The long-slumbering Too Human might appear at first glance to offer straightforward sword-swinging and stylized gunplay, but now that we’ve finally gotten to play it after all these years, it turns out it’s actually an ambitious marriage of deep character customization and varied action-strategy. Which of the five distinct classes you pick has considerable impact on how you play, but that’s just the beginning of a long narrative path paved with choice.

Whether you opt for the dual-wielding Berserker and his melee strength, or the Commando and his explosive expertise and ranged prowess, RPG-gear lust kicks in almost immediately. Mechanical goons drop cash bounties, ornate weapons, and rare armor for one of six slots. Crack open crystals and other breakable litter to discover runes, which you can slap into any free sockets your weapons and armor might have, granting stat bonuses and elemental effects. Rare but powerful charms require a bit more work, demanding that you cut down a bunch of a particular enemy and build your rune collection before you can snag mighty talents like Gravity Well, which pulls adversaries into a more easily nuked clump.

Once you hit level 5, your class’s threepronged skill tree opens up in a World of Warcraft–style panoply of possibility, letting you emphasize the traits you find most appealing and effective — whether it’s a Champion’s air-combat acrobatics or the Defender’s protection bonuses. A handful of levels later, you’ll be called upon to pick an alignment: cybernetic disciples might be more immediately potent damage dealers, but humans are blessed with greater flexibility and technical aptitude. In the battle against the machines, you’ll have to decide just how much like the soulless enemy monsters you’re willing to become.

That’s only where the MMO inspirations begin, though. Cooperative online play is being designed to draw together a diverse party of soldiers, with all sorts of auras and complementary abilities. Unlike most modern MMOs, however, players aren’t forced to adopt a narrow developer-defined role to be effective. Even the Bio Engineer, Too Human’s equivalent of a healing class, must do his share of damage to fill up his combo meter, which serves as the basic fuel for all special abilities, from group healing to finishing moves to room-clearing “ruiner” (i.e., smart bomb) eruptions.

Methods abound for destroying the legions of robots that populate each detailed and beautiful architectural marvel. Get right into the thick of it and slice through dozens at a time, launch a couple into the air and juggle them with your firearms, or hang back and demolish them from afar. The adjustable but automatic camera system frees up the right thumbstick for more natural combat control, and it allows you to skate the distance between foes with a simple twitch of your thumb, even in midair. Meanwhile, exploring and opening doors in cyberspace clears paths in the real world while giving you a puzzle-solving interlude between frenzied clashes.

Whether Too Human can rise to the challenges set by its own complex design remains to be seen, but an early turn at the controls only renewed our hope.
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SIDEBAR: Norse of a Different Color

The story of Too Human takes Norse mythology and sends it spinning through a prism of futuristic technology, marauding fl esh-harvesting robots, and human augmentation. You needn’t be a scholar, but the more you know, the more you’ll appreciate the inventive twists.