It’s 2008. You have just finished a dark sci-fi, action RPG that ends on a cliffhanger. The first in a promised trilogy where you can carry over your created character to the next game, taking your progress with you. No, not Mass Effect, I’m talking about Too Human! The second-to-last game by Silicon Knights is a Diablo-esque dungeon crawler where you battle endless waves of enemies as cyborg Norse god Balder.

In a frozen apocalypse, the last remnants of humanity are protected by the Æsir, cybernetics-enhanced Gods who do battle with Loki’s armies of trolls, goblins and dark elves (all robots; this is a man vs. machines conflict like Terminator or The Matrix) and worship O.D.I.N. the Organically Distributed Intelligence Network, their version of cyberspace. Really. Aesthetically, this game has the vibes and style of a mid-2000’s fantasy action movie that never took off to become a franchise. Like one of Zack Snyder’s lesser movies (I’ll let you decide if that sounds complimentary or derogatory to you.) You play as Balder, the younger brother of Thor with the classic video game protagonist backstory of amnesia, and a dead wife too. There’s plenty of conflict between Balder and the other gods, over whether not they are worthy of the worship of their human followers who live in squalor below the gods’ golden cities.

There are multiple classes to choose from and I chose a Berserker who focuses on dual wielding melee combat. Apparently this was a poor choice as my low health led to me dying constantly, and my melee “strength” wasn’t a strong trade-off. It’s hard to describe how wild this game’s control scheme feels in 2026. The left and right triggers control your firearms, and the left stick is movement. But all melee strikes are controlled by flicking and rotating the right stick in different directions. No camera control, you can only center the camera behind you with the left bumper. In the first third of the game, I felt strong: hacking and slashing my way through hordes of enemies by simply pointing the stick in their direction, juggling them and dashing from one foe to the next. A steep difficulty curve in the second level basically killed my enjoyment of the game though. When you die, a golden Valkyrie appears from the sky to literally revive you as the battle continues around you. It’s nice to not lose any progress when you die, but I probably had to sit and watch this long animation about 50 times throughout the game.

I won’t hold the game’s cliffhanger ending against it, but Too Human lacks a lot of elements that could make it a fun RPG. There aren’t any side quests; town hubs with shopkeepers and quest givers would definitely flesh out the world and story. Maybe it was just my class and build, but I found the combat too unforgiving; a simple concept like healing items would have made it bearable. Constantly dying and watching the respawn animation made Too Human a slog. The game has a pretty infamous reputation at this point, being the second to last game developed by Silicon Knights before 2011’s X-Men: Destiny. Silicon Knights lost a lawsuit to Epic Games over misuse of the Unreal Engine and was forced to delete their game code, and recall and destroy all unsold retail copies of Too Human and X-Men: Destiny. A sad fate for a studio that made some good games, and Too Human is an interesting dud at least.

Game Design: 1/5 Vibes & World: 3/5 Fun to Play: 2/5

Bonus Points:

• Juggling enemies is cool
• Swapping between laser guns and medieval weaponry mid-battle
• Walking around with Mimir’s severed head yapping at you, 10 years before God of War did it

Current ranking of all Xbox 360 games:

• #1 – Singularity
• #2 – Kameo: Elements of Power
• #3 – Too Human