My editied notes from SP gameplay
My editied notes from SP gameplay
The details from my four turd rating. These are my opinions, YMMV.
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Firstly, let’s get my biases out of the way. This is important: each gamer will have their own likes and dislike, their own needs and desires, their own ‘hot button’ items for a given game. A review is mostly subjective opinion and experience. As such, views may differ wildly between two players of a game. Objective issues (e.g. technical issues, bugs, etc.) fall into the ‘facts’ category, but clearly player bias influences the impact of these on overall game experience and satisfaction. There really can’t be a ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ subjective opinion: each gamer must make up their own mind in the end as to the quality of a game, barring gross and obvious defects.
I like games that are technically proficient: they run well, with few if any serious bugs. The immersion should not be interrupted by ‘unrealistic’ actions or interactions, at least as far as those having to do with ‘real’ human characters. Sci-Fi games can get away with more here, since who is to say what is ‘real’ in those.
I like eye candy, but not at the expense of game play mechanics.
I like good audio: realistic weapon sounds, character sounds, music. Particularly the latter: really good ‘mood music’ can dramatically enhance the immersion for me, just as good cinema relies on the soundtrack to enhance the viewing experience.
NPC action should seem ‘real’ for me: goofy path finding, retarded activity, etc. can wreck the immersion for me.
Game ‘flow’ is important to me. Don’t cut scene me to death, and FFS, don’t make me have to play too many ‘playable’ cut scenes.
Play time length is important in SP for me. Ten plus hours at $50 for a game seems fair to me. Four or less does not, excepting everything else being absolutely superb. On this, replay value counts a lot for me: open games fare better than very linear games in general.
I am mostly interested in SP: MP Pub play is so wrecked IMHO that other than controlled competitive play or play with trusted friends, I seldom bother playing MP any more.
With that out of the way, my thoughts on Homefront single player, in the rough order of my ‘likes’ above:
Technical Proficiency:
Overall, I encountered only one ‘bug’ (see NPC action below for issues that some might put here but I view as programming choices by the DEVs). A few times, when respawning after a death, a weapon I was carrying was gone, and/or weapons discarded were no longer on the ground. Minor, but irritating, particularly if I’d just made a weapon swap that turned out to be a poor choice. 5:4 aspect ratio seems a bit screwed up: sight picture is oval. I’d like to get wood from the NPC’s supplier. Even thin wood is impenetrable by the most powerful weapon, yet you will see bullet holes tattooed throughout the game’s structures.
B
Eye Candy:
The graphics are good at higher settings. In fact, they're quite acceptable at low settings. Nothing awe inspiring, but good. In most of the game, there seems to be little difference in visual quality between the lower settings and higher settings, despite a fairly significant FPS penalty. Comparing screenshots, the changes are often quite subtle, and in fast-paced play, hardly noticeable except perhaps for water. Some minor and very infrequent ‘hitching’ (from streaming?) on a lower-end test system (Q6600/8800GTS), but quite playable at reasonable settings. No playability issues on high-end test machines.
B-
Audio:
Decent. The character audio is puzzling sometimes, sounding like you’re hearing them over a walkie-talkie, despite them being next to you. Dialogue is a bit b-movie stilted a times, good for a giggle at how cliche it can be. Music ranges from just OK to compelling. Some parts of the game benefited from the music adding to the tension of the mood. Weapon sounds are fair - certainly nothing like the realism of say recent DICE shooters. Saved from a C- by a few quite good sections of music.
B-
NPC action:
Some seriously goofy, robotic path-finding action here. Occasional NPC stupidity is evidenced. Characters crouching behind a box, weapon penetrating said box while shooting is one of the WTF moments seen by me. NPC happily facing away from a fire fight, standing in wildly open space and apparently meditating, yet not incurring the wrath of the enemy is equally bizarre and immersion busting.The inability to pass an NPC at times (‘playable’ cut scenes), or doors / gates / etc. being impassible until all your NPC teammates have passed leads to yet more WTF moments. Typical “got you covered, go do XYZ...NOT” is seen, and NPC often bypass enemy with no ill effects, only to have said enemy stick a barrel up your butt when you pass. Too much “no, really, that enemy is all yours, I insist” action, where an enemy is practically begging to get dispatched by one of your NPC teammates, but they do nothing. Some movement by NPC (bullfrog like leaps, flitting like they have nuclear powered roller skates) is just plain outlandish. Several instances of ‘sneaking’ by enemy NPC, improbably close and all the while having dialogue yelled at you, with nary a twitch from the enemy is immersion killing.
D+
Game Flow:
Decent. A bit fractured - it is not always clear what your character should be ‘doing’. Very linear game play - despite well rendered locales that seem wide open, you will quickly run into the ‘plexiglas wall’ should you try to wander off of the path the DEVs have predetermined for you. The game started to have the feel of Black Ops 'Here’s a little game to go with the myriad of cut scenes’ at times, but thankfully you can quickly skip most of them. A few too many ‘playable’ cut scenes for my liking, with the frustration of slow-mo movement and inability to pass NPC and do something useful. The Dr. Seuss level of prompting (‘Get to the door’...’look at the door’...’find the door knob’...’open the door’...) for goals seems a bit over the top, appropriate perhaps for a first-time gamer, but irritating if you’ve already played FPS genre.
C-
Play Time:
4.9 Hours, goofing off and testing settings and performance. I’d guesstimate 4 hours for an average FPS player, perhaps a couple of hours on easy and storming through the game. Just when I expected I was about to view a cut scene leading to the mega-battle in the big city, the credits rolled for my biggest WTF moment in the game.Were the game open, replayability might save this, but it is not, and unlike something like Half-Life 2 that has high replay value for me despite being quite linear, there is no desire to play this game again. MP play seems to be satisfying to gaming friends that are playing the game in this mode, but does not enter into my assessment in the SP context.
D-
Overall, with my personal biases weighted for my game desires, a D+/C- game in SP. Worth the $10.00 it cost me considering the free Metro 2033 game the pre-orders garnered, but nothing more. If SP is important to you, wait for the game to be on sale.