Section 8

Section 8

"You'll come back to Valve, you're like a crack addict, they have you hooked."

Launch Trailer




Developer: TimeGate Studios
Release Date: September 4th, 2009
Distribution Method: Steam, EBGames, etc
Price: $49.99 (Steam)
ERSB Rating: T (13+)
Website: http://www.joinsection8.com/
Game Information: Section 8 while not a new concept feels like one of the better Sci-Fi / Futuristic Shooters, it blends fast paced combat with precision aiming and throws an extremely unique resupply system for killed Teammates and Enemies.


Gameplay: Section 8 is based in a Futuristic Universe pitting players with amazing armor suits against each other, these armored suits have a few features that aren't listed in the Instruction manual, one of these features is the Shields you're given, based on how you customize your character within the game you will have either a large amount of shielding which will act as another health bar, your actual health will be left untouched until your shield is gone. Now I know what your thinking, "Shields in an FPS?, what the shit I'm used to shooting people in the head!" well you can still do that in Section 8, the game offers a large amount of customization for your characters, one of those is Shield Penetration, which being mostly a sniper was my favorite customization to add to my characters, just ask DooD how much I ripped his ass up with my Sniper rifle and Shield Penetration.

Section 8 also features a large amount of weapons, ranging from Miniguns, Rocket Launcher, Assault Rifles and Sniper rifles, added onto that is the face that you can customize your own character and weapons with different features, all of these features are available to you as SOON as you start the game so the unlock process is much better then dare I say Call of Duty 4, you're not going to be going into this game with a bunch of 13 year olds that can play the game 10 hours a day 7 days a week and getting owned, everyone is on a same playing level, the only thing that matters is your actual skill and the time to dedicate into getting better, with that being said the gameplay section has become much longer then I wanted :P

Single Player: I haven't had a chance to play the Single Player yet but from what I understand, you're part of a kill team known as Section 8 who where all deemed to crazy and careless to maintain they're rank in the Military so have been moved to Section 8 to fight in the battles regular people (who likes them anyways) aren't capable of doing, throughout the Single Player campaign you play a Soldier known as Alex Corde from the 8th Army Infantry, you're set out to complete various objectives throughout the Campaign against your fictional nemesis ARM of Orion, I highly suggest you get used to killing ugly son's a bitches now because the people from ARM of Orion are the ugliest people I have ever seen. (no offense to DooD )

Multiplayer: Multiplayer is much like any other FPS, you shoot things and they die, but this is where Section 8 shakes the system up a bit with Dynamic Combat Missions (DMC for short) when one of these activates you'll be given a random objective, some of these objectives are simple like Take over X Base in Y Minutes, but a lot of them are difficult, VIP for example is a DMC where a random player on the opposing team or on your team becomes the VIP and you either have to Protect or Kill this target before he reaches his randomly assigned escape zone, with that said, escaping as the VIP is tough, people are "Burning In" beside you left and right, you're taking cover, running, sprinting, trying not to die, but just remember iO plays this game, do you think you can run from us?, seriously you're sprinting to the left, people on the opposing team yelling at each other because you're about to escape when SPLAT you die, crushed by a player known only as [iO] DooD.

With those last 5 minutes of gameplay in the back of your mind you're set out to take over the world, while don't get to ahead of yourself now, you've just activated a Base Takeover DMC, basically there are numerous bases on each Section 8 map, each of these are numbered and when a Base Takeover DMC is activated your goal is to takeover the base which is specified in the amount of time the game gives you, sometimes this is 3 minutes, sometimes it's 5, but who pays attention to time anyways, get the hell in there and get your revenge on [iO] DooD, that son of a bitch crushed you remember. There are also another number of DMC's I won't get to, that would spoil the Multiplayer for you, let's just say you'll have to buy Section 8 to see the rest of them .

Section 8 also used a unique Respawn System, rather then being forced to wait for 20 seconds (like in Team Fortress 2) you'll have to "Burn In" to get back into the game, what this means is that you're dropped from let's say 5000 feet in the air and guide yourself to where you want to land, sometimes you can land on people, and sometimes you'll be taken out quickly but AA turrets, when this happens you'll either be laughing or crying, or both . Burning in is much like waiting to respawn but rather then be forced to look at a loading screen that's counting down until you respawn like Team Fortress 2 you're going to be looking at a screen of fire and skydiving until you land on the ground below.

Multiplayer also offers "Ranks", these ranks are based solely on YOUR performance, this is one of the advantages of the game, as you kill more people your rank increases, with increased rank comes fear for the opposing team that a Rank 50 (Insert Skull Icon Here) [iO] DooD has joined the game, the ranking system is much like Call of Duty 4's ranking system where the skilled will rise faster, while the not so skilled will eventually get the same rank as the skilled players this number is just another number, it doesn't mean you're good or bad it just means that you've played long enough to achieve each rank.


Achievements: While there are achievements in the game during the Open Beta / Closed Beta we where never allowed to play with them, they have always been locked out so I have very little news about these, but from what I understand achievements are going to be based on various achievements in game, Killing X amount of people in Y amount of time, Killing a VIP, Killing a Tank, Living through AA turrets, etc. Most of these achievements won't seem new to you, they're just an extra feature I feel was thrown into the game last minute to add another reason to keep playing Section 8, with that being said continue onto my rating below.


My Rating: 8 out of 10, I liked this game, it was a great time, but as most people know the UT3 engine is notorious for having Twitch Like gameplay, and while I like that style of FPS it doesn't work for Section 8, the controls at times made me extremely angry to the point where I'd utter out things like Cock Muffins or Shit Skittles, besides that Section 8 is a solid game, I didn't have a single night where I didn't have fun or see something new throughout my weeks of playing Section 8, I'd highly recommend it.