 Meet Rubi. She carries a sword, dual wields her pistols, and drinks bottles of whiskey to replenish her health. She does not wear all yellow and have a desire to kill her baby-daddy (as far as we saw), nor does she carry around a flock of doves to release every time she pulls out her guns. (DLC perhaps?)
Rubi is the star of WET, a third person shooter produced by Artificial Mind and Movement (A2M) and published by Bethesda. From the beginning you’ll notice the B movie film grain covering the visuals, which sets a distinctive mood for the piece without really confining it to a specific time -- despite a 70’s era soundtrack, there are high speed car chases, over the top acrobatics, a black and white “rage mode” and the game goes into slow motion every time your feet leave the ground. Somewhere in there, something is anachronistic, but with so many influences (Kill Bill, Stranglehold) it’s hard to pin down exactly what belongs and what doesn’t. Similarly, it’s difficult to say whether or not this game is going to belong in your library.
Don’t be alarmed if your computer also enters slow motion when you hit the juuuummmmppppp…..
First of all, let’s point out one fact: when designing a shooter of any kind, crosshairs should be an “x,” “+,” or possibly even a “.” (if it’s small enough) in order to give the impression that at some point of conjunction there is pinpoint accuracy, where shots matter. Crosshairs should not be a “o,” or “ ” because these crosshairs make it look like your bullet will strike in a random place anywhere within that space. We won’t get into which is truer to life, because when we are playing a video game we are in a fictional world where the developers make up the rules.
Needless to say, the crosshair in WET is a small circle which made me feel frustrated every time I pulled the trigger and missed a shot -- whether it was actually my fault or not. Even with the slow motion acrobatics, I had a really hard time progressing through the tutorial level, which requires you to kill multiple enemies while performing specific tasks, such as jumping or sliding down a ladder upside-down.
It is important to note that I had similar crosshair/difficulty complaints with games like Stranglehold and Max Payne (back in the day), causing me to put the titles down unfinished, and it is equally as important to note that my colleague breezed through a later stage with no problems whatsoever after being specifically told, “This is really hard and you are going to die.” So it may very well be that whether or not you enjoy this game will be dependent on how you feel about other games in this genre.
 Fortunately enough for me, using the magic of a preview build, I was able to skip the offending portions of the game entirely, proceeding directly to the more action packed car chase scene, which had Rubi jumping from the hoods of vehicles, firing her guns at thugs poking out the back windows of sedans. A timed button sequence appeared on the screen at certain intervals, where you were obliged to jump stylishly to the next car, sometimes beheading a nearby enemy with your sword. Making these jumps (and avoiding death) was done easily enough and made me look forward the seeing semis, just to watch Rubi wall run between two trucks.
In my play through there wasn’t much opportunity to explore how the sword is integrated into the gameplay, how extensive the combinations were with it or how easy it might have been to simply slice up bad guys rather than shoot them, so it may very well be that after the tutorial level, when given full freedom to dispatch enemies as I wish, the game might be the sort of title that could keep me interested.
 WET ultimately seems to me to be a fans-only affair, and isn’t likely to please every type of gamer. Unless there are some genre-redefining moments still up A2M’s sleeves, WET looks to be the sort of title a only a handful of people will really enjoy -- enough for the faithful to clamor for more, enough for the developers to feel satisfied that they created something others enjoyed, but probably not enough to make stockholders shell out for a sequel. I’m still willing to give it a chance in a few months, but what happens to this game between now and its “Fall 2009” release date will determine what place it earns in my rental queue (and give me more time to come up with some really good puns).
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Maybe this will be another Too Human for me where there is a lot of negative feedback on the game, but to me it looks very interesting. 
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