Xatrix first game was Cyberia, a futuristic game that took place in the year 2027. Xatrix then began making games with a little more humor in them. Redneck Rampage, where Leonard and Bubba save the day, Redneck Rampage Rides Again, Bubba and Leonard are back to save the day, and Redneck Deer Hunting, an entertaining hunting experience all without ever wearing blaze orange. Then came The Reckoning a Quake II Mission Pack. Now they bring us Kingpin: Life of Crime.

If you liked the movie Payback, then you will love this game. It starts off with an angry Kingpin wondering where one of his right hand henchmen (Nikki) is. Little does this Kingpin know that Nikki is conducting a little business of his own, that is, beating the snot outa you, and pretty much sealing the deaths of any mobsters in a fifty mile radius. Fueled by revenge, you make your way to the top of the crime business killing anybody that gets in your way.

Gameplay

Xatrix offers two different types of installations. One for mature people that can handle blood, gore, cussing, and other violent propaganda, and one for the weak of stomach which offered minimal violence with non-explicit language and such and such, of course, I chose the low violence... yeah, right.

Kingpin has seven episodes and twenty-four levels of gameplay. You should notice Kingpin isn’t all about action though, there are some role-playing elements that makes it different from the rest of FPS. The role-playing involves finding money to buy supplies at the local pawn-o-matic. These supplies include weapons, health, weapon mods, ammo, and armor. The weapons are (from weakest to strongest) lead pipe, crow bar, pistol, which can be upgraded with mods such as pistol rate of fire, fast reload, silencer, which is very realistic, and magnum, which boosts the power on the gun. The rest are shotgun, tommygun (my favorite), HMG (a powerful semi-automatic rifle), grenade launcher, rocket launcher, and flame-thrower. There are some more mods, but I don't want to spoil all of the excitement.

Other role-playing elements involve the NPCs, which are computer controlled characters you can interact with. Most of these are characters can give you information on how to get further along in the game. In Kingpin, players will be able to hire up to 2 thugs to act as bodyguards. You have three simple commands for your hired goon. These commands are: Follow, which will make him follow you anywhere, you can tell your goon to do his special move, which is his ability (such as lock picking or explosives expert), or you can simply tell him to stay still. Ryan "Ridah" Feltrin, the maker of the QuakeII Eraser Bot, made the artificial intelligence making your competition as life-like as they get. One addition to the brain bashing violence and list of enemies are rats, big rats that bite.  I didn't like this addition very much, but I didn't mind blowing them away.

Another thing about Kingpin is that it is realistic.  When you are being shot at, your life depletes very quickly. I found myself standing in one spot and shooting with one hundred percent life and when the gunfight was over my life was in single digits. Another great highlight of this game is the blood trails.  Do you ever think you wounded a bad guy but not sure where he went? Its simple, just follow the blood trails...

Sound

I couldn't get the full benefits out of my Sound Blaster Live! Sound card because Xatrix felt it wasn’t necessary to implement specific API support. I could hear people talking faintly even when I was across the street or on the other side of a door, or through a vent that goes in a room full of people.  Walking through the ghetto you can hear cans being kicked and dogs barking.

In the shipyard you can hear foghorns and low rumbles off in the distance from ships coming in. All and all the sound was very impressive. I found myself laughing at some of the characters taunts and ramblings. It seemed like all the characters knew someone that just got killed recently.  Here is the normal conversation between two NPCs:

NPC1: It was a hit alright, big time.
NPC2: Doing the 9 ta 5 stretch.
NPC1: Eh... it's a damn shame.
NPC2: Foe' get about it!

Sometimes I liked to just listen to them talk about nonsensical jabberings... I am more than satisfied with the audio and the interesting characters.

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