Marc Ecko's Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure for Xbox Reviews by Gamers

This was a great game is every respect. What it does is it allows anybody, familiar with the world of graffiti or not, to jump right in and experience it.

The game puts in the shoes of the aspiring graffiti artist, Trane, in the near-future, fictional city of New Radius. Starting out, you get nothing but a few markers to put your name up with. And then as the game and story progress(not more than around a half hour later) you get some paint to start writing with and at the same time, are given your first taste of what fighting is going to be like.

The basics of both are simple to learn, but will take a while to master, which in itself is fun, because it gives you the feel that as Trane becomes a better writer, so are you at the same time. Which makes it feel more like you are not playing a person in a game, but living the life set up in it.

In the early stages of the game, your biggest concern is a rival writer's crew called the "Vandals", lead by a guy named Gabe. But as time goes by, your biggest concern becomes the ever tightening noose of the CCK(Civil Conduct Keepers).

As the game goes on, Trane's abilities with a spray can increase and you learn newer and cooler tags for your Black Book to put up on the streets. And these tags are divided into two sets: your pieces, which are the more intricate tags that usually involve spray and the other are your free form, which are quick and can go anywhere with a blank space. Both have 5 different types that you learn over the course of the game.

Another very cool thing about this game is that the developers were able to bring in actual legends of the graffiti world to do voice over work and lend their faces and tags to the game. Through out the game, you get to talk to and learn from about six different artists, including Futura and Shepard Fairey, aka OBEY. Along with being able to take pictures of dozens of other artists' work as you go around different parts of New Radius.

Awesome game, and I highly recommend it

This is a common example of developers being pressured by producers and corporate heads to pack certain kinds of content into game even if it sacrificed game play. Saying that, this game has so much style packed into it that it destroys game play. For example, the fighting system, this is the worst system I’ve seen in a long time. The animations are so stylized that it hinders the controls and you are basically watching your guy grab your opponent and do the same extremely long animation to only take away a fraction of their health. It looks cool the first few times, but once you’re well into the game, this just becomes frustrating. This game is made up of 3 types of game plays. Fighting, tagging, and exploration (which includes all the jumping, shimmying, etc puzzles). The fighting is bad, as I stated before. The tagging games are fun at first, but get very old very quickly, you have to tag so much with the same mini-game, that it’s just a chore by the 3rd level. The last game play type was exploration, which is not that bad in certain parts, the real problem is the level design, some are ok, some are horrific. For those who have played it, that level where u have to tag those 2 trucks with 20 tags in 2 mins with the guard around is just horrible design. Other bad things are animation, the animations are clunky and badly put together. The graphics are ok if everything is still, but once things start moving the horrible animations make everything go bad. The game is also pretty buggy(I played on the xbox), I managed to crash the game about 3 times and also had to restart many levels due to npcs getting stuck in walls and being unable to hit them, etc.

The best part of the game is the music, which is very good. Also all the art is very good, your tags get better and better, and are the only reason to keep playing the game. The story is ok, but nothing special. Lots of style, and pretty good replay value.

Sorry Pdiddy not everything you touch turns to gold.