Ok, I am going to give you, the reader, the best review you have ever read. There will be NO weird words in this review, NO random sillyness, just plain facts. You can call me the Fact Man. But that would be dumb. So don't.

In Mark of Kri, you play some big fella by the name of Rau. The main premise of the game is that people hire you to go and stop bandits from taking over places. Everything works from a central hub, the bar, where you meet the client, accept the job, and do it. You don't, however, get to go back to previous stages. There is a training mode though, which explains the basics, a little slowly if you ask me.

So now let's talk about the gameplay. Rau can use 4 types of weapons, Sword, axe, bow and spear. He can also fight barehanded. This is by far the best part of the game. As barehanded, you can do stealth kills by sneaking up on enemies. You can also disarm enemies, throwing their weapons in their faces to kill them. This is extremely fun. The problem lies in the battles. While the idea behind making each enemy a certain button is cool, it gets disorienting really fast. You can only hit enemies up close, so when one enemy gets a bit far away and you push the circle button, Rau swings, missing the enemy, and getting hit. In fact, Rau gets hit a lot. By the second stage, if you haven't learned to block, and just like to tap the buttons really fast to try and kill enemies, you will die quite a bit. Enemies die really fast once you disarm them, but tend to block most all attacks. As they block attacks, their life goes down really slow, so to kill them you must do an attack when they don't expect it.

The best part of Kri I believe to be in the stealth kills though. Kri picks up the Tench engine of stealth killing, and improves on it. To target an enemy, you spin the right analog stick in their direction. It will assign the first three enemies to the x, O and square buttons. Then just hit the buttons to fight. But once you shealthe your sword, you can sneak up on enemies, swing that analog stick, push the x button when close enough (the x will stop flashing when you are close enough to execute) and watch Rau tear that sucker up. Each enemy has a certain stealth kill. There are about 20 or so kills, but they go by fast. Even in the first stage you will have seen them all.

The raven is also a nice addition. You can use the raven at any time to fly ahead to certain points only to spy out where enemies are. The problem comes mostly in the game from the controls, like always. Rau moves in bumps, there is no other way to explain it. Every step you can feel in the controller. He moves fine until he picks up his next foot, where he slows for a second. Trust me, it sounds like no big deal, but it will drive you bonkers. Why couldn't they make him fluid like any other character? Beats me. Also, if Rau hits any sort of obstacle, from bush to side of table, at any sort of angle, he doesn't go around it, but stops completely. This means everything you hit, which is a lot since you can't spin the camera, will stop you. It's quite up there in the annoying factor.

The great thing about the game is the artwork. The in-game models look great, they have that Disney Black Cauldron feel, but more cleaned up. It's a very stylized feel, and don't get scared if you think that the game plays like a Disney game. Rau is very fluid, flinging his sword around at enemies, making them bleed all over the frikkin' place. My favorite part of the game has to be the loading screens, which show the exquisite pictures as they are drawn. First the basic outline of Rau will be drawn, then shaded, then the area around him, then all the background, all shaded, then colored, really fast-like on the screen. It's beautiful to watch. But perhaps that's the artist in me talking.

Basically I will say this. It is a Sony 1st party game. What 1st party game has Sony ever made that is great? Decent is the best word to describe this game. It's got flaws, but if you want to spend time learning to block a lot, the stealth kills are fun, and you can live with the bad controls. The level designs are nice, but there aren't much in the way of extra ways to go. Also not being able to go back to previous levels is a tad annoying, if you wanted practice or whatnot.

The problem is repition as well. All you do is kill people, crazy-like. If you played State of Emergency for days upon end, you will like this game. It's basically the same, except wit stealth kills and setting. Every job is basically to kill a bunch of bad guys. Some puzzles would be nice too.

What liked: The pictures in the game were great, they transfered nicely to the gameplay. The stealth kills were fun and reminiscent of Tenchu.

What disliked: No control of camera, hard to move, the same enemy can either die real quick if you disarm him in the first hit, or block for hours on end.

What to expect: Decent gameplay, fun if you like Tenchu or that sort of thing.

What not to expect: A Disney cartoon. Beware the blood and gore.

What's so different from this and other games of it's genre: The one button per enemy is the only difference. I guess his amazing fighting style, but that fits in with the one button thing, so that's about it.

Ratings on:

Control: 5 - Here is where the game is lacking. You can't spin the camera, and Rau runs into stuff really easily, stopping every time. The whole "lock onto multiple enemies" thing was done rather well though.

Graphics: 8 - They aren't the best PS2 has ever put out, but they do have a certain style that works.

Sound: 4 - Nothing you haven't heard anywhere else.

Style: 3 - Basically it is a glorified Tenchu mixed with crazy beat-'em-up action. No ninjas though.

1st hour: 8 - This is cool. Watch me kill these people crazy like. Watch me stealth kill these people crazy like.

5th hour: 6 - Can we do anything else besides kill people crazy like?

#1 reason why I hate this game: Controls. That's it.

by Hawke

2nd Opinion
      by Sundu

      I think this game deserves a closer look than Hawke gave it. I really enjoyed it before it got old and thought about buying it before I beat it. Mark of Kri is a very well made game. It has the best brawling system I've seen, crazy stealth kills, and extra savoir-faire. Tragically, however, even with a great fighting system brawls get old, and stealth can carry a game for a long time, unless its only six stages long. The big fights are what made me notice the game, and they were fun, and very violent. Each of the melee weapons (sword, spear, and axe) have four combos that involve dismemberment, stabbing, and plenty of blood. However, the best combos are for one enemy at a time and, in a large group, fights turn into blocking the enemies' attacks and having them block yours. Only the axe kept the big fights bloody--, uh . . . interesting, but the last stage more than exhausts its fun. As Hawke said the real fun is in the stealth kills and disarming.

      This game is quite deceptive when it comes to length. It has only six stages, but they are very long, repetitive stages. Each one has challenges which unlock fighting arenas. The stages can be replayed to complete all challenges and beating the arenas unlocks concept art and new outfits. However, long stages kill one's motivation to replay them and if, heaven forbid, you finish the challenges early, the rest of the stage is a bore. The fighting arenas are each one big fight, which, as I said, is very boring and eventually just frustrating.

      Overall, this game is badass, as long as you are being stealthy on your first time through a stage and still working on the challenges. If any of those pieces are missing, it kind of drags.

P.S. Ico is a Sony 1st party game and it is one of the best games ever.