James Bond is a lot of things to a lot of people. Like The Doctor and his TARDIS, Agent 007 exists in many times and places, with just as many personalities and faces. The idea of collecting the seminal moments in Bond history in one entertainment package is enticing, but fraught with difficulty. How do you pick the best parts of a franchise spanning half a century and string them together into a meaningful whole? The answer is more dastardly than any evil volcano lair ever conceived.

007 Legends may sell itself as a celebration of Ian Fleming’s super spy, but it’s actually more of a tie-in with the upcoming Skyfall film. The frame narrative is that during the events of the movie, Daniel Craig’s Bond is shot and begins to have flashbacks about his earlier missions. This is the only thread that holds together the multiple short campaigns, which consist of 2 or 3 missions apiece from Goldfinger, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Licence to Kill, Die Another Day, and Moonraker. Some free Skyfall DLC is inbound, but until then you are left with an incomplete game.

It would be easy enough to criticize the lineup of adventures included in the package. If I have to slog through the terrible level design of innumerable secret hideouts then I want a chance to kick Christopher Walken off of a bridge. It’s only fair. With that said, the attempt to mine your nostalgia may have been in vain anyway–more than a few things are changed. Let’s put aside the fact that Craig is playing Bond in every story, which is a necessary concession. What about the fate of Blofeld and the generic white woman replacing Halle Berry? I’m not a big enough fan of the property to say for sure, but I feel as though some of these alterations border on disrespectful.

Even the strictest adherence to canon couldn’t have saved the gameplay though. The missions in Legends are broken up into three distinct parts: bland shooter segments, short stealth sections, and investigative sequences. To call the gunplay derivative of Call of Duty is insulting to the hard-working people of Treyarch. In truth, the shooting feels more like GoldenEye 64 writ large, as very few few modern techniques are brought into the fold. Instead, much of the action is a shooting gallery full of identical brain-dead enemies. The sole saving grace of the experience is the option to turn off regenerating health, allowing for an old-school med-pack and body armor run-through.

Nothing is wrong with the game’s stealth mechanics on a purely mechanical level, but there are very few opportunities for them to flourish. Each movie has a part or two where sneaking is possible, but they are usually short or far too easy. In fact, I found a few parts of the game that could be completely bypassed by sprinting through all of the patrolling guards. This isn’t possible during mandatory stealth sections in which being spotted causes an automatic mission failure, but you are given more than enough sleeping darts and silenced pistol rounds to manage. There is one stretch of Licence to Kill in which these elements come together in a satisfying way, but the rest of the game squanders its potential.

One mechanic I enjoyed, perhaps ironically, was Bond’s gadgetry. Complicated and outlandish gizmos are par for the series course, but Legends cuts the Gordian Knot and jams everything into a modern smartphone. Need to take pictures of evidence? Smartphone. Need to hack a computer? Smartphone. Need to check for fingerprints? Smartphone. It’s a corny idea, but it works, especially with the little mini-games which are needed to crack safes and infiltrate security systems.

With that bit of back-handed praise out of the way, let me introduce you to the worst aspect of 007 Legends: boss battles. Every fight, whether it be with the iconic Oddjob or the hulking Jaws, is represented by the same quick-time event/min-game. The game tries to present these fights as though they were immersive, but nothing could be more artificial than pushing the analog stick in the direction of a giant flashing prompt. I’ve seen better fighting mini-games in NHL titles. The effect may have been mitigated if it occurred less frequently, but alas.

There are plenty of other disappointing aspects to mention. The texture work is sloppy at best and hilarious at worst, extending from every surface and onto major character models. The upgrade system is perfunctory, as most guns fire similarly and there is little incentive to spend experience points on guns you will probably end up discarding from room to room. It also has to be said that I ran into a few bugs, including enemies sprinting against walls and some odd frame-rate drops. Legends may be marketed as a history lesson, but it has all the earmarks of a movie-licensed cash grab.

The multiplayer portion of the software is functional. Up to 12 players can shoot each other in an attempt to recapture the glory of GoldenEye, but I doubt anyone will stick with it long. Between the disappointing single-player and the impending releases of Black Ops II and Warfighter, I expect the servers to be empty within a week. The ability to play split-screen multiplayer is a nice touch in this day and age though, despite its inclusion ending up as so much polished brass on the Titanic.

007 Legends isn’t worth your time and money, but that doesn’t mean that the core concept is worthless. The legacy of James Bond is more than perfect for an episodic format, which Telltale has proven is reasonably viable. Going even further, I would suggest that future Bond games abandon first-person all together in favor of a more Alpha Protocol approach. We all have fond memories of the N64 days, but this entry has proven that the character has no place in the modern shooter scene. With such a rich body of work to draw from, James Bond deserves better than this. We all deserve better.

A copy of the game was provided by the publisher for review purposes and played to completion in about 4 hours, with an additional 2 hours spent with the multiplayer modes. The title was played on Xbox 360, but is also available for PS3, PC, and (eventually) Wii U.

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