Generic game-play, hidden story in Tron: Evolutions

By Jared Vaillancourt [creative writing bureau chief]

Tron: Evolutions is a video game juxtaposition. What’s that, you ask?

Anyone who’s played The Force Unleashed and/or Mirror’s Edge will basically have played Tron: Evolutions. It incorporates the combo-style combat of the former with the freedom of movement of the latter. Since both of those games sat poorly with the critics, it’s easy to imagine Tron (as most movie-based video games go) surrendering to the same scathing flames. However, this game has something the others don’t: a good story.

Everything else about the game is a generic sham, so never mind. However, the surprisingly in-depth and entertaining legend of Tron: Evolutions follows the tale of Anon (literally: Anonymous), a police/security officer who tries to help Quorra during the movie’s infamous Purge.

If you haven’t seen the movie, Quorra is a type of computer program known as an ISO, a sentient self-determining free radical capable of independent thought. The Purge, on the other hand, is this computer game’s universe’s version of the Holocaust. A basic program named CLU, made in the image of the legendary Kevin Flynn, takes power from that worthy in a bloodless coup in order to eradicate the ISOs. Although Flynn escapes (at the apparent sacrifice of the heroic warrior Tron), Quorra and Anon are the only witnesses to CLU’s treachery.

As CLU’s warriors and war machines work to suppress the citizens of the capital city, Anon and Quorra work to escape and make their way to Arjia city, where the ISOs live in an egalitarian utopia. There they seek the newly elected co-administrator of the entire system, an ISO named Radia. Although Radia still holds ties with her co-administrator CLU, agreeing to help him hunt down the virus that allegedly killed Flynn, she is quick to believe Quorra when she tells her what really happened. Radia sends Anon to another ISO who helped Flynn escape, but before either can make it to their beloved leader, the alleged virus actually appears and kills Anon’s new partner.

Anon barely escapes and finds his way back into Arjia city, which CLU’s warships are in the process of annihilating. Before he can get to Radia, CLU reveals his betrayal to Radia and uses the virus (go figure, he created) to kill Radia. Before Anon can react, Quorra violently attacks, only to be knocked out and kidnapped by CLU’s forces. Anon is caught in the destruction of Arjia city, and passes out in the depths of the grid.

Anon awakes some time later to Flynn himself, who uses the fragments of the dying virus to upgrade Anon’s disk and give him a fighting chance to infiltrate CLU’s flagship. Anon confronts CLU (who remarks, “No one’s managed to kill this guy yet? What the hell!?!”) and defeats his elite guards. The rescue effort is interrupted however, when the virus invades the ship in an attempt to get revenge on CLU. Anon kills the virus, destroys the ship and barely manages to save Quorra before sacrificing himself to ensure her survival. At the end of the game, Quorra watches as Anon dies before her eyes, and wanders the wastelands alone until Flynn rescues her.

In short, the story of the game covers the Purge, as after Anon’s sacrifice, Quorra is the only ISO left alive. Flynn is trapped in the Grid, and the stage is set for the events of the movie. While the game itself is sub-par (and would probably have worked better as a movie by itself), the tale is quite compelling and, for that reason at least, makes the game worth playing. Don’t let the mediocrity of the game engine get you down, though.