Graffiti has become a well established art form among many circles nowadays, with some creations going for big money in art galleries across the globe. With its humble roots firmly fixed in defacing surfaces in public places by using marker pens or car spray paint, you simply cannot avoid graffiti in most urbanised areas. Living in London England and also being a frequent user of the capital’s public transport system graffiti is always present in some form or another and seems to be something that local governments can’t battle against entirely no matter what they throw at the perpetrators. This seems to be a theme in Marc Ecko’s Getting Up Contents Under Pressure or Getting Up for short, which tells the tale of graffiti artist Trane who starts the game in a regular graffiti war with rival gangs and ends up taking on the established order of the anti graffiti Government. Life is tough on the mean streets and as the name suggests “getting up” as in getting your artworks painted and noticed by people is the order of the day for Trane as he begins his adventures into urban persecution and criminal activity.

Gameplay
Getting Up is a third person action game which encompasses elements from several genres. Firstly you have a fighting engine which allows Trane to perform limited kicks, punches and throwing moves. Trane is also able to interact with certain objects such as pieces of wood or baseball bats and use these as a weapon although these degenerate with use and will eventually break. The combat is fast, simple and can sometimes pit Trane against 3 foes at any given time making his job of simply painting walls a lot tougher than it sounds. What is amusing is the fact that trane not only has to be wary of authority such as the police but also subway workers and such like who also seem to take pleasure in attempting to beat down poor Trane. Getting Up features a fair amount of stealth as well, which means creeping around avoiding the government police force (CCK) as well as things like security cameras and civvies. Not only is stealth used to navigate the environments but is also a factor when painting (obviously you do not want to be seen committing an act of crime). The stealth isn’t always forced and more often than not you are able to get into the odd skirmish from time to time with the option to stand your ground and fight or run away and hide until things quieten down enabling you to carry on sneaking around in a similar way to the Metal Gear Solid games. Another feature of the game is the general level of puzzle solving exploration and I apologise for making yet another comparison but Tomb Raider did spring to mind on occasion. Trane is a pretty athletic character and I guess he has to be if he is to reach some of the insane painting spots that litter the levels. This means that Trane is able to scale buildings by climbing pipes and clinging onto ledges and such like. Trane also makes for a decent jumper as he is able to jump from say one moving subway train to other without skipping a heart beat! Using the games clever intuition button which switches the view to a first person viewpoint for looking around on the spot, highlights places where Trane will be able to start painting. These spots range from very easy to challenging in working out how to reach them. Some spots offer challenges to complete such as tagging a certain wall within a time limit and a certain number of times. In Getting Up players have to manually paint the surfaces rather than simply pressing a button and have the computer do it for you. What this translates to is moving the right stick over the entire outline of the piece that appears when Trane enters paint mode. Players also have to take into consideration drips which can occur if Trane sprays on one area for too long. Spray cans also need to be shaken or recharged every few moments which means if Trane is painting under pressure with guards almost on him then getting the job done quickly is paramount to his success. Getting Up features a reputation system which unlocks more moves and abilities for Trane. With every bit of graffiti Trane puts up he gains more rep points. Bonus rep points can be gained if Trane can paint within a time limit or uses the largest piece in his repertoire on a wall or if he can paint with no drips. Trane’s adventures start out pretty simple but end up getting quite complicated as he gets further into the thickening plot which is portrayed very well. Trane gets to meet all sorts of characters some friendly and others not so friendly as you would expect. What is pretty neat is Trane can actually meet some real life Graffiti artists who have made cameo appearaces in the game such as SEEN and Futura 2000 to name but a few. At these junctures the true Kings of Graffiti lend there wise words and expertise to Trane where by he learns new skills and also gets them to tag his black book which houses his sketches and artworks. From the main menu players can view the black book and read some biographies of the real artists featured in the game which is pretty neat indeed.

Graphics
The graphics in general are pretty decent and convey the urban feel of the game pretty well. There are some reasonable character models used, who mostly animate well albeit a little stiff looking at times. The graffiti itself is excellent and shows off a variety of styles such as bubble, wildstyle, characters and even top to bottom whole subway car pieces. Players are able to choose which pieces they use from a selection of pieces gained through playing the game which prevents things from getting stale especially if you were forced to paint the same piece over and over. Invisible barriers make their presence felt in Getting Up as well as some inconsistent objects for grabbing onto which look like they can be grabbed and perhaps should be but they cant! Overall the graphics hold up well especially when it comes to presentation as the game menus are all subway inspired, looking exceptionally cool and fitting to the game’s theme.

Sound
Urban street game equals urban soundtrack and that’s what you get here although there are a fair number of musical tastes catered for and it works perfectly whether you like the tunes on offer or not. Graffiti and Hip Hop have always gone hand in hand with each other and therefore Getting Up doesn’t disappoint on this front as some cool tunes are featured. There are loads of tunes to play and hunt for in the game world to play on Trane’s ultra modern i-pod. The sound effects are pretty standard and as you would expect with a touch of ambience thrown in amongst the sound of spraying paint and ball bearings rattling around the insides of a spray can. The voice acting ranges from predictably cliché to good and I think the team did a good job in conveying the story line overall. Trane is acted very well and always has something to say during all stages of the game.

Longevity
Getting Up is a reasonable length game and depending on how good you are at solving puzzles will ultimately determine the game’s length because at times finding the spots required for painting to complete objectives might be the toughest opponent you will find (other than re-spawning guards on occasion). Getting Up features a number of secrets to find across the levels and luckily players are able to replay levels that have already been beaten to try and hunt the things that were missed the first time. Sadly there are no multiplayer modes which incorporate the exploration /graffiti although there is an arena mode where players can duke it out for street supremacy using a number of the game’s characters. There are also some bonus missions thrown in for good measure for players to unlock and tackle as they progress through the story.

Overall
Marc Ecko’s Getting Up Contents Under Pressure is a cool game that is hard to find too many faults with as it mixes things up rather well albeit in rather neat small sections at a time. It’s a shame that players weren’t given a fully free roaming environment to mess around in but what is on offer is the next best thing. Getting Up could be described as Jet Set Radio without the cartoon flavour and minus the roller blades but maybe that’s going too far as really the only thing they have in common are the exploration element and graffiti. I’ve enjoyed playing the game but maybe that is more to do with the fact that I have an interest in graffiti art. I guess people who are into Urban culture will gain more from the game than those who aren’t. For a slice of escapism from the norm then I highly recommend Getting Up as it is taxing at times and often gripping as the story unfolds. Getting Up is a solid title that works and reeks of ultra modern cool.