Less is More - Or Less is Less = An OK Game
Ok I put better then 12 hours into Team Death Match (TDM) since the release of FEAR: Combat. I'll note that despite my take the number of servers and players has increased quite a bit. With that my feelings from my initial review are about the same if a bit lessened. The game is pure action, and that in my view is a part of its waning appeal. After a week the l33t skills of hopping like a rabbit and getting multiple "Unarmed Attack" kills has settled in.
There is no real reward for taking a knee and iron sighting your target. That really just makes you a clay pidgeon. I'll note that today I resited from doing so and simply ran and gunned my way through corridors throwing greneades and mines to good effect. I also saw a great many (what had to be new players) crouching and aiming then getting mowed down like blades of grass by hopping oponents. Not a pretty picture.
Bad Level Design
I thought it would take a while to get used to FEARs level design. Primarily corridors with very few areas for open space fighting. Well I have to say I didn't. Most levels while looking nice are a mish mash of winding corridors that run into each other.
Because of this a majority of action takes place in tight quarters with grenades, rockets, and gunfire going off taking out 3 to 4 people indescrimently. If there's a saving grace about these levels its that it commits players to work together, but that's about as strategic as it gets. There are generaly 3 to 4 men groups running in packs that run into one another.
There is one level I like better then most and that is the Cafeteria. This one actually does create skirmish points and choke points where teams try to advance on one another. I've been in some real great heated battles here as this level keeps teams trying to take the perrimeter while others dare to take the central corridor. Alas, that is the only level that feels strategic.
Achilles Heal
The smallest of details detracts from the overall possibilities of this game and that is the armor and health power ups. I can get into the action side of this game as I can get into Counter Strike: Source, but the Armor power ups steal away the whole ballance of weaponary in this game. I really like the fact that you have to stay on your toes to avoid getting shot. You spawn into the game with regular armor and 100% health. It takes a minimal amount of rounds from most any weapon to take you down.
Unfortunately the Armor power ups reduce the weapon ballance to such a degree that skiled/veteran players know exactly where these are and will always run through less advanced players. Of course the ensuing "You XXXXXXX Cheat" or "Haxor" remarks fly.
Limited Time
FEAR:Combat is fun but its long term appeal is limited. having gone to the official forums, it looks like the mod teams are having their own issues designing new levels. Without much a of a Mod or Map making following, even this Free download doesn't look to last very long on my hard drive.
Saturday, August 26, 2006
Sunday, August 20, 2006
FEAR: Combat - Full Free MP Download
Download - Install - And Play
Sierra and Monolith have made the complete multiplayer portion of FEAR Combat available for free.
http://www.joinfear.com/
Here's what you get in the complete (1.8 gigabytes)download
F.E.A.R. Combat features:
- 10 Multiplayer Game modes.
- 19 Multiplayer Maps.
- 12 different weapons.
- Punkbuster support for anti cheat support.
- The capability to download user generated content.
OK - How Does This Play?
In a nutshell - FEAR Combat is fun. Or can be fun.
FEAR is not a pretentious FPS simulation by any stretch of the imagination. A may look like Rainbow 6, but is far from it. Anyone looking for realism had better look elsewhere.
What FEAR does offer is a straight forward "gun and run" fun. That's right - Gun and Run. That's right - There's little penalty for being at full sprint or strafing and firing of multiple rounds. This is more like Counter Strike on Steroids. There are conventional weapons and then there are sci-fi weapons like the Plasma gun which will remind many of the Quake 2 Rail gun. The Penetrator is more like a souped up Nail gun that shoots steel bolts that pin the target to nearby walls like poster art.
Although I was not able to figure out how, there are hand or better foot to head combat moves that I received more than once. Pretty lethal in close quarters.
Although my mind is more into crouching and iron site my target, it tends to leave you vulnerable to a strafing combatant that's firing and can lob a grenade. Its better to keep your mind open to bolt/strafe and grenade an area with your team mates.
Yes, team mates. One of the shining graces that makes FEAR stand out is its encouragement of team play.
Team Combat
Fear excels in allowing the player to review where his team mates are and what condition they are in. Well - when they are alive and dead. You see floating icons on the screen. These are the positions of your team relative to you. When you men go down you will see Skull and Crossbone icon giving you the warning to proceed with caution.
So FEAR may be less realistic but it offers very useful simple icons to aid in team play. To be sure, there were plenty of times I faced large groups of combatants. Its hard to argue the effectiveness of this icon system to weed out fractured units and lone gunmen. The barrage of bullets sparking and splintering wood along with grenade shockwaves are enough to make you fall back and find some others. You can easily give a command and pinpoint the enemy position which will show a red marker on all your teams screen.
Looks Good and Looks Can Kill
FEAR is for the most part balanced. An action game with unique multiple weaponry and varied game modes, and it doesn't skimp in the visual department. Now here is where FEAR might strike fear into potential players. It as pretty high system requirements. Not as steep as the single player demo but High none the less. I tested the MP on a OC'd AMD @ 2.2 with 1 Gig of 3200 Ram - Radeon 9800 XT and Audigy 2. I was able to get smooth play in 800x600 with medium settings. Using an AMD64 FX53 Radeon X800PRO Audigy 2 ZS with settings just above my OC'd unit.
So if your running anything under 2.0 GHz and a lower range video card you may need to forego many of the nice effects FEAR MP offers. I know I didn't even consider buying FEAR after playing the SP demo simply because it brought my highest end system to its knees.
It was a bold move by Sierra in deciding to offer MP for free. A game I and others had otherwise written off. I am sure there are thousands of first time players like myself that are impressed with this offering. Now many may consider buying the full game now to give the SP a run.
MP Maps
In closing I thought I'd comment on the MP maps. Better put, the TDM maps as I played more TDM than anything else. The maps look nice but may be more winding than is necessary. You really have to play the maps allot to get your bearings. Most are indoors with multiple levels. Getting to where your guys are can get tricky. This uneeded complexity in corridors minimizes skirmish or choke points that can make TDM so much fun. Only one or two maps are designed to bring on a focused firefight on multiple levels.
It's up to the modders and mappers to build complimentary maps that highlight FEARs strategic team potential. With this free offering, theres a real good chance that will happen now.
I give the FEAR Free download a solid 4 of 5 stars
Sierra and Monolith have made the complete multiplayer portion of FEAR Combat available for free.
http://www.joinfear.com/
Here's what you get in the complete (1.8 gigabytes)download
F.E.A.R. Combat features:
- 10 Multiplayer Game modes.
- 19 Multiplayer Maps.
- 12 different weapons.
- Punkbuster support for anti cheat support.
- The capability to download user generated content.
OK - How Does This Play?
In a nutshell - FEAR Combat is fun. Or can be fun.
FEAR is not a pretentious FPS simulation by any stretch of the imagination. A may look like Rainbow 6, but is far from it. Anyone looking for realism had better look elsewhere.
What FEAR does offer is a straight forward "gun and run" fun. That's right - Gun and Run. That's right - There's little penalty for being at full sprint or strafing and firing of multiple rounds. This is more like Counter Strike on Steroids. There are conventional weapons and then there are sci-fi weapons like the Plasma gun which will remind many of the Quake 2 Rail gun. The Penetrator is more like a souped up Nail gun that shoots steel bolts that pin the target to nearby walls like poster art.
Although I was not able to figure out how, there are hand or better foot to head combat moves that I received more than once. Pretty lethal in close quarters.
Although my mind is more into crouching and iron site my target, it tends to leave you vulnerable to a strafing combatant that's firing and can lob a grenade. Its better to keep your mind open to bolt/strafe and grenade an area with your team mates.
Yes, team mates. One of the shining graces that makes FEAR stand out is its encouragement of team play.
Team Combat
Fear excels in allowing the player to review where his team mates are and what condition they are in. Well - when they are alive and dead. You see floating icons on the screen. These are the positions of your team relative to you. When you men go down you will see Skull and Crossbone icon giving you the warning to proceed with caution.
So FEAR may be less realistic but it offers very useful simple icons to aid in team play. To be sure, there were plenty of times I faced large groups of combatants. Its hard to argue the effectiveness of this icon system to weed out fractured units and lone gunmen. The barrage of bullets sparking and splintering wood along with grenade shockwaves are enough to make you fall back and find some others. You can easily give a command and pinpoint the enemy position which will show a red marker on all your teams screen.
Looks Good and Looks Can Kill
FEAR is for the most part balanced. An action game with unique multiple weaponry and varied game modes, and it doesn't skimp in the visual department. Now here is where FEAR might strike fear into potential players. It as pretty high system requirements. Not as steep as the single player demo but High none the less. I tested the MP on a OC'd AMD @ 2.2 with 1 Gig of 3200 Ram - Radeon 9800 XT and Audigy 2. I was able to get smooth play in 800x600 with medium settings. Using an AMD64 FX53 Radeon X800PRO Audigy 2 ZS with settings just above my OC'd unit.
So if your running anything under 2.0 GHz and a lower range video card you may need to forego many of the nice effects FEAR MP offers. I know I didn't even consider buying FEAR after playing the SP demo simply because it brought my highest end system to its knees.
It was a bold move by Sierra in deciding to offer MP for free. A game I and others had otherwise written off. I am sure there are thousands of first time players like myself that are impressed with this offering. Now many may consider buying the full game now to give the SP a run.
MP Maps
In closing I thought I'd comment on the MP maps. Better put, the TDM maps as I played more TDM than anything else. The maps look nice but may be more winding than is necessary. You really have to play the maps allot to get your bearings. Most are indoors with multiple levels. Getting to where your guys are can get tricky. This uneeded complexity in corridors minimizes skirmish or choke points that can make TDM so much fun. Only one or two maps are designed to bring on a focused firefight on multiple levels.
It's up to the modders and mappers to build complimentary maps that highlight FEARs strategic team potential. With this free offering, theres a real good chance that will happen now.
I give the FEAR Free download a solid 4 of 5 stars
Friday, August 18, 2006
What's Wrong ID and the FPS
Back to the Future Past
As a gamer for more years than are worth going into say that I remember downloading the official release of DOOM 1 via my 9600 Baud modem from a popular BBS.
Like many people who were taken by Doom into all day/all night stints glued to their CRT's, I had more than a casual interest in DOOM 3. I like many others had found our first immersive gaming with the original, so the anticipation was very high.
Without going into a long drawn out hi and low story, Doom 3 was a new low water mark for a title released from Carmack and company. Aside from being pitch dark this iteration lacked all the suspense and induced head peering of the original. Subtle as those points were, they were all but gone in Doom 3. With the exception of a few real horror moments, the game brought nothing new to the table.
FPS gaming has matured to a new level and ID seems to have invested in visuals. These high visuals and technical achievement which ultimately detracted from the game.
With the maturation of FPS tiles came new gaming conventions. Most of which Doom 3 sidelined. The game was much too linear and in the end too predictable. The annoyances of having beastlies pop out from hidden doors behind the player became too much.
Did Something Right and No one Noticed
OK - so enough with that. Doom 3 was a let down. But why? I'll make this next observation quicker. Return to Castle Wolfenstein. The single player in RTCW was not much more advanced than its previous offering but its Multiplayer had definitely matured. I was amazed at the effort. Class based MP that was actually fun and balanced. Then BAM - A month later Electronic Arts released Medal of Honor. A simpler Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Objective based WWII FPS. For whatever reason, the RTCW servers drained. Its not that ID didn't do a great job, in fact I can't really explain the desertion. Some have claimed it was out of their expertise and should have stuck to the formula that made the company a splash in the first place.
The Last Hurrah
ID's real last hurrah was Quake 3 and some might argue that even Quake 3 came short of the mark in many ways. People were divided between Q1, Q2, and now Q3 game play. There were three camps of favorites all of which detracted from the last offering.
Then came Unreal which wowed players with its storyline and ultimately Unreal Tournament was released. It was everything that Quake series wasn't. Not only did it build on the existing FPS MP mechanics, it offered unique and most importantly fun new MP game types. This made Quake 3 Deathmatch look like a Wooly Mammoth in a tar pit.
I remember firing up Q3 sometime in 1998 after playing my share of UT. I was almost aghast at the limited feel of it. How could I play this - I shut it down and uninstalled it.
Quake 4 - More an Aftershock?
I don't know what ID and Raven were thinking but this is really a mix of things not to do. I knew the Quake following was fragmented. That Quake players had and were playing UT games. Somehow somewhere someone said lets make Q4 MP play like Q3 MP.
I recently purchased Q4 and fired up the game up for online play. There was that weird tear in gut. That smirk on face that would probably look like it was brought on by pain. Aghast at what looked like regressive game play. It felt like 1998 all over again.
Greener Pastures Ahead?
ID has the chance to redeem itself again. Quake Wars: Enemy Territory looks to be a winner. More in the lines of an improved RTCW. COuld they pull it off - or will the vaunted company that unleashed the FPS game phenomenon on the world be dealt another blow. DICE/Electronic Arts are working on a very similar themed title. Battlefield 2142. Both titles have similar release schedules. This could be deal breaker for the gurus at ID.
As a gamer for more years than are worth going into say that I remember downloading the official release of DOOM 1 via my 9600 Baud modem from a popular BBS.
Like many people who were taken by Doom into all day/all night stints glued to their CRT's, I had more than a casual interest in DOOM 3. I like many others had found our first immersive gaming with the original, so the anticipation was very high.
Without going into a long drawn out hi and low story, Doom 3 was a new low water mark for a title released from Carmack and company. Aside from being pitch dark this iteration lacked all the suspense and induced head peering of the original. Subtle as those points were, they were all but gone in Doom 3. With the exception of a few real horror moments, the game brought nothing new to the table.
FPS gaming has matured to a new level and ID seems to have invested in visuals. These high visuals and technical achievement which ultimately detracted from the game.
With the maturation of FPS tiles came new gaming conventions. Most of which Doom 3 sidelined. The game was much too linear and in the end too predictable. The annoyances of having beastlies pop out from hidden doors behind the player became too much.
Did Something Right and No one Noticed
OK - so enough with that. Doom 3 was a let down. But why? I'll make this next observation quicker. Return to Castle Wolfenstein. The single player in RTCW was not much more advanced than its previous offering but its Multiplayer had definitely matured. I was amazed at the effort. Class based MP that was actually fun and balanced. Then BAM - A month later Electronic Arts released Medal of Honor. A simpler Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Objective based WWII FPS. For whatever reason, the RTCW servers drained. Its not that ID didn't do a great job, in fact I can't really explain the desertion. Some have claimed it was out of their expertise and should have stuck to the formula that made the company a splash in the first place.
The Last Hurrah
ID's real last hurrah was Quake 3 and some might argue that even Quake 3 came short of the mark in many ways. People were divided between Q1, Q2, and now Q3 game play. There were three camps of favorites all of which detracted from the last offering.
Then came Unreal which wowed players with its storyline and ultimately Unreal Tournament was released. It was everything that Quake series wasn't. Not only did it build on the existing FPS MP mechanics, it offered unique and most importantly fun new MP game types. This made Quake 3 Deathmatch look like a Wooly Mammoth in a tar pit.
I remember firing up Q3 sometime in 1998 after playing my share of UT. I was almost aghast at the limited feel of it. How could I play this - I shut it down and uninstalled it.
Quake 4 - More an Aftershock?
I don't know what ID and Raven were thinking but this is really a mix of things not to do. I knew the Quake following was fragmented. That Quake players had and were playing UT games. Somehow somewhere someone said lets make Q4 MP play like Q3 MP.
I recently purchased Q4 and fired up the game up for online play. There was that weird tear in gut. That smirk on face that would probably look like it was brought on by pain. Aghast at what looked like regressive game play. It felt like 1998 all over again.
Greener Pastures Ahead?
ID has the chance to redeem itself again. Quake Wars: Enemy Territory looks to be a winner. More in the lines of an improved RTCW. COuld they pull it off - or will the vaunted company that unleashed the FPS game phenomenon on the world be dealt another blow. DICE/Electronic Arts are working on a very similar themed title. Battlefield 2142. Both titles have similar release schedules. This could be deal breaker for the gurus at ID.
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