocky and not well animated. The odd perspective choice, a sort of looking-in-to-a-student-diorama thing, adds to this. Things get really close to the screen and really show off their pixelated look. I like the way they look like little clay figures and such, but that’s only if you step away a bit from the screen. The Incredible Hulk: The Pantheon Saga is also just generally pretty dark and drab. The few cutscenes of the game follow the same trends too. Of course, The Hulk himself isn’t exactly pretty to look at even in the comics.

There tends to be a reflection in the wake of giants, and the sounds don’t seem out of place with the graphics. The sound quality is kind of thin with tinny sound effects and cheesy rock music. The sound effects made by the big green guy himself might be the worst; that punch voice clip is a little annoying with how often it happens. The music isn’t particularly bad, following in the tracks of Twisted Metal, but it is repetitive and not very memorable either.

Remember The Hulk smashing through the cover? That was pretty cool, but that isn’t really what happens in this game. Sure, there is a lot of fighting, the environments are destructible, and some of the special moves are pretty cool, but the game is pretty awkward. The camera angle makes fighting really weird, and spamming moves is often your best bet in a way that feels unnatural. It’s also kind of weird to have The Hulk finding keys to open locked doors that don’t seem particularly large or durable. Why wouldn’t he just smash on through?

The Incredible Hulk: The Pantheon Saga is not a very long game; I completed it in one night. The story did not make any sense to me, though I assume readers of the comic from that time would know way more about it. From weird platforming on ice, to fighting laser-shooting robots, to smashing big statues and defeating Greek gods, The Incredible Hulk: The Pantheon Saga is quite a weird adventure that doesn’t make the impact one would hope it would make.

The Incredible Hulk: The Pantheon Saga receives a Bad (3).

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