Major downfall was the pre-release hype it received and the lack of story it delivered...
One of the things I liked was the logging of stats, along with the variable difficulty it adds some replay value to an otherwise very short game. No complaints about the machine gun either, that turned out to be my favorite weapon w/ the grenade launcher secondary fire. I liked the recoil effect it had as well. The nades were fun, and I rightfully earned my status by the end of the game as accomplished pineapple tossin lieutenant john blade: champion for hire. Also the headshots were cool no matter how many times you saw it.
One of the things that hurt this game is definitely the guns. There just aren't enough rampage worthy guns, I found the shotty to be just shy of completely worthless. Pistol was ok except for that awkward zoom mode: what ever happened to crosshairs?? I used the zoom once or twice in the first section and never used it again.
The biggest thing that hurt the game was the lack of an involving story. Honestly I went to write this review and couldn’t remember for the life of me what the plot of the game was without looking it up... if that tells you anything.
Besides the lack of story and arsenal I thought the game was a good all around shooter. Kept me entertained for a while, even though it only took me a little over 5 hours to complete, I played a little bit every few days. Will I buy the next one though? Eh... we’ll see, but I have a feeling if Ritual doesn’t step it up with the next two episodes we certainly won’t see the predicted 9.