Genre: First Person Shooter; Sub-genre: Stealth
ESRB: M (profanity, machine gun violence and arbitrary female nudity)
Estimated hours of gameplay (thorough play/quick play): 24?/??
Developer: 4A Games
I suppose this was bound to happen eventually. For the first time I am attempting to review a game that I played but did not play completely to the end. Looking at a walkthrough on Gamefaqs.com, I've determined that I've gotten about halfway through it. So why am I still reviewing it? Well, it took a significant chunk of my time away from me. So I'm writing a review, dammit. But why did I stop playing it? It's simple: it's booooooooooooring.
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| Oh, boy! Nothingness! |
I put it on a harder difficulty and that did little to make the game a challenge (there's another difficulty you can add called "Ranger Mode" but that is only available as a pre-order bonus or paid DLC). Perhaps if I played the game as the achievements screen wanted me to by using all stealth and not killing anyone I would have had a challenge. But considering the lack of features in stealth (your best weapons are waiting, melee punching, and blinding night vision) and the fact that that is a boring way to play a game that gives you a whole bunch of guns, consumables, and ways to customize said guns I don't see why I would want to. The problem with both the stealth and the gunplay is that they exist in these limiting levels and they step on each other's toes. The game takes place in an underground subway thing so most of your time is spent in incredibly cramped, dark hallways. The enemies are bored out of their minds staring at the black walls so there's no extra fun things to watch while you wait and survey the land. A game like Hitman: Blood Money makes waiting interesting because the NPC's have THINGS TO DO so it's fun to see what their lives entail. Also, in that game and not this one, the levels are big and open with all kinds of paths to explore. Another stealth-heavy game, The Last of Us, makes stealth interesting through use of tension. Here, it doesn't matter if you fail because you have a selection of awesome guns with unending ammo; at any point you can just blast everyone in sight. And because of all the stealth mechanics in place the enemies are so much easier to defeat using conventional methods.
There are some levels that take place topside, out of the subway, but they are shorter. You have to manage your gas mask filters and can run out of air if you waste too much time. So instead of allowing me to explore this beautifully tragic world I'm forced to hurry along and finish the level. The ONE thing I kept wanting to do in this game was explore. This game does NOT want you to explore. Even if you find an area to be a little more open, it is very minorly so and only rewards you with some gas mask filters to make up for lost time (that's if you are lucky).
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| Look out, Spiders! Next you might have to fight a Giant Rat! |
If this game has a strong point, it is the story. Not that I cared about what was going on for a single second, but this world has been carefully crafted. For some reason the player character doesn't speak. That wouldn't be so strange if not for the fact that he narrates the opening of the game and between each level. Is he just socially awkward or something? Luckily, everyone in the world is rather used to dealing with psychotic mutes and is able to maintain a one-way conversation as though that's a commonplace practice. Putting that aside as best I can, it's hard to connect with this game. I tend to blame myself for this one as this setting is too familiar for me. A setting is generally much more emphasized in a video game than any other media because the player is meant to form his or her own feelings and opinions on it rather than view those things occurring to the characters in the story. I've seen this stuff before, so I just don't care.
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| So the world was destroyed by nuclear war yet, somehow, Nazi's are back? |
Conclusion:
A competently put-together game. It has no flaws other than my expectations for something more. It should probably be given three stars, but because I was so unbelievably bored it became a one star. I compromised and gave it two.
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