Cabelas Big Game Hunter PS2

Make no mistake, Cabela's Big Game Hunter is a simulator. As in real life, hunting is mostly about choosing the best equipment, and having an incredible amount of patience. Don't believe me? Fire up Big Game Hunter on the medium difficulty setting and try playing with a typical FPS attention span. Be prepared for countless hours of running in circles and staring at trees. There are no run-and-gun play mechanics to be found here. Instead we have a moderately successful attempt at a thinking man's hunting game for fans of the sport.

Big Game Hunter offers two modes of play, quick hunt and career hunt. Quick hunt lets players choose what game they will hunt in any location that has been unlocked. At the onset of the game, only Alaska is available for play. Of course the only way to gain access to new locations is through Career Hunt mode. In order to achieve any amount of success in this game it is important to pay attention to the details while setting up each game.

There are eight locations, each with a number of connected areas. Each sub-location has its advantages for spotting a type of animal. For example, Polar bears are more likely to be found fishing near icy lakes than in a dense forest, or on an ATV riding down a logging road. There is a vehicle available in each level in case players want to head to a new location without quitting the hunt. The vehicles are appropriate to the setting, a snowmobile for the Alaskan winter and a truck for the mountain roads, and have a very simple control setup. One button for gas and one button for reverse.

At the onset, character selection is relegated to six different types of hunters. There is a teenage male, mid-40's male, mid-60's male, teenage female, mid 30's female, and McNeil. Each of these characters has their own strengths and weaknesses for accuracy, strength, stealth, resilience, and tracking. Cabela is covering most of the demographics with these character ranges; however this could have been presented in a more veiled fashion. Having age and experience effect player stats makes sense, but it feels a little goofy to be choosing a character named "mid-40's male." In case you were wondering, McNeil is not some sort of ageless, male/female combination. He is the first of eight bonus characters that can be unlocked by completing each level.