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SiN Episodes - Emergence Review
Along with pale imitations, it seems the destiny of genre-defining games to provoke a reversal in design decisions. The success of 3D platformers has lead to a renaissance in 2D gaming, World of Warcraft has pushed online game designers away from the fantasy genre, and Half-Life 2 has prompted a lot of story-light brainless shooters. It's this last genre that houses SiN Episodes: Emergence. A traditional run and gun First Person Shooter (FPS), SiN is a blood-soaked five hour jaunt you can download from Steam for about twenty bucks. At that price and that length, this Aeon Fluxian gorefest may just be a happy start for the age of episodic content. Read on for my impressions of a good-looking throwback that proves you don't need millions of dollars to make a fun title.
Calling SiN story-light might not be fair. It would be more accurate to say that this first episode of the 'season' isn't heavy on plot elements. Ritual plans on making these 5-8 hour gameplay releases a regular event. A 'season' will be a complete story made up of three episodes: a beginning, a middle, and an end. You're awakened at the start of this episode staring into the um, eyes of an attractive woman and a well-dressed guy. You're strapped onto a table, and have apparently been injected with something. Before you can really understand what's going on, another attractive woman comes to your aid, spiriting you away in her auto.
What follows is a textbook-standard FPS. You make your way through the grubby urban environments, a secret underground lair, and moist crawlspaces, shooting the faceless bad guys that get in your way. Weapons are fairly limited in this first episode; For most of the game you have a pistol, a shotgun, and grenades. Really, though, what else do you need? Enemy models and map creation are fairly generic, though they are competently executed. There's a couple of nice action set-pieces, such as a fight against jet-pack wearing baddies from inside a cargo crate being lifted over a body of water. The few explanatory plot moments are used with the in-game engine, as in cousin Half-Life.
If there is a differentiating element to SiN, it is the adaptive AI and stat-tracking that haunts you throughout the game. Every bullet you fire, which gun you use, whether it hits or not, all are tracked as you move through the title. The enemies will start off fairly dumb, but if you find yourself having an easy time of it you'll start to notice the enemies beginning to adopt new tactics. If you pwn the bad guys hard enough in the first few levels, you may even find yourself outclassed when the action gets fast and furious later in the episode. This intelligent adaptation to your gameplay is a little spooky once you start noticing it. The first time you find yourself in the middle of a well-executed pincer maneuver, with soldiers on all sides closing in, you'll know you've gotten the AI's attention.
Visually, SiN looks a lot like cousin Half-Life, which only makes sense; Emergence was created with Valve's Source engine. All the 'fun with physics' moments you can have in Half-Life 2 are here in SiN, with some extra surprises. Despite what the Mythbusters had to say on the subject, compressed air tanks make surprisingly good weapons here. The polish on the game's look is less pronounced than it was with Half-Life 2, the result of a smaller budget and shorter development time. The audio is run and gun standard, but the weapon sounds are surprisingly satisfying. They have a lot of heft, which partially makes up for the very few weapons you'll have access to in the game.
If Emergence was $15, this would be a sure thing; At $20 I'm not sure this particular ride is worth the price of admission. Just the same, if you've got the money lying around and are a fan of the FPS genre, you're probably going to enjoy SiN There's nothing particularly wrong here, just a general sense of 'been there, done that'. At only five or six hours play time, you probably won't even have time to get bored before the episode is over. Future episodes will elaborate on the plot, give us more enemies to fight, and more weapons to fight with. As such, the pricetag may be more justified for future episodes. For right now, though, here's hoping they drop the price to make this bite-sized FPS morsel taste just right.
- Title: SiN Episodes: Emergence
- Developer: Ritual Entertainment
- Publisher: Valve
- System: PC
Calling SiN story-light might not be fair. It would be more accurate to say that this first episode of the 'season' isn't heavy on plot elements. Ritual plans on making these 5-8 hour gameplay releases a regular event. A 'season' will be a complete story made up of three episodes: a beginning, a middle, and an end. You're awakened at the start of this episode staring into the um, eyes of an attractive woman and a well-dressed guy. You're strapped onto a table, and have apparently been injected with something. Before you can really understand what's going on, another attractive woman comes to your aid, spiriting you away in her auto.
What follows is a textbook-standard FPS. You make your way through the grubby urban environments, a secret underground lair, and moist crawlspaces, shooting the faceless bad guys that get in your way. Weapons are fairly limited in this first episode; For most of the game you have a pistol, a shotgun, and grenades. Really, though, what else do you need? Enemy models and map creation are fairly generic, though they are competently executed. There's a couple of nice action set-pieces, such as a fight against jet-pack wearing baddies from inside a cargo crate being lifted over a body of water. The few explanatory plot moments are used with the in-game engine, as in cousin Half-Life.
If there is a differentiating element to SiN, it is the adaptive AI and stat-tracking that haunts you throughout the game. Every bullet you fire, which gun you use, whether it hits or not, all are tracked as you move through the title. The enemies will start off fairly dumb, but if you find yourself having an easy time of it you'll start to notice the enemies beginning to adopt new tactics. If you pwn the bad guys hard enough in the first few levels, you may even find yourself outclassed when the action gets fast and furious later in the episode. This intelligent adaptation to your gameplay is a little spooky once you start noticing it. The first time you find yourself in the middle of a well-executed pincer maneuver, with soldiers on all sides closing in, you'll know you've gotten the AI's attention.
Visually, SiN looks a lot like cousin Half-Life, which only makes sense; Emergence was created with Valve's Source engine. All the 'fun with physics' moments you can have in Half-Life 2 are here in SiN, with some extra surprises. Despite what the Mythbusters had to say on the subject, compressed air tanks make surprisingly good weapons here. The polish on the game's look is less pronounced than it was with Half-Life 2, the result of a smaller budget and shorter development time. The audio is run and gun standard, but the weapon sounds are surprisingly satisfying. They have a lot of heft, which partially makes up for the very few weapons you'll have access to in the game.
If Emergence was $15, this would be a sure thing; At $20 I'm not sure this particular ride is worth the price of admission. Just the same, if you've got the money lying around and are a fan of the FPS genre, you're probably going to enjoy SiN There's nothing particularly wrong here, just a general sense of 'been there, done that'. At only five or six hours play time, you probably won't even have time to get bored before the episode is over. Future episodes will elaborate on the plot, give us more enemies to fight, and more weapons to fight with. As such, the pricetag may be more justified for future episodes. For right now, though, here's hoping they drop the price to make this bite-sized FPS morsel taste just right.
The success of 3D platformers has lead to a renaissance in 2D gaming,
I guess I don't follow games that closely anymore. What 3d platformers have I missed, and what games defined the 2d renaissance that followed?
The game doesn't have a flashlight, unlike HL2/DOOM3/QUAKE4. There are some darks aeas where I could've used a flashlight. I think every law enforcement officer should has some kind of flashlight, either the small pen variety or the large billy club type. Not having one is inexcusable. Otherwise, I love the game.
My spirits were dampened when I stormed through it in 5 hours, but I still came away from the game with a feeling of satisfaction. The idea to go with an adjusting AI that tailored itself to your gameplay was GREAT. Too many shooters have an element where you find one good technique and use it on every single enemy: "headshot...headshot...headshot", but in SiN, after a few headshots the enemies come equipped with helmets (the weapons they carry, body armor, and even their numbers differ on how you're playing). I wish more companies would take this approach -- it seems like it makes for a very versatile experience.
A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing.
The "You only license software" line is bullshit peddled by certain groups in the software industry. The copyright laws are the same for software as for books, music, and movies. If you've bought a copy, that copy's your's. Copyright prevents you from copying it (except under limited circumstances), but the physical media and copy is yours to use.
In any case, your point is completely irrelevent. There is no reason to force your customers to register with a third party (or even you) in order to use the product they've bought.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Hey, where's the rating!?
I wanted to post some screenshots (see last paragraph), but instead I'll write a few sentences about the game to make this post at least somewhat useful.
Boobies! Here's the attractive woman from the first scene. They have realistic shake physics, that's probably what Zonk meant by "fun with physics". There are some other fun aspects, like the warning signs which say "When all else fails, use crate" or com-stations (basically phone booths) where you can dial a number you see on ads.
Shooting stuff is, I'd say, quite satisfying, although there are only 3 weapons. A very accurate and powerful piston, a shotgun, and an assault rifle. They all have alternative fire which you often have to use to kill off tougher enemies. The ones at the beginning go down with a headshot, or a shotgun blast from a close distance will send body parts flying, so that's always fun to watch. Some heavily armored fuckers at the end require a good portion of the AR mag.
To the whole episodic concept, well I didn't find it too unreasonable. Not unlike HL2, it leaves the story hanging, but it's not much (if at all) shorter than Max Payne. Considering it's not full price, that's not very bad, although of course cheaper would be even better.
I have a screenshot gallery with over 60 shots in it, but I decided not to post it here for two reasons: 1) I host it on my DSL line 2) I wrote the gallery perl script myself, so it's probably quite dangerous. I'll try to get a static version online, though.
I DID buy HL2 for the storyline and I wasn't disappointed. The game isn't narrated, per se, but the story is there for those who look for it. It's a Pulp Fiction of games, requiring you to play it a few times to catch some of the subtle hints.
For instance, at the beginning when Gordon's teleportation goes wrong he winds up in the office of the nefarious Dr. Breen who is talking to SOMETHING on a video display.
In one level you find an evolutionary poster showing the transparent skeletal heads of an ape, a human, and a strange human\alien "combine".
In the opening sequence the G-man tells you "The right man in the wrong place can make all the difference in the world," and he goes on to make repeated and illogical appearances all over the game, talking to unexpected people, strolling through areas you've infiltrated while barely outrunning death itself, having just done who knows what.
Even the graphical textures and level designs hint at a personal history of inanimate objects. The meticulous totalitarian dystopia of City 17 is complemented by the spotless streets and gleaming buildings in perfect repair. You can only speculate how much work Civil Protection, or likely the citizens themselves, put forth to keep the city clean - especially in contrast to how filthy the rest of the game is, by in large. HL2 has story all over the place in little chunks. Whether the story is cohesive is irrelevant to me, personally.
SiN, on the other hand, is a brainless blast-a-thon that wasn't worth the effort pirating. I deleted it in 20 minutes. Nice boob physics though.