PlayStation 3 cross-platform development, astonishingly, is on the up. Anyone who has played Call Of Duty 4 or Burnout Paradise on the PS3 will have noticed this, which is quite a jarring contrast to last year’s rubbish ported efforts. We now assume that developers have a grasp on the PS3’s technology, and that they’ve somehow adjusted to the awkward development process as the months have slid by. Unfortunately, while remaining a lot of fun, Lost Planet: Extreme Condition is evidence that few publishers really prioritise the PS3.

It’s an absolute dog’s dinner of a port, even though the game beneath it remains perfectly playable. Let’s be clear – Lost Planet: Extreme Condition is rarely hampered by slowdown, but is instead hindered by the blockish graphics, which look nowhere near as tight as the year-old Xbox 360 version of the game. On the plus side, however, every downloadable extra, from the previous versions, is stockpiled for the PlayStation 3, but there are no advantages to the PS3 edition other than this.

On its own design merits, though, Lost Planet: Extreme Condition is more than acceptable. It’s a basic Capcom shoot-’em-up in every sense of the term, and games like it have been kicking around since the Mega Man era. With no threat of differentiation in its structure, Lost Planet: Extreme Condition is accessible enough for most gamers, but the intelligent difficulty levels ensure that the game has a meaningful impact on the player.

As with classic games of its ilk, Extreme Condition is dependent on varying difficulties to set it apart. Play the game on Easy mode, for example, and rolling through the levels is but the merest of tasks – enemies are weak, and they rarely attack, leaving the player with a solid yet brainless action game to pile through. On the hardest difficulty setting, however, Extreme Condition is much more about survival, and the cold weather becomes the greatest enemy of all.

On the game’s HUD is a counter labelled ‘T-ENG’. This stands for thermal energy, which is consumed as you walk around the snowy terrain. Enemies drop thermal energy when they’re felled, but there are also signpost generators that give off massive heat signatures. With these functioning as checkpoints, of sorts, the pressure is on to race to the end of each level without sustaining too much damage; the thermal energy also recharges the health bar when Wayne (the game’s lead character) is injured.

The hunt for thermal energy adds tension to every shootout – if you choose to play it on the hardest difficulty, it’s a much more engaging experience. Even if that turns out to be too hard, though, and you opt for the Easy mode, it still has a lot of character, and the design of it is fluid and thrilling.

This is due, in part, to the sheer brilliance of the Akrid. These creatures often best Shadow Of The Colossus in the size department, and the level of detail on each of them is impressively concise. Even the basic, ten-apenny enemies can surprise the player with their gigantic scale. They’re the main incentive to progress, really, as successive levels offer up more and more huge next-gen baddies to take down. Lost Planet: Extreme Condition is rarely boring, and there’s very little to be frustrated by.

The non-technical issues are, more often than not, with the more minimal aspects of the game. For example, the grappling hook, which is used to reach higher environments, is fiddly and very dysfunctional. While we were hoping for a simplified, Uncharted-style hanging shoot option, the grappling hook in Lost Planet: Extreme Condition is only truly effective when every enemy has already been dispatched. Its use as a tactical advantage is limited, as a single hit will prevent you from reaching higher ground.

Repetition is also a problem. Lost Planet: Extreme Condition is around 12 hours long in Normal mode, but the constant shooting can become quite grating. The mech-style Virtual Suits are do a good job of breaking up the shooting sections, but even they descend into brainless gunning for 90 per cent of the time.

These are small issues, though, when they are compared to the total retardation of the technical issues. The blocky graphics are horrible, angering aspects that could easily have been ironed out in just a few months. How, exactly, does a one-year-old Xbox 360 game look worse on the PlayStation 3? Everything, from the character models to the explosions, has seemingly been layered with a lattice effect, which means that everything is ruined by the blockish visuals. Lost Planet: Extreme Condition is a rushed job on the PS3, without a doubt.

At this point, PlayStation 3 dev kits have been kicking around for at least the last two years – so when will developers finally understand how the console actually works? Given that Devil May Cry 4 functions so wonderfully on the PlayStation 3, we’re at a loose end as to how Lost Planet: Extreme Condition can fall so short. If Capcom had actually sorted this brilliant shooter out for the PS3, then it would’ve received a score of 81%. As it is, though, Lost Planet: Extreme Condition is marred by the truth that somewhere, on another console, somebody is enjoying the game much more than you ever will.

Samuel Roberts