So after beating the suprisingly great 50 Cent: Blood In The Sand, i
quickly traded it into my place of work, for fear that it's poor sales
and the fact that we were having a sale would plummet it's trade value
to nothingness. so i brought it, and a copy of Tetris for the DS in,
and got about 40 bucks. after my employee discounts i realized i had
enough to get Red Faction: Guerilla for about a dollar ten in actual
cash, and went for it. i had heard some generally good things about the
game, and the comparisons to games i love like Far Cry 2 and
Battlefield: Bad Company piqued my interest.
Well i've put about 6 hours into the campaign, and i only baught it a
few days ago, so that's a good sign. the game is a great time waster,
and i mean that in the best possible way. you're given areas of the
considerable map to fuck around in, and you do exactly that. there is
little to no linearity to the mission strands, but unfortunately that
means there's also a great lack in variety. you've got your "save the
hostages" mission, your "blow up this building" mission, and your
"chase these fuckers down and fuck thier fucking shit up" mission, and
that's pretty much it. they vary up the mission types every once in a
while, but it's few and far between. the best missions i've come across
in the game have all been the ones that lead out from or directly into
cut scenes.
i think a more appropriate but less sellable title to the game would be Red Faction: Terrorist.
Guerilla implies stealthy tactics in order to win a war inwhich you are
greatly outnumbered. that's not what you're doing in this game. in the
game you're essentially made to bring down an authoritarian government
by destroying buildings like Town Halls and Military Bases. you usually
have to barrel into a base or populated area in a big car, guns
blazing, set a bunch of bombs in strategic places, ignite them, and
survive as you try to escape with your life. think of the 80's in
Ireland... but IIIIN SPAAAAAACE!
the game's biggest victory is that it's based on a gimmick, but that
gimmick doesnt get old. blowing up these buildings in newer, bigger
ways is always fun, and getting the fuck away before your balls get
blown off is just as intense and engaging. some of the story missions
are really wonderful, specifically your first encounter with the savage
Marauders.
the game's biggest flaw is that Mars is kind of fucking boring. the
whole planet looks just like earth, but, you know, a desert, and a
reddish sky. the game reflects that very well, but in capturing the
essense of what Mars actually looks like and would look like
terraformed, you get a game with bland colours, bland looking vehicles,
and an overall monotonal feel that might immerse you, but it sure as
hell doesn't grab you the way Far Cry 2's lush jungles or Bioshock's
art-deco ruins did.
what Red Faction: Guerilla boils down too is a vast improvement on an
otherwise terrible franchise, and a game that isn't quite deep, but
certainly isn't shallow. it's a pleasent experience that you can put
alot of time into without realizing it, and that's the sign of a pretty
damn good game.
did i mention there are giant mechs?
there are giant mechs.
