Genre: Action
Publisher: Midway
Developer: Terminal Reality
Release Date: September 5, 2006

Raise your hand if you like Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. If you don't, well, get used to him. You're going to be seeing a lot of him in Spyhunter: Nowhere to Run. He has been set to star in a Spyhunter film for ages now, so Midway scooped him up to star in the latest game as well. His name is Alex Decker, and by the time he's done, NOSTRA will either fear him or be destroyed.

This new Spyhunter's biggest selling point, other than The Rock, of course, is the fact that for the first time in a Spyhunter game, you're going to be allowed to leave the car. In fact, in the preview build we played, you pretty much had equal time on foot and in the driver's seat. Specific levels require specific tools, so you may find yourself racing away from your enemy on a busy river with your car transformed into a boat at one point, only to come to a stop at a dock and exit your ride for some old-fashioned hand-to-hand combat.

The hand-to-hand combat is fully motion captured by The Rock himself and looks good even in the preview build. You have your standard punching attacks, but holding the attack button will let you whip out what basically amounts to a fatality. The Rock will punch a bad guy hard enough to stun him, and then you'll have a chance to hit any of the face buttons. Depending on which button you press, you'll get a quick move where The Rock dispatches his foe with a suplex, a backbreaker, a Rock Bottom, or another wrestling-themed move. You can even grab an enemy and hold him over your head so that you can throw him into a wall, over an edge, or into his buddies.

This doesn't mean that hand-to-hand combat is it, however. Alex Decker is a spy hunter, and spy hunters need guns. You'll come across a wide variety of weapons, with everything from machine guns to handheld pistols. You have a limited zoom option for when you need pinpoint shooting. Decker is also able to hug a wall, allowing you the ability to fire from cover. If you're in a tight spot, you can also duck and hide behind cover.

It wouldn't be a Spyhunter game without a couple of things. The first is that good old-fashioned Peter Gunn theme song, which has made the translation intact, although the rest of the music seems content to be a little generic. The second is the car. Spyhunter is all about the car. The series is 23 years old now, and everyone loves the Interceptor.

Good news: The Interceptor is still awesome. You've got all the classic weapons at your beck and call, which is definitely a good thing because you'll need them. Whether you're driving the Interceptor in car mode or boat form, you'll be going up against a few enemies at a time on the ground, and then probably a few more in the air, and then still more that are gun emplacements or something similar. You can break out with the classic wheel spikes whenever you like, which is always fun when you're surrounded on all sides. When you pull off a particularly cool kill, of which there are many, you're treated to a "crash cam," a kind of slow-motion, zoomed-in view of the other vehicle wrecking.

You're going up against the evil NOSTRA organization in Nowhere to Run. Our preview build started with the Interceptor being stolen. From there, you have to infiltrate a NOSTRA boat (don't worry, there's very little sneaking) and then retrieve the car. Easier said than done? Most definitely, but that doesn't make it any less fun.

Spyhunter: Nowhere to Run is shaping up to be a fun arcade-style shooter. Everything that made the original Spyhunter cool has made it intact and is reflected in both the driving and shooting portions of the game. The Rock's controls are simple and intuitive. If you spend at least 10 seconds with the game, you'll have the hang of it. At that point, pulling off special moves, blowing other cars off the road, and firing noxious black clouds out of the back of your ride will be second nature. Spyhunter has always been about fast-paced action, cool explosions, and cool cars. With the addition of being able to do missions on foot, Nowhere to Run is going to deliver that in spades.