Rabbit Run: Marc Ecko’s Getting Up – New Radius Freeway

Game: Marc Ecko’s Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure
Level: New Radius Freeway
Developer / Publisher: The Collective / Atari
Game Released: Feb 14, 2006
System: Xbox
ESRB Rating: Mature 17+ (Blood, Violence, Strong Language)
Spoilers: Just level footage, glimpses of cutscenes. Minor character spoiler.
Length of Run: 6:33 min.
Played By: Tommy Gun

For more information on the game, you may want to read my Getting Up review.

Calling this a Rabbit Run may seem a bit weird. It’s pretty much just normal gameplay, there aren’t a whole lot of shortcuts that can be taken. Still, it was done as fast as possible, and more importantly, I chose this level because it shows off a lot of different elements: climbing, balancing, multiple graffiti styles, and lots of combat with different weapons. The level itself is also really cool. In fact, this was the first level of the game that really got my attention. Up until here the levels had been pretty small and not as exciting as I wanted, but after playing this I was finally satisfied. Unfortunately this level is the very middle of the game (literally; the first level of “Act II”), which means it’ll be a while till you get here if you haven’t played the game yet.

Making the Video:

As lame as it is to say, this actually isn’t a single-segment run (I let Gabe die in the final section, so I had to restart). I only did the run once (after beating it the first time, and practicing once). I didn’t bother doing it over again. For one, there just wasn’t really a point, especially since there are cutscenes that break up the parts anyway (flow is already broken). Two, the part where the worker runs after me and falls is just too good to not leave in, since it probably wouldn’t have happened again. Third, there are enough camera problems and shoddy controls that some lame mistake was bound to happen and the run would never be perfect. It’s not really a game I care enough about to try to perfect.

Notes on this Run:

0:10 I left in the menus at the beginning just because they’re cool. However, I edited out all the loading parts, so it’s really fast. If you play the game, it won’t be that short.

0:29 You’re supposed to time your run through the cars (i.e., wait), but you can jump if they’re about to hit you, and you can also stop in between cars.

0:31 You can’t jump over the median block because of the auto-grab controls. I should have just restarted, but I left it in because it’s a great example of how that can get annoying. Yes…that’s why. Then watch the camera shift to the completely wrong direction.

0:53 Awesome music. I guess it isn’t a “real” song though, because it’s not on the soundtrack or anything. EDIT: After nearly a year of wondering, I finally found out the name of this song! Thanks to the internet, the song is: Kasabian – “Club Foot”.

0:57 No point in beating up the workers here, unless you want to get the bonus graffiti.

1:05 Cutscene, skipped. Obey!

1:33 Here’s a tiny shortcut. It’s a bit faster to jump the gap than walk all the way around, even though you’ll have to turn around to do it, which takes forever. Dammit Trane, turn!

1:44 Don’t you love how the camera switches to a totally arbitrary angle not anywhere near where you actually want to go?

1:51 I missed this jump a couple times before filming just because the camera kept moving to lock onto the enemy. Watch the worker fall! Hah! If you don’t kill him he’ll throw stuff at you while you’re climbing, so I was lucky here.

3:00 This was a mistake, if you’re not close enough to the large graffiti, you’ll do something else, like use a marker, sticker, stencil, etc. The lock-on is a bit weird sometimes.

3:26 Good example of the many graf/billboard modifications you do. “Ruining the future for everybody!”

3:57 If you jump at the last second you can grab the top like I did, otherwise you’ll have to climb up a bit. Saved a tiny bit of time here.

4:07 Cutscene. It actually forces you to watch Gabe climb around, but since it’s a checkpoint and I had to restart anyway, I just edited it out.

4:27 I grabbed the car battery on the way to the last tag so I wouldn’t have to run back for it during the fight that’s about to happen.

4:53 Ready? FIGHT! Here you get to see a whole lot of stuff: multiple weapons, spray paint flame thrower, insult moves…the combat actually looks much more interesting here than it usually is. The flame thrower is actually really weak. You’d think setting someone on fire would hurt them pretty badly, wouldn’t you? It’s useful to distract them for a bit though, and you could throw them off the edge, but I wasn’t really ever close enough. If you’re wondering why I never picked up those red bolt cutters, it’s because they can’t be used as a weapon, they’re for cutting that lock on the fence.

6:56 Ending cutscene, skipped.