The mission design, art direction, and writing here is remarkably shitty for its day. Most [giant finger quotes] "story" is conveyed via obnoxious HUD mission descriptions, and the mission loops are almost always designed around forcing you to revisit an area you've already cleared, so you can collect an item that won't appear until you receive the new mission objective (which, of course, you can only receive after finishing the area for the first time).

While there was definitely a gap in the market for an endless RNG loot loop game on consoles at the time, it's a little surprising an aesthetic style so bland this found an audience so rapidly. Later games would ramp up the annoying epic cheese-monkey humor factor in the dialogue, but unlike this one, you couldn't really argue they lack personality.

Once the DLCs hit, though, the visual language starts to make a lot more sense, if for no other reason than the new environments use a color other than beige.