Since the game's announcement I have been pretty excited at the possibility of playing against PC gamers, bridging the ageless gap between keyboards and controllers. I picked up the game with no reservations about the Shadowrun Universe, simply because I knew nothing about it. I was aware of it's existence and knew of the WizKids Games license, but I had never played anything that involved the Shadowrun universe before. However, this game is so different from 
every other first person shooter, I don't really know how relevant the Shadowrun license is.
The game's core mechanics come from the customization available. Before the match starts you are given the option of four different races to play; Human, Elf, Troll, Dwarf. They each have their own strenghs and weaknesses and lean better towards different strategies. With their high helth, damage resistance and slow movement, Trolls work well as defensive tanks. Elves are much faster and have the ability to regenerate health if untouched for a few moments, making them excellent flag snatchers or lightning fast assassins. Dwarves are shorter, harder to kill and have immense magical potentioal with their ability to steal "essence" from almost everything in the game, making them great summoners, conjuring demons to fight, trees to heal and barriers to keep the enemy at bay. Humans are the most well rounded out of the four, they don't excel in any particular stat, but they take less penalty for using technical equipment and start off with more money than everyone else.
After racial selection the real choice begins. Each round a buy menu is available, and each player can spend the money they earned in the previous round; maiming opponents, completing objectives, or aiding teammates. The menu breaks down into 4 categories; Weapons, Tech, Magic, Team. The weapons menu is fairly straight forward, buy a gun, buy some ammo.
The thing you need to remember about investing alot of money into a weapon is that if you die, your investment is gone at the start of the round. Magic and Tech however, do not dissapear.
The Magic system works off a self-replenishing meter called "essence", every ability requires a certain amount of available essence. Want to teleport through a wall? 3 points are drained from your bar. Summon a barrier to trap the enemy? 2 points are missing while the barrier survives. There are seven magical abilities to choose from, each offering something unique to build a good strategy on.
The strategy comes not just in the use of magic, but it's combination with technical abilities. Tech is the other side to your character, you can customize him with various enhancements at the price of blocking off part of your essence meter. When blocked off, you cannot use the essence for magical ability. Finding the right mix of tech and magic is the key to winning, choosing complimentary abilities will go a long way. For example, the tech menu offers 2 interesting abilities; "Enhanced Vision" lets you see through walls and find your enemies, "Wired Reflexes" gives you the ability to move twice as fast and even more with a damage inducing sprint. Combined with the "Teleport" spell and a nice, hefty boomshot or katana, this is a lethal combination when put on the already quick elf.
Most games that try to add customization to their games inevitably create a rock-paper scissors effect making the game less fun. Shadowrun however, defeats that with the limitless customibility that increases with more people on
your team. Creating a good synergy with your comrades is beneficial for the group and yourself. You profit by helping your teammates, gaining money as the "Tree of Life" you cast heals them, or gainingpart of the profits of their kills after you "Ressurect" them. The Team option on the menu even allows you to give money to eachother, ensuring each player is well enough equipped to contribute to the whole.
Although the game has a wonderfully complex combat system, it does have shortcomings. There are 8 player models in the game. 1 for each race on each team. This makes telling players apart diffcult without reading their names. Also, for a multiplayer only game, there are relatively few maps. In addition to few maps, there are only 3 game types; kill 'em all in "Attrition", capture the neutural artifact in "Extraction", or play capture/defend in "Raid". With such limitation it would be easy to question the game's staying power. However, these problems can (and likely will) be remedied in the future with some downloadable content, but it definately should have been there from the start. Being a multiplayer-only game, there is no single player campaign, save 6 training missions that bring you up to speed on using different abilities. Also, if you want to play this game well, you need a microphone, without one strategy is impossible and defeat is immenent.
There was something that I didn't really notice about the game, but am thankfull for. The servers they use for this must be phenominal, I have yet to play a game that lagged, I have an excellent connection at home, but no matter what I play, I'll always run into a bad server. This doesn't happen with Shadowun, which is good because that could really destroy the game's
potential. I also never noticed when I was playing against PC players. There is no difference in skill or anything to really point them out on the battlefield, so I guess FasaStudios completed their goal in making a seamless experience regardless of platform. The seamlessness continues in ways recent games have not. Shadowrun not only matches the amazing party system created in the Halo series, but it excells because Games For Windows Live is now active and PC gaming friends can join in, just as easily as 360 gamers. It really is only a few buttons (or clicks) before you have a team of 8 friends on various platforms stealing the artifact from the opposition.
Shadowrun beings a new complexity to first person shooters, not with randomness, but with carefully design. The game offers something new, making it really stand out when compared to the overwhelmed category. I reccomend this game as a buy if you are inerested in online multiplayer, want to use your strategist cap, or simply like innovation.
every other first person shooter, I don't really know how relevant the Shadowrun license is.The game's core mechanics come from the customization available. Before the match starts you are given the option of four different races to play; Human, Elf, Troll, Dwarf. They each have their own strenghs and weaknesses and lean better towards different strategies. With their high helth, damage resistance and slow movement, Trolls work well as defensive tanks. Elves are much faster and have the ability to regenerate health if untouched for a few moments, making them excellent flag snatchers or lightning fast assassins. Dwarves are shorter, harder to kill and have immense magical potentioal with their ability to steal "essence" from almost everything in the game, making them great summoners, conjuring demons to fight, trees to heal and barriers to keep the enemy at bay. Humans are the most well rounded out of the four, they don't excel in any particular stat, but they take less penalty for using technical equipment and start off with more money than everyone else.
After racial selection the real choice begins. Each round a buy menu is available, and each player can spend the money they earned in the previous round; maiming opponents, completing objectives, or aiding teammates. The menu breaks down into 4 categories; Weapons, Tech, Magic, Team. The weapons menu is fairly straight forward, buy a gun, buy some ammo.
The thing you need to remember about investing alot of money into a weapon is that if you die, your investment is gone at the start of the round. Magic and Tech however, do not dissapear.The Magic system works off a self-replenishing meter called "essence", every ability requires a certain amount of available essence. Want to teleport through a wall? 3 points are drained from your bar. Summon a barrier to trap the enemy? 2 points are missing while the barrier survives. There are seven magical abilities to choose from, each offering something unique to build a good strategy on.
The strategy comes not just in the use of magic, but it's combination with technical abilities. Tech is the other side to your character, you can customize him with various enhancements at the price of blocking off part of your essence meter. When blocked off, you cannot use the essence for magical ability. Finding the right mix of tech and magic is the key to winning, choosing complimentary abilities will go a long way. For example, the tech menu offers 2 interesting abilities; "Enhanced Vision" lets you see through walls and find your enemies, "Wired Reflexes" gives you the ability to move twice as fast and even more with a damage inducing sprint. Combined with the "Teleport" spell and a nice, hefty boomshot or katana, this is a lethal combination when put on the already quick elf.
Most games that try to add customization to their games inevitably create a rock-paper scissors effect making the game less fun. Shadowrun however, defeats that with the limitless customibility that increases with more people on
your team. Creating a good synergy with your comrades is beneficial for the group and yourself. You profit by helping your teammates, gaining money as the "Tree of Life" you cast heals them, or gainingpart of the profits of their kills after you "Ressurect" them. The Team option on the menu even allows you to give money to eachother, ensuring each player is well enough equipped to contribute to the whole.Although the game has a wonderfully complex combat system, it does have shortcomings. There are 8 player models in the game. 1 for each race on each team. This makes telling players apart diffcult without reading their names. Also, for a multiplayer only game, there are relatively few maps. In addition to few maps, there are only 3 game types; kill 'em all in "Attrition", capture the neutural artifact in "Extraction", or play capture/defend in "Raid". With such limitation it would be easy to question the game's staying power. However, these problems can (and likely will) be remedied in the future with some downloadable content, but it definately should have been there from the start. Being a multiplayer-only game, there is no single player campaign, save 6 training missions that bring you up to speed on using different abilities. Also, if you want to play this game well, you need a microphone, without one strategy is impossible and defeat is immenent.
There was something that I didn't really notice about the game, but am thankfull for. The servers they use for this must be phenominal, I have yet to play a game that lagged, I have an excellent connection at home, but no matter what I play, I'll always run into a bad server. This doesn't happen with Shadowun, which is good because that could really destroy the game's
potential. I also never noticed when I was playing against PC players. There is no difference in skill or anything to really point them out on the battlefield, so I guess FasaStudios completed their goal in making a seamless experience regardless of platform. The seamlessness continues in ways recent games have not. Shadowrun not only matches the amazing party system created in the Halo series, but it excells because Games For Windows Live is now active and PC gaming friends can join in, just as easily as 360 gamers. It really is only a few buttons (or clicks) before you have a team of 8 friends on various platforms stealing the artifact from the opposition.Shadowrun beings a new complexity to first person shooters, not with randomness, but with carefully design. The game offers something new, making it really stand out when compared to the overwhelmed category. I reccomend this game as a buy if you are inerested in online multiplayer, want to use your strategist cap, or simply like innovation.
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2 comments:
i cant believe you just recommended this game... i too had high hopes for this game but they came crashing down when i actually played it. great idea but not greatly executed.
I'm going to have to disagree with you. I thought the game was very well put together. Look beyond the superficials like models and maps into the core gameplay. Every ability , race and weapon is well balanced. That is something far more difficult to achieve than any other feature. The game is designed as a hardcore multiplayer game and succeeded by providing a hardcore multiplayer experience.
Though I disagree with you severely please let me know what you disliked about the title. I do think though, if you spend more time with it you will start to see where I am coming from.
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