Surreal Software was responsible for the gruesome Suffering series, and while some Midway developers have seemingly spent most of their time trying to figure out ways to become a further embarrassment in the industry, Surreal has spent the last few years developing an admittedly promising new entry to the increasingly plentiful sandbox genre.

This Is Vegas puts its emphasis on fun and excitement as you take your customised character on his journey to become the top dog of Sin City. The story has a powerful businessman attempting to turn Vegas into a family-friendly tourist trap, with you building your own not-so-family-friendly empire to combat his plans. While Vegas + sandbox pretty much sells itself, the storyline should help focus the gameplay a bit.

The game breaks the personalities of Vegas into four specific groups, or ‘suits’, and you will need to interact and earn a reputation with each suit to gain access to additional locations, missions and privileges. Aside from unique and story-driven events, there are also four primary types of activities to keep busy with and build a name for yourself: gambling, racing, clubbing, and fighting.

In regards to gambling, the version on display only had blackjack, slots and poker, with the possibility of other variations such as craps or roulette being added later. If This Is Vegas fails to include as many types of gambling as possible, it will be doing itself and gamers a major disservice. After all, what is Vegas if not the continuous opportunity to drain your bank account and ensure your children will end up in community college? Cheating does add a bit of complexity to the gambling system, allowing you to mark cards, tilt slot machines and use special glasses to know who has what hand, but there absolutely needs to be a greater variety than just blackjack and poker if the game hopes to capture the true spirit of its namesake.

Once you’ve made a little cash you can buy some trendy threads and hit the many clubs scattered throughout the city. The demo revealed Aqua, a respectable spot off the strip in need of a kick-start. To get the party going and the bodies moving you hit the dance floor at the request of your sexy DJ friend, initiating a hybrid Tony Hawk/Bust A Groove dancing mini-game. Dancing near a girl (and possibly another dude, we were too afraid to try) will get them to dance with you, which is a nice touch. After you’ve pulled off your best moves and earned enough party points, you’re beckoned behind the bar to serve drinks, light cigarettes, and crack skulls in yet another fastpaced mini-game.

As the club gets more popular and the drunken losers begin to pour in, you’ll need to take out the trash, Chuck Norris-style. The fighting engine as seen in the demo was disappointingly bare bones, with only punch, grab and block being implemented. Wayne Laybourn, the art director for Surreal promised more moves and special attacks in the finished version, but did say that there will be no levelling up of attributes, like strength or health, a strange oversight in a game that focuses entirely on building every aspect of your character.

These are just a few of the many activities the game will offer and hopefully the developers can keep the game from becoming a monotonous grind à la Just Cause’s side missions. This Is Vegas aspires to be a deep game with a lot of variety and this early version suggests Surreal is on the right track, but there is still plenty to do and a few major design decisions yet to be made before the game’s holiday release. If we had to bet on it, we would say the odds are in This Is Vegas’ favour.

William Haley