Lions, Tigers and Bears, Oh Crap

949621_106433_frontActivision’s and Cabela’s long-running hunting series hasn’t had the best track record over the years, barely hovering on the mediocre for over a decade, but it’s hard to pass up a Wii game that allows you to track and kill everything from Grizzly Bears to Tigers.

Featuring over 25 different types of animals and nine locations to hunt, “Cabela’s Most Dangerous Hunts 2009” appears on paper at least to be the deepest and most polished hunting game ever released.

However, don’t let the intriguing premise fool you, this game is for the dogs.

You wouldn’t think that a hunting game could be linear, but that’s the best word to describe this one. Rather than have the ability to simply hunt, the story mode puts you in the middle of an environment and forces you to react, making it feel more like a mini-game than a fully-fleshed game mode.

This mistake could be forgiven if it was the biggest, but it’s not.

Far from it.

The actual plot of the story is one so ludicrous that X-rated movies have more interesting characters and depth.

The product description on Cabela’s website provides a solid sample of this:

“Flint Abrahams is on a mission. It’s your job to see him through it in Dangerous Hunts 2009. Flint’s friend and mentor was killed by a vicious bear, so he must increase his hunting skills to find the bear and take it down.”

All you need is Tony Danza as Flint, Bruce Campbell as the mentor and Louis Gossett Jr. as the voice of the Bear and you’ll have a more enjoyable B-movie than anything this game produces. However, while the story is a joke and is void of any type of polish, it gets even worse.

Controlling like a poor man’s Resident Evil 4 on the Wii, Dangerous Hunts 2009 fails to recreate the fun and precision of hunting. Usually forced to defend yourself against several animals at once, the controls don’t allow you to cover enough ground fast enough, resulting in getting mauled time and time again.

Not exactly what you want to happen when you’re hunting.

But then again, we’re talking about a game with a multitude of problems.

Making things easier for you is an “Adrenaline Boost” ability, that slows things down and pinpoints animals via infrared and somewhat makes up for the game’s shoddy control. However, this ability doesn’t save the game and manages to eliminate any realism it could have had. If that wasn’t enough to deter you, you’ll even be attacked by Elephants as soon as you get within their sights. The missions in career mode are timed as well, hurting the game even more.

This is not a hunting game, it is a disaster.

Void as well are any stealth elements that should be incorporated in a decent hunting game, forcing you to keep yourself out in the open and shoot animals that seem to randomly appear. Sure there are “prey calls” and other things you can do to attract animals, such as dragging dead animals and using them as bait, but it all feels rehearsed.

Graphically speaking, Dangerous Hunts 2009’s visuals are the best part of the game, but they too are miserable. Aside from a great-looking intro video and some nice character models of the animals, the game’s graphics look like a muddy PS2 first person shooter, making it another reason to stay as far away from this game as possible.

Considering all of this, regardless of how frugal a gamer you are and how desperate you are to kill endangered species all over the world, this is not a game that is worth any of your time. It’s brainless, rushed and lacks any of the true skill needed to recreate a hunting experience.

In a day and age where everything this side of checkers is being ported over to the Wii, do yourself a favor. If you want to go hunting, throw on a flannel jacket and some timberland boots and jump in your car with your trusty rifle.

Leave this one on the shelf.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 13821 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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