Red Faction: Guerilla
July 28th 2009 09:32
- Todd Cooper
THQ and Volition inc. have successfully made the GeoMod 2.0 engine work overtime with the third instalment of the Red Faction Series which takes place 50 years after the first game and sees the Red Planet being militantly occupied by the Earth Defence Force, and an uprising Martian population starting to take action.
The story sees you, Alec Mason, touchdown on Mars looking to do an honest days work in the mining trade only to be pulled into a freedom fighting war band after a rather overzealous show of force from the Earth Defence Force soldiers who find you and your brother prospecting for scrap metal - the most valuable commodity on the red planet is salvage. This is also the Red Faction’s currency and will be traded for weapons and upgrades during gameplay. After the fracas the Red Faction leader inducts you, rather unceremoniously, into the Red Faction.
The campaign takes you through the liberation of the six inhabited regions of Mars (liberation in this case taking the form of the demolition of the infrastructure of your enemies, liberation if ever there was a definition) Parker Sector, Dust Sector, The Badlands, Oasis, The FreeFire Zone and EOS.
Running and driving across the barren landscape of the red planet from mission to mission could have been boring but there is more on offer here than just knocking down structures. For those not content with demolishing buildings and scurrying off to your safe house extra missions come in the form of Guerrilla Actions; Raids, Assaults, Convoy Capture, Destruction, Interception, Captive Rescue, Drive by sprees, Destruction sprees, Transport missions and Demolitions missions - all of which contribute to the amount of support given to you by the general populace of Mars. The main missions and the destruction of EDF property will loosen the hold of the EDF in the sector- strangely however if you run around destroying the buildings, effectively reducing the EDF presence to 0%, before taking on the missions the structures will be fully restored at the mission start. Annoying.
Graphically the game is quite pleasing - the dusty cracked sun baked surface of Mars has a very gritty, unwelcoming feel to it, right down to the little sand storms whirling around in the open spaces. Even in the greener terra-formed residential areas there is still a constant dust storm.
The EDF buildings and structures are all always easy to spy being deep green against the red or dark brown of the rock and look angular and high tech, in complete contrast to the Guerrilla safehouses which are little more than scavenged shanty towns. The character models move well and are fittingly grungy and sunburned in the case of the guerrilla characters and suitably faceless and imposing for the enemy models, the weapons and vehicles are rendered well with wear and tear and weathering making them look more authentic and adding that little extra - especially in the case of the trays of the mining vehicles which are caked in dirt and residue from carting ore around the planet.
Occasionally there will be some pop-up on the mountains as you drive and in some areas the fade off of terrain seemed to happen a little bit quickly, but these are small gripes and don’t really detract from the gameplay experience.
The sound is in most cases fairly sparse, the lightly orchestral score can get a bit tedious at times but is not overly intrusive, the only constant noise is the crunching of the rough ground beneath your boots or the tires of your vehicle - though there is the static radio news broadcast in the guerrilla camps and the propaganda slogans shouted over the loudspeakers in the mining areas. The explosions are suitably chunky and pleasing to hear. The sledgehammer too makes quite a pleasing thud as it smashes through walls, crates and enemy soldiers.
Online play offers up the usual Deathmatch (here called Anarchy) and Capture the Flag modes. There is also Siege mode in which two teams vie for control of three target areas one team tries to protect as the other tries to destroy them and Demolition wherein you must protect the Destroyer and destroy the environment to score points. There is also a Spectator mode for those who like to watch. The online multiplayer modes are made more interesting by the addition of backpacks which give power-ups to the players these range from jetpacks and stealthpacks to tremor inducing packs and healing packs that speed up the health regeneration process.
Overall Red Faction Guerrilla is a thoroughly enjoyable romp through an almost entirely destroyable environment and it will keep you entertained with the campaign and online modes for a fair amount of time - and for those who must achieve all goals set by a game try finishing all the Guerrilla Actions on the Insane setting.
Highly Recommended.
Red Faction: Guerilla is available on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and will be available on PC on September 11.
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