Is it a car? Is it a boat? Spy Hunter's PS2 debut elects to answer: (D) all of the above.

Published in Official PlayStation2 Magazine, September 2001

When the original Spy Hunter first appeared way back in 1983, its central gimmick -- a car which could also turn into a boat to travel across water -- and smoothly addictive gameplay made it stand out easily from the numerous clone racing titles littering the arcades. Of course, two decades later a self-transforming vehicle that shoots at a few enemy spies is hardly enough to make discerning gamers drool over their flat screen TVs. Fortunately, Spy Hunter has been completely rebuilt for its PS2 debut.

In this update, not only has the perspective changed from an overhead view of a straight road to a three-dimensional, behind-the-car vista, but the G-6155 Interceptor (your vehicle) has quite a few new tricks up its sleeve. There's a total of 14 missions on offer to test its capabilities. Each requires you to race around a variety of well-developed, distinctly James Bond-style locations (the streets of Frankfurt, tropical swamps, Columbian drug lairs amongst them) and complete risky espionage tasks, ranging from blowing up helicopters to picking up satellite communications devices.

Your Interceptor still turns into a boat when you hit water, and offers an impressive 360 degree view of the process the first time you do it, but that's not the only switch on offer. Take too much damage from poor steering or enemy attacks and you'll transform into a somewhat less sexy looking motorcycle.

That can be to your advantage, as the cycle is easier to manipulate and can sneak through some tight spaces the car doesn't handle well. Drive into the open back of one of the orange weapons trucks (another detail from the original) and you can switch back to car form, as well as picking up extra weapons to blast the endless stream of enemy agents trying to ruin your day.

While you can't drive blind, the steering is forgiving enough that you can concentrate on the important tasks of destroying most everything in sight and finishing as many tasks as possible. Each mission only requires that you complete the primary objective, but you can't access later missions without a set number of points, so rest assured you'll be playing most of them more than once in a bid to rack up the numbers.

A new two-player option (complete the mission while trying to wreck your opponent's car) is further incentive to keep playing, but you probably won't need it. Even in unfinished form, this is just as addictive as the original, and far more challenging and varied.