So it's the game of the film of the book, eh? Quite frankly, the thought of meeting that Axl Rose out of Guns 'n' Roses in a dark alley is slightly more horrific than meeting Arnie. Still, that's by the by and, after a pointless effort to let you know how scared I am of Axl Rose, we'd better take a look at the game.
Level One - The shopping mall - Enter Arnie stage right, and the strange liquid bloke stage left. If you play this game anything like I do, it will run as follows: Arnie kicks the other bloke. Bloke turns his hand into a spike and stabs Arnie. Arnie tries to punch him. Arnie misses. Bloke head-butts (or rather blob-butts) Arnie. Arnie kicks. Arnie kicks. Arnie kicks. Arnie kicks. Bloke melts. Bloke reforms himself. Arnie keeps kicking. Bloke eventually dies after doing various liquidy things. [Why do I get the feeling that everyone's going to write in, having followed this paragraph to the letter and then lost? - Ed]
Level Two - The flood channel - Enter Arnie on a cool Harley, with John Connor draped over the back, being pursued by the same rather scary liquid bloke in a pretty hefty truck. The idea here is to outrun the truck, whilst not smashing into tyres, sofas (Well, they look like sofas!) and the other stuff that litters the highway. If you do, both Arnie and John lose even more energy. There are also puddles to skid about in and drink cans that, for some reason, seem to cause immense hassle. [I think they're meant to be petrol cans actually. - Ed]
Later on, you get some smart puzzle bits to work out. In Level Three, you have to operate on the Terminator's arm. It's one of those rearrange-the-blocks puzzles and it's fiendishly difficult. Still, everything's made a bit easier by the friendly controls. If you're kicking yourself with frustration, it won't be because of the joystick. A couple of levels later, you have to do the same thing with old Termy's head. The levels kind of repeat themselves, so you get a couple of other racey levels and a couple of fighty ones. They may be quite similar ideas, but they get progressively more difficult. One thing's for sure, this is a blimmin' hard game.
Like Arnie (okay, I admit it, I can't spell his last name), this game is immense and well 'ard. You've seen those games where you complete them in a matter of seconds? Well, this is definitely not one of them. You will progress further every time you play, but you won't complete this on your second go. You'll definitely keep on trying and there are certain skills that you'll slowly get the gist of, and some that'll take a little longer to master. Indeed, there are a wide range of skills needed, not least puzzling out just how to fit all those blocks into Arnie's unfinished fizzog.
This isn't just a fighting game, a racing game nor a puzzle game. It is in fact a combination of all the elements that have created classic games in the past. Whether this was a deliberate strategy on the part of the programmers, or whether the plot of the film simply lent itself rather easily to this format isn't clear. Whichever way round though, you'll have a lot to do.
So how does it measure up? Well, as an action game, it's got it all, or most of it at least. And it's even got those lovely puzzley bits. It's nicely presented, with some good graphics, and incidental loading screens. It's definitely worth a review, which is a good job really!