Red Faction Guerrilla

[MinisterofDOOM]

I originally was going to pass on this one because of how much of what this game SHOULD have been being missing. But after playing the demo I picked it up anyway. I loved both the original Red Faction games, so I had high hopes for RFG and it has let me down.

The destructive aspects of the game are tons of fun. Unfortunately just about every single other aspect of the game is in need of work...a LOT of work in some cases. The problem is that, instead of being an action game based around GeoMod 2.0, it's an action game with GeoMod 2.0 glued on. None of the rest of the game works WITH geomod. It just works next to it. It's not well integrated or streamlined in the least.

Perhaps the biggest problem the game faces is that combat is not particularly fun...and any time you wreak much havok you'll attract the attention of the EDF and get stuck fighting them. The game is subtitled "guerrilla" and combat works...sort of...appropriately. You die quickly in the open, and there's a cover system. Unfortunately there's no such thing as cover in a world where nearly everything is destructible. And you're virtually always alone...even against dozens of EDF soldiers. Yeah, you can have AI helpers, but they're so useless that they honestly might as well not be there (not exaggerating...you're no less alone with their help than without).

The game also has too much loading, and all load times are unforgivable. Even the objectives map has to load...often for several seconds. Pause screen (through which you save your game after multiple menu tiers and confirmation boxes) lags, too, with each progressive menu tier lagging again. So saving your game takes ages and is tedious...and all that is compounded by the fact that you have to back out through every step after saving your game instead of it kicking you back into gameplay. Of course that wouldn't be an issue if it weren't for the death system, which autosaves UPON YOUR DEATH , then "respawns you" (Um...isn't this the...single player mode...? ) at your nearest safehouse with a penalty to morale. But...since I waded through the menus to manually save before the mission I died on, I can just go back and skip that penalty. But of course the "Devs can choose not to be a$$ and just not design the game to autosave WHEN YOU DIE" option isn't on the list. So you'll be wading through the clunky menus often if you want to keep your morale up. Because you'll die a lot in combat because--again--you'll be all alone without cover and die easily in the open.

The game uses control and morale stats to show your progress toward liberating each of the 6 sectors you'll move through. EDF (bad guys...even though they were the good guys in the first two games...here we go with the smiley again) control is decreased by taking out strategic EDF-controlled structures, and by doing missions. Morale increases the numbers of utterly useless people who (don't) fight alongside you as well as increasing the contents of ammo crates (because we can't just have ammo pickups anymore...that's too 1990s...no, it's 2009 and we need a gimmick for everything) and the amount of salvage you gain from each mission (in-game currency used to buy better gear with which to 'splo stuff up). So high morale is good, low control is good. Sadly, aside from a few basic mission types, all the missions are not just bad, but downright irritating. The good ones have you destroying things in a set amount of time (you can retry to beat your best time) or generally wreaking havok. The bad ones having you playing gofer and wondering (honestly, I asked myself this on many occasions) WHY you are doing whatever menial task you're doing...especially since oftentimes ignoring or failing very frustrating missions incurs no loss...and finishing the same mission gains nowhere near enough to justify having done the mission.

So...RFG is a sub-par action game with major issues in just about every department, but the geomod tech is a thing of beauty (when it's not glitching out and causing bridges to float magically in the air despite the supports having been explodified) and saves the entire game. But it's definitely a yelling game. You'll be screaming, cussing, shouting, and hurling your controller more than you can ever recall having done those things before. And that's just for one mission. Then you do it again for the next. And again. And again. But you get to blow stuff up while cussing...so...well...you decide if it's worth it or not.

Final note:Where the %#@$ @#$% @#$%ing @#$% is the coop? Hello? Volition? You know, the guys who made Saints Row 2, the best sandbox game ever thanks to the much-lauded drop-in/drop-out coop? Where the hell did it go? Because, quite frankly, coop is the one thing that could make me forget all the game's faults. EVERYONE wants to experience the fun of blowing up a world alongside a friend. And Volition totally blew it. Niiiiiiice. Very nice. World's biggest facepalm.

[s0m3th1ngAZ]

Your car reviews I could live without...your video game reviews, however, are spot on Guess I'll skip this one when it comes to PC. (Or maybe not...everything could be fixed with the port...who knows)

[hsckris]

I have this game and I agree with MOD 100%.

The only thing I would add would be that multiplayer can be fun... the back/jetpacks give you more options.

[MinisterofDOOM]

I traded this in for Crysis and Crysis Warhead a couple days ago. Definitely a good move.

[RCA]

http://www.escapistmagazine.co...rilla

Maybe this is something you guys might like...I LOLed

[MinisterofDOOM]

Yeah, he's pretty spot on, but ignores most of the game's other glaring flaws to focus on the big one: in a game where everything's destructible, you're not allowed to actually destroy stuff. There's so much extra garbage piled on top that destroying stuff lasts 3 seconds and wading through combat and morale and all the other steaming crap takes 10 minutes. Not worth 3 seconds of joy.