Posted: Tue Nov 30, 2010 10:00 am
Red Faction -
You are a miner on Mars and very oppressed by the corrupt government. While mining a rebellion breaks out and you become their big gun.
This is an FPS that was really pushed due to it's environment. The claim was you could blow up anything. That's true as long as you're blowing up things in your linear path...except doors.
This was a late 90s game so expect limitations in the graphics and sound.
Decent game for its time, and despite showing its age, its still ok to run through once. Although, it does suffer from some flaws. A few:
1. No autosave
2. Ridiculously hard boss battles...until you learn the trick, then they're ridiculously easy.
3. Horrible AI that spawns enemies and makes some of them expert marksmen.
A retro FPS that'd be worth grabbing as part of a package deal or under $3.
Red Faction 2 -
Red Faction had you playing a miner named Parker in the desolate Martian landscape. In RF2 you play as Alias the demolitions man on an elite special forces team tasked with taking down a dictator named Sepot.
First things first, I have no idea where this storyline came from. The original is never mentioned and Mars (if the game is even set there) went from desolate landscape to urban jungle. This is the Halloween 3: Season of the Witch of the Red Faction series.
The story is written really badly too. An example of that is the two big name actors they hired to do voiceovers, Jason Statham and Lance Henricksen, are barely in the majority of the game, and half the game is about one of them!
Again, destructible environments are the big selling point, and again, it works only on the linear path the game walks you down.
Like the original, a few variations are thrown in to change up the pace. For example, you'll be the gunner in an airship and pilot a sub. The sub moments being the absolute worst parts of the game. The game begins getting choppy during those scenes and sub control is ridiculous (Hint: when fighting other subs, just climb up and down constantly while firing and you'll win.).
The boss fights in this one are similar to Red Faction, crazy hard until you learn the trick, and then they're simple. Even so, I reached a point late in the game where I got bored with fighting the same mutated super soldiers over and over and over again that I turned on the super health cheat and walked to the end of the game. It just got too boring and I have a ton of other games on my PC waiting to be played.
I guess it's a good time killer if you have nothing else going on and you've beaten all the other games you own. Otherwise, you can skip it.
I just realized this was released 4 years after Half-Life and doesn't come close to that experience. Ouch.
Red Faction: Guerrilla -
Mars is a desolate landscape again...but I'm currently playing it so I'll save the full review.
Early impressions:
-It's obviously a console port.
-The driving controls are terrible.
-They have left the FPS genre.
-This is essentially GTA on Mars.
-The story is MUCH improved over RF2.
-The destructible environment has really improved.
-Fun so far despite its flaws.
You are a miner on Mars and very oppressed by the corrupt government. While mining a rebellion breaks out and you become their big gun.
This is an FPS that was really pushed due to it's environment. The claim was you could blow up anything. That's true as long as you're blowing up things in your linear path...except doors.
This was a late 90s game so expect limitations in the graphics and sound.
Decent game for its time, and despite showing its age, its still ok to run through once. Although, it does suffer from some flaws. A few:
1. No autosave
2. Ridiculously hard boss battles...until you learn the trick, then they're ridiculously easy.
3. Horrible AI that spawns enemies and makes some of them expert marksmen.
A retro FPS that'd be worth grabbing as part of a package deal or under $3.
Red Faction 2 -
Red Faction had you playing a miner named Parker in the desolate Martian landscape. In RF2 you play as Alias the demolitions man on an elite special forces team tasked with taking down a dictator named Sepot.
First things first, I have no idea where this storyline came from. The original is never mentioned and Mars (if the game is even set there) went from desolate landscape to urban jungle. This is the Halloween 3: Season of the Witch of the Red Faction series.
The story is written really badly too. An example of that is the two big name actors they hired to do voiceovers, Jason Statham and Lance Henricksen, are barely in the majority of the game, and half the game is about one of them!
Again, destructible environments are the big selling point, and again, it works only on the linear path the game walks you down.
Like the original, a few variations are thrown in to change up the pace. For example, you'll be the gunner in an airship and pilot a sub. The sub moments being the absolute worst parts of the game. The game begins getting choppy during those scenes and sub control is ridiculous (Hint: when fighting other subs, just climb up and down constantly while firing and you'll win.).
The boss fights in this one are similar to Red Faction, crazy hard until you learn the trick, and then they're simple. Even so, I reached a point late in the game where I got bored with fighting the same mutated super soldiers over and over and over again that I turned on the super health cheat and walked to the end of the game. It just got too boring and I have a ton of other games on my PC waiting to be played.
I guess it's a good time killer if you have nothing else going on and you've beaten all the other games you own. Otherwise, you can skip it.
I just realized this was released 4 years after Half-Life and doesn't come close to that experience. Ouch.
Red Faction: Guerrilla -
Mars is a desolate landscape again...but I'm currently playing it so I'll save the full review.
Early impressions:
-It's obviously a console port.
-The driving controls are terrible.
-They have left the FPS genre.
-This is essentially GTA on Mars.
-The story is MUCH improved over RF2.
-The destructible environment has really improved.
-Fun so far despite its flaws.