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Red Faction on the PS2 is arguably the best first person shooter for the console and, unusually for the genre, has actually been ported to PC. However, will it fare quite so well in a market full of Quake, Half-Life and Unreal, that have already gained mass appeal?
First of all, Red Faction has to be more of a Half-Life variant than an 'all-guns-blazing' shooter like Quake or Unreal. There is a story that runs constantly throughout the single player part of the game, with characters to talk to, and team mates sending you messages telling you what's going on. The basic plot is that you are a miner named Parker, who works for a corporation based on Mars called Ultor. However, despite the glowing image this company has on the outside, it is actually corrupt, with terrible working conditions, guards regularly beating miners and a deadly plague sweeping through the colony. Due to this, a small resistance has built up, headed by a woman codenamed 'Eos'. During a regular shift, a guard tries to beat up one of Parker's workmates, and this is enough to start a riot, with all miners grouping together headed by Eos, working to overthrow the company.
You start the game just before the riot takes place, and completely unarmed. Immediately, you have to pick up an injured guard's security baton and defend yourself and your friends from the oncoming armed security officers, picking up their guns as you progress. You regularly find yourself having to save your fellow workers, and they in-turn show you where to go to get out of the mines, or tell you more about the revolt, and this is how you work through the game.
A unique twist to Red Faction is the 'Geo-Mod' technology the game's developers have used to create deformable terrain. Down in the mines, there are many places where you can blast through walls to find secret areas, and even destroy bridges to stop convoys or remove the supporting pillars of an enemy building and watch it crumble to the ground.
In terms of the weapons on offer, Red Faction doesn't disappoint - they range from simple pistols and assault rifles to rocket launchers and rail drivers. All weapons have a secondary function, and some have neat abilities such as an infra-red scope to detect enemies through walls. There are also pickups that increase your defences, including medikits and environsuits, with super versions of both that have double the effect. Finally, you have the ability to hijack five different vehicles throughout the game, including a submarine, driller and aircraft.
One new addition for the PC game is an online multiplayer mode, that will work over the internet or a LAN. Here you get to play in 24 specially-made arenas with up to thirty-two players in either Deathmatch or Capture the Flag mode. Anyone who's downloaded the Red Faction Multiplayer Demo (if not, you can get it here) will know that it's great fun, and can look forward to more weapons (such as heavy machine guns, fusion rocket launchers and flame throwers) and some great new maps in the full version. Quite simply, it's the perfect companion for the single-player game.
Another extra to be enjoyed by PC owners is the inclusion of a level editor, allowing you to create your own maps and then play on them in the multiplayer mode. As usual, use of the level editor is not covered in the user manual, but instead in an online help file that requires some reading before you'll be able to make levels as good as those that come with the game. However, even if you're not creative enough to make your own levels, it still opens up possibilities for other people to make their maps freely available on the internet, hopefully providing a limitless source of new ones to try.
Graphically, there's little to find fault with Red Faction. Although the single-player game takes place in mines on Mars, which may not seem to have many possibilities to show off a good graphics engine, Red Faction manages to make it interesting by combining mazes of caves, interesting machinery and high-tech facility sections to work your way through. The atmosphere of the game is also very good, with many nice lighting and realistic (not forced) fog effects making everything look nicely polished.
For sound, there's a very nice orchestral score to accompany a lot of the single-player game, with the pace and style of the music changing as you move into new areas. The general feeling of things happening around you is also heightened by the constant dialog you receive from Eos, the riot leader, and a friend who is helping you through the game. There are even nice touches such as being able to hear guards chatting to one another if they haven't seen you sneaking up, or hearing your comrades asking for assistance when in trouble.
Overall, Red Faction is an excellent game, with both a great single-player story mode and a frantic online multiplayer option. It not only improves on games such as Half-Life, but also adds new features and depth as well, to become one of this year's best PC releases so far. We don't often award a perfect score here at Next Level Gaming, but here we have a game that excels in every area, and definitely deserves it.
Marc Hull
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| After receiving great success on the Playstation 2, Red Faction has come to PC with an added online multiplayer mode and fully-featured level editor. As you'd expect from a console conversion, the single-player game has plenty of depth and should take a while to complete, while the online multiplayer mode is more than enough to match the likes of Counter Strike and Quake with up to 32 players per game and deformable terrain that allows you to blow through walls to find secret areas or surprise your opponents. Overall, this is a well-polished game and one of this year's best releases. |
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