Too Human

Too Human is an action role-playing game from a third-person perspective. The player takes control of the lead character Baldur in a third-person perspective with the camera distance being adjustable, even controllable during some in-game cinematics to involve the player in the story further. Camera control is limited to the player, with the choice to re-adjust the camera back to its default third-person view being the primary feature following the player and swinging when the player does the same, similar to an auto targeting system. This is because the right analog stick is used for melee combat, instead of camera control, with certain attacks and combos being executed by pushing the stick in the direction of the target with follow-up stick movements applying further attacks with projectile attacks only using an auto lock-on system.

Attacks can be combined to execute attacks such as performing combos on enemies in mid-air, attack slides, and juggling foes in the air with projectile weapon attacks. Another aspect of combat are "Ruiner" attacks, powerful abilities that can indirectly affect surrounding enemies and can be mixed with other attacks to perform finishing strikes.

Too Human is set in a science fiction reimagining of Norse Mythology, wherein the Norse gods are cybernetically augmented warriors worshipped by so-called mortals, which are non-augmented humans.

Before the Dawn of the Æsir, the machines called the "Children of Ymir" stalked Earth, bent on destroying humanity. As the war escalated, man and machine exchanged nuclear and anti-matter weapons, leaving the world frozen in a thousand-year winter. Humanity now teeters on the brink of extinction. Earth's population is now only a few million sheltered in the walled enclave of Midgard.

Too Human was announced by the developer Silicon Knights in 1999 to be released on the PlayStation, with a first teaser showing during E3 that same year. Unlike its eventual format on the Xbox 360 as a single disc, the game was to be released across four CD-ROMs bundled together (a similar format to that of Final Fantasy VIII released in 1999). Also unlike the finished product, the plot, while involving the theme of human cybernetic enhancements, was to be set in the distant future of 2450 AD instead of the alternate science fiction take on Norse mythology.

Development halted when Nintendo announced an exclusive partnership with Silicon Knights, and the game was moved to the GameCube in 2000. Prototyping for the game took place on the GameCube, but the staff at Silicon Knights soon devoted their efforts towards two other releases, Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem and Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes, with no further news of Too Human, without any indication of future development being announced until five years later in 2005.

Upon the game's release, Too Human received a mediocre to fair reception from critics with an average review score of 68.59% at GameRankings and 65/100 at Metacritic. NPD Group reports that the game sold approximately 168,200 copies during the month of August 2008 in North America; it was the eighth best-selling game in the region during that time. Too Human "sold around 700,000 units" quoted from Denis Dyack in a Joystiq interview.

The game's concept of mixing science fiction with Norse mythology was praised by critics with X-Play saying while it "sounds like a stretch, on the whole, it works" where "the art direction manages to seamlessly blend the grandeur we think of with this mythology and make it come alive again with a healthy dose of futurism". IGN found it to do "a great job of keeping you engrossed in the game". It found the game's audio to be its stronger part, calling the music and voice acting "top-notch". Graphically, GameSpot was most impressed with the environments that "feature excellent detail and lighting, with towering statues lording over the proceedings and shafts of light spilling onto mounds of snow". However it did note "each setting seems much like the last", with "stiff combat and facial animations [that] become more and more noticeable", a point Game Revolution echoed by stating "the game begins strongly with some stunning art design throughout the first level" before becoming too familiar.