It’s a special week for me here in my little slice of the internet. I’ve ventured out of my comfort zone of PlayStation 3 games and am mixing it up. There couldn’t have been a better time to finally head into the unknown territory you all know as the PlayStation Vita. What better to motivate me than the latest addition to the Killzone series, Killzone: Mercenary for the PlayStation Vita?

Now let me start by saying that I really have not played anything on the Vita. Shame on me, but I haven’t really encountered any games that get me hyped for an extended gaming session on handheld. Don’t fret, because I feel this way about most handheld games. However, I really enjoy the Killzone series so I am actually pretty excited about a shooter that you can carry around with you. Oh, and let’s not forget that anytime the word “beta” is thrown around everyone wants to be the first to try it. And that, my friends, is hype.

I think we can all agree that shooters are hard to pull off successfully on handhelds. There are just so many things that could go wrong when you have so many elements of a shooter to consider. Once I started the multiplayer beta up though, I was instantly surprised by the graphics and overall layout. The menus were pretty straightforward but I honestly hadn’t read up on the different game modes so I was going in blind. The game threw me into a match and I had seconds to figure out what I was doing. Luckily, the controls seemed very natural for a shooter and I quickly got the hang of it despite my lack of Vita gaming. That had been my main concern, because controls can make or break a game for me.

After several matches and a quite a bit of frustration, I couldn’t really grasp if I liked what I played or not. I was at a huge disadvantage compared to the players who had leveled up and were playing in parties. The objective style gameplay was refreshing to see over any deathmatch-style multiplayer though. The more I played of the beta, the more I enjoyed the familiar shooter experience in handheld form. I am curious to play the other multiplayer modes and especially the campaign. I also wonder about the staying power of a multiplayer shooter for a handheld because squinting at a tiny screen for several hours could get old. I’m getting ahead of myself again and I have been wrong before.

More than anything this beta got me excited for the upcoming game and campaign. Few shooters really grab my attention as far as story and single player experiences go. We all know everyone plays Call of Duty for the multiplayer because it’s certainly not winning any awards in the story department. So I can’t wait to see how Killzone: Mercenary does in both the single and multiplayer experience, because there is such potential with the story. I have high hopes for this game though because the controls already feel better and more natural on the Vita than any shooter I’ve attempted to play on the PlayStation 3 in a while. Overall, I think I will go out of my way to experience a new way to play an FPS game, especially when I can play as the Helghast and take the game on the go. It seems like a win-win situation, right?

Discuss:

Are you a fan of the Killzone series? What do you think about shooters on handheld platforms?