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Black FPS Preview
The First Person Shooter that had everyone abuzz at this year's E3 was the simply titled 'Black'. Eurogamer has a piece on the upcoming console-based action game, where it's come from, and where it's going. From the article: "But one thing Ward freely admits is that Black distills the team's best memories of their favourite movies. In fact, the last time out we got a sneak peak at the storyboarding process down at Criterion's HQ, each of the game's levels were explicitly designed to play out like your best memories of the best action sequences they could think of. Not a bad basis for an action game, you might reason."
This is an outrage. Why do the call it a "black" FPS? Would other FPS's like to be called a "white" FPS?
English is easier said than done.
It's like, how much more black could this be? And the answer is none. None more black.
LOAD "SIG",8,1
While I'm not an FPS fan (gives me headaches), the fact you can do anything to the external environment is extremely exciting for really just about every game, not just an FPS. Outside the scope of the game, I imagine this will be awesome for every other genre. RPGs, adventure games...
Well, all hype aside, it's sounding pretty cool.
PS2 or (e)Xbox... No PC eh? Ok, that BLOWS, expessially for an FPS.
So when will PC get more good games, and not these PS2 or Xbox shill games?
"One thing that's clear is that Criterion is going to finally break with its 'action-only' tradition and furnish Black with the requisite back-story and cast and spin a narrative around the game." - TFA
Does anyone else interpret this as meaning "cutscenes galore?" Or, has the industry learned from Final Fantasy?
None More Black is a pretty good band, too...you should check 'em out.
"How like you to drag your keyboard to a gun fight." - Aaron Bedard (BANE)
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
Well.. at least 'till I got the duct tape mod.
The one FPS that had people creaming themselves was F.E.A.R.? Black looks pretty good, though...not that this is my kind of thing...no magic and no scantily clad ladies proclaiming strange things that make little, to no, sense.
"How like you to drag your keyboard to a gun fight." - Aaron Bedard (BANE)
We clicked on the monkey and it gave us NO price! stay tuned!
Come on guys, dont you recognize a PR ad-article when you see one?
Whats next? a link to a free psp conga line?
Go ahead MOD my day!
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As a rabbid FPS fan,all I can say is WHO HOOOOO!This game sounds orgasmic!I mean...being able to take down an entire building with 3 or 4 RPG's!? Not to mention this oughta give other game developers ideas on how a game SHOULD be made!Though I am still suprised at how few developers took the hint from Red Faction,and used the idea.I'm still jonzing for the driving game that lets you fly through buildings or cut through an alley to take the lead!What about an RPG game where you can make a trap for some huge monster so when he trips it a couple of trees (supposing there big enough) take him down a peg or two?Meh,these are just ideas I'm just throwing out for the game developers/slashdot readers out there.GET THE HINT!-ahem...ok,I'm done.
"Did they look like psychos to you,do psychos EXPLODE when sunlite hits them!?"-"Seth Gecko" (George Clooney)
The main impression I got from looking at the screenshots is "Wow those weapons look nice. I wish I could see what the actual game looks like, though." None of the images seemed to provide a clear view of what the weapons or environments look like. Not terribly useful for a preview.
System Shock 2 4tw.
I'm hoping it's the same thing with Black. No ammo, shoot everything. (Actually, Project: Snowblind seems to be like this, minus all the nifty environmental stuff in Black. I haven't played very far yet though.)
What I hope it's not is another Red Faction: nice wall damage in most places for the first level or so, then it's a gimmick that doesn't really matter.
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
...let go of their fears of their software being *ahem* "pirated" around the Internet.
Sometimes one has to realize that they are lucky to receive payment for one copy, much less thousands. They should stop suing and be happy with whatever they get from sales.
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
When you shoot anything it explodes or reacts. the entire level is "interactive" it will have a "story" around the engine that does that. thats it.
On a curious note: PDZero for x360 suposedly does exactly the same thing.
Go ahead MOD my day!
More opinions here
"The First Person Shooter that had everyone abuzz at this year's E3"
That's funny, this Slashdot adver...newspost is the first i've heard of it.
I break stuff in real life all the time. It's really cool!
Car breaks down - Dose it with gasoline and send it pinballing down a cliff with flames dancing to the sweet night music of destruction. Bump my head on a my basements low doorway - let the sledgehammer rain down wood splinters and chunks of drywall until I have enough headroom. Gumball machine steals my quarter - crowbar it into flying shards of glass and hundreds of colorful bouncing gumballs.
I'm telling you there's no limit to the number of life's problems that can be solved by breaking stuff. I already have all the particle effects, realistic physics, and CD quality audio I'll ever need.
How about EuroHacker? :)
(I work for the zine, btw)
Just as the parent post noted, Eurogamer suggests that most of the 'fun' from Black comes from its physics engine and the ability to destroy crap in the environment. Although having a good physics engine is good, I seriously doubt that Black (coming out on the PS2 and Xbox 1 in 2006) will be able to able to replicate the physics modeling of the upcoming Unreal 2007 engine, or for that matter, even Half-Life 2 (viz. gravity gun). Bottom line: Full environment interactivity is hard enough on a high-end 3.2Ghz gaming workstation, much less on a 250 mhz PS2
"Black" - didn't that come out last year under the name Doom III?
Is there a downloadable trailer? Can I please be one of the cool guys who's "abuzz" about Black?
"We have an A-Bomb...what more do you want, mermaids?" --I.I. Rabi, speaking in defense of Robert Oppenheimer
I wonder how the enamy AI will use these features? If I am walking along should I worry about a builing crashing on my head? This will certenly add a level of stratagy to FPS that never existed before, especialy if the AI is "smart"...
I don't hold much hope. remember we were promised the whole "geo-mod" thing that would let us damage pipes and use explosives to create troughs and flow lava or fluids, or we were supposed to be able to knock down buildings...only to find out there were no alternative paths thru pipes, liquids did not channel, and the one or two towers you could damage required so much explosives it was much simpler to snipe the enemy. Other stupididty came from blowing out windows and then the wall, but the window *frame* hovering in midair. Or destroying both ends of a land bridge and the thing floats all by itself.
In multiplayer, it was fun to set the bombs under the few destroyable walkways and wait till someone was over it...boom! Other than that, most of the big Geo Mod promises were not there.
Are they saying there that it won't be released on PC? NOOO!