What Makes A Good First Person Shooter: A Series

SATCHMO · 07-02-2009, 12:04 AM

The original Syphon Filter for PS1 and the first few James Bonds were my fave, but then again I'm not really that into video games.

Piss Me Off · 07-02-2009, 06:51 AM

Yeah Goldeneye is going to have to make an appearance, pretty much summing up all the shooting games i like!

Fruitonica · 07-02-2009, 08:13 AM

Half Life series is definitely my favourite of all time. I'm not sure whether I prefer the original or sequel. One the one hand, HL2 is overall more polished and has the grav gun, and I'm one of the few who really enjoyed the vehicle sections.
But the original just feels more intense when you play it, for some reason the combine troops actually feel like a step down from the marines. Basically because you can kill them so quickly they don't get a chance to do much cool stuff, whereas the marines could live long enough to flank you and flush you out.

Will the Thief series or Deus Ex make an appearance? Or are you going to focus on the strictly 'shooter' games?

**Janszoon** · 07-02-2009, 08:44 AM

I have to admit a lot of first person shooter games make me nauseous. It's weird because I don't get motion sickness very easily in cars, planes, boats, etc., but some of those games—woah. At any rate I kind of avoid them because of this but I do own a couple and Metroid Prime is a pretty cool one.

Alfred · 07-02-2009, 10:47 AM

Metroid Prime 3 is an excellent game and one of my favorite first person shooters, if it counts (a lot of it is based on puzzles and exploring).

I really want to get Bioshock. I played through the demo and it's fantastic.

LoathsomePete · 07-02-2009, 11:21 PM

I think that instead of just talking about a game, I'll talk about what makes a first person shooter great, then use an example to further prove my point.

Fear

No not the game (I will get to that in a bit), but the use of fear in video games is detrimental to creating an enticing atmosphere. When the original Doom came out, their use to "Closet Monsters" appearing seemingly at random. I still recall the second level of the original Doom scaring me when I was forced to go into a darkened room in search of a key to open a door.

No game gives off the same level of fear as the Condemned series. Condemned: Criminal Origins was one of the launch titles and met to some critical acclaim, but also a lot of well deserved criticism. Before I get to the criticism, I just want to talk for a moment of all the things Condemned does right. For one, it is one of the few first person shooters that puts the emphasis on melee combat rather than guns. While guns are present in the game, they are actually quite ineffective as they all have extremely limited ammunition and the sporadic movements of the enemies make it hard to actually hit anything. Limited ammunition is something the Resident Evil series is known for (well that is until Resident Evil 4), putting you alone in a setting, surrounded by people all wanting to kill you and with very little in the way of defending yourself. Rather than using firearms to dispatch your foes, you can clobber them to death with blunt objects like 2x4s, conduits, lead pipes, and the occasional fire axes, sledgehammers, and wrecking bars. The use of melee weapons isn't exactly new to First Person Shooters, in Doom you had your fists, in Duke Nukem you had your boot, and in the Half-Life series you have your crowbar, but none of them actually feel like you're making an impact. In Condemned, you can almost feel the impact up your arm as you whack clouds of blood and teeth from a teenager runaway's face. It only gets better when the enemies drop to their knees and you can deliver fatal finishing blows, like snapping their necks or giving one final punch to the face. It only gets better in the second game Bloodshot, where there are environmental finishes, such as snapping their necks in a toilet bowl, throwing them face first into a TV, or putting their head in a vice and crushing it into a gooey mess.

There's far more to this series than just gratuities violence though, one, and quite possibly the most important is the setting. Each of the levels take place in poorly lit decrepit buildings that are inhabited by murderous junkies and people suffering from schizophrenia. The enemies are often lurking the shadows, muttering threats or random babbling. The levels range from abandoned buildings to unused subway stations and tracks, to an old abandoned department store, a school, and finally a farm. The limited lighting makes it hard to anticipate when an enemy is near, forcing you to rely on your ears more than your sight. When you do get to see an enemy in some kind of light, their appearance is anything but wholesome. Missing teeth, facial cuts and suffering from malnutrition the enemies put a whole new level of uneasiness, as they're not the legion of identical enemies most games give us. All these aspects help to create a truly eerie atmosphere that has you sitting on the edge of your seat, reveling in both fear and anticipation of what's going to happen next.

Earlier I stated as to why I didn't use the game F.E.A.R as my example, as it usually gets lumped into the horror genre. There really isn't much horror to the game, as misleading as title may be. The game plays as your standard military shooter in which you play some random soldier who was just assigned to the unit. You have a super power that lets you slow down time (Because bullet time hasn't already been done to death) which gives you an incredibly unfair advantage over the enemies. The enemies are nothing more than a clone army of super soldiers (Because that's never been done before). Occasionally the game remembers that it's trying to be a horror game and the screen will get dulled, some weird sounds will start to play, a blood splat will be thrown randomly on the ground and a few more surreal things happen, but then you're back to dreary old reality in which you get to clear out another room of enemies. Those surreal moments were really the only part of F.E.A.R. that I liked, but they were so few and far between it really makes it hard to call it a horror game. It's a competent first person shooter, but it brings nothing new to the table, and doesn't deliver the same feeling of well... horror that the Condemned series delivers.

ProggyMan · 07-03-2009, 12:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alfred

Metroid Prime 3 is an excellent game and one of my favorite first person shooters, if it counts (a lot of it is based on puzzles and exploring).

I really want to get Bioshock. I played through the demo and it's fantastic.

Bioshock is great.

Seltzer · 07-03-2009, 08:16 AM

I've never really been a fan of FPS games but BF1 Desert Combat and BF2 have always been favourites of mine. I've spent a large portion of my life playing DC with mates.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Piss Me Off

I'm playing through Half Life 2 now (slow off the mark) and i'm still at the sewers but it's shaping up to be brilliant. What you said about shooters being all macho-marines is very correct and puts me off the genre on the whole, maybe i've been playing too much Nintendo but i ask for a bit more charm and uniqueness than that.

Ever played Postal 2? Technically not the best but it's a laugh.

Postal is fun as well - have you ever played multiplayer with low gravity settings?

LoathsomePete · 07-03-2009, 01:34 PM

To this day, Desert Combat is still my favourite mod for any game. I'm hoping that when Black Mesa comes out it'll knock it out of place, but until that comes out, DC is still up there.

Piss Me Off · 07-03-2009, 03:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Seltzer

Postal is fun as well - have you ever played multiplayer with low gravity settings?

Hehe yeah, i'm glad they didn't tone down the stupid amounts of gore for multiplayer as well. Anti gravity reminds me, i do have a soft spot for Unreal Tournament too.

07-02-2009, 06:51 AM	#12 (permalink)
Piss Me Off Moodswings n' Roundabouts Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: At the corner of Dude and Catastrophe Posts: 4,512	Yeah Goldeneye is going to have to make an appearance, pretty much summing up all the shooting games i like! __________________ Last FM Rate Yr Music Muxtape

07-02-2009, 08:44 AM	#14 (permalink)
Janszoon Mate, Spawn & Die Join Date: May 2007 Location: The Rapping Community Posts: 24,593	I have to admit a lot of first person shooter games make me nauseous. It's weird because I don't get motion sickness very easily in cars, planes, boats, etc., but some of those games—woah. At any rate I kind of avoid them because of this but I do own a couple and Metroid Prime is a pretty cool one. __________________ A Night in the Life of the Invisible Man Time & Place 25 Albums You Should Hear Before the Moon Crashes into the Earth and We All Die last.fm

07-02-2009, 10:47 AM	#15 (permalink)
Alfred one big soul Join Date: Feb 2008 Location: Canada Posts: 5,096	Metroid Prime 3 is an excellent game and one of my favorite first person shooters, if it counts (a lot of it is based on puzzles and exploring). I really want to get Bioshock. I played through the demo and it's fantastic. __________________ LAST.FM / VINYL COLLECTION / RYM

07-02-2009, 11:21 PM	#16 (permalink)
LoathsomePete Cardboard Box Realtor Join Date: Feb 2009 Location: Hobb's End Posts: 7,648	I think that instead of just talking about a game, I'll talk about what makes a first person shooter great, then use an example to further prove my point. Fear No not the game (I will get to that in a bit), but the use of fear in video games is detrimental to creating an enticing atmosphere. When the original Doom came out, their use to "Closet Monsters" appearing seemingly at random. I still recall the second level of the original Doom scaring me when I was forced to go into a darkened room in search of a key to open a door. No game gives off the same level of fear as the Condemned series. Condemned: Criminal Origins was one of the launch titles and met to some critical acclaim, but also a lot of well deserved criticism. Before I get to the criticism, I just want to talk for a moment of all the things Condemned does right. For one, it is one of the few first person shooters that puts the emphasis on melee combat rather than guns. While guns are present in the game, they are actually quite ineffective as they all have extremely limited ammunition and the sporadic movements of the enemies make it hard to actually hit anything. Limited ammunition is something the Resident Evil series is known for (well that is until Resident Evil 4), putting you alone in a setting, surrounded by people all wanting to kill you and with very little in the way of defending yourself. Rather than using firearms to dispatch your foes, you can clobber them to death with blunt objects like 2x4s, conduits, lead pipes, and the occasional fire axes, sledgehammers, and wrecking bars. The use of melee weapons isn't exactly new to First Person Shooters, in Doom you had your fists, in Duke Nukem you had your boot, and in the Half-Life series you have your crowbar, but none of them actually feel like you're making an impact. In Condemned, you can almost feel the impact up your arm as you whack clouds of blood and teeth from a teenager runaway's face. It only gets better when the enemies drop to their knees and you can deliver fatal finishing blows, like snapping their necks or giving one final punch to the face. It only gets better in the second game Bloodshot, where there are environmental finishes, such as snapping their necks in a toilet bowl, throwing them face first into a TV, or putting their head in a vice and crushing it into a gooey mess. There's far more to this series than just gratuities violence though, one, and quite possibly the most important is the setting. Each of the levels take place in poorly lit decrepit buildings that are inhabited by murderous junkies and people suffering from schizophrenia. The enemies are often lurking the shadows, muttering threats or random babbling. The levels range from abandoned buildings to unused subway stations and tracks, to an old abandoned department store, a school, and finally a farm. The limited lighting makes it hard to anticipate when an enemy is near, forcing you to rely on your ears more than your sight. When you do get to see an enemy in some kind of light, their appearance is anything but wholesome. Missing teeth, facial cuts and suffering from malnutrition the enemies put a whole new level of uneasiness, as they're not the legion of identical enemies most games give us. All these aspects help to create a truly eerie atmosphere that has you sitting on the edge of your seat, reveling in both fear and anticipation of what's going to happen next. Earlier I stated as to why I didn't use the game F.E.A.R as my example, as it usually gets lumped into the horror genre. There really isn't much horror to the game, as misleading as title may be. The game plays as your standard military shooter in which you play some random soldier who was just assigned to the unit. You have a super power that lets you slow down time (Because bullet time hasn't already been done to death) which gives you an incredibly unfair advantage over the enemies. The enemies are nothing more than a clone army of super soldiers (Because that's never been done before). Occasionally the game remembers that it's trying to be a horror game and the screen will get dulled, some weird sounds will start to play, a blood splat will be thrown randomly on the ground and a few more surreal things happen, but then you're back to dreary old reality in which you get to clear out another room of enemies. Those surreal moments were really the only part of F.E.A.R. that I liked, but they were so few and far between it really makes it hard to call it a horror game. It's a competent first person shooter, but it brings nothing new to the table, and doesn't deliver the same feeling of well... horror that the Condemned series delivers. __________________ Last.FM 101 Albums That May Not Change Your Life, But I Really Like And You Might Too

07-03-2009, 01:34 PM	#19 (permalink)
LoathsomePete Cardboard Box Realtor Join Date: Feb 2009 Location: Hobb's End Posts: 7,648	To this day, Desert Combat is still my favourite mod for any game. I'm hoping that when Black Mesa comes out it'll knock it out of place, but until that comes out, DC is still up there. __________________ Last.FM 101 Albums That May Not Change Your Life, But I Really Like And You Might Too

07-02-2009, 12:04 AM	#11 (permalink)
SATCHMO Al Dente Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Texas Posts: 4,708	The original Syphon Filter for PS1 and the first few James Bonds were my fave, but then again I'm not really that into video games.

07-02-2009, 08:13 AM	#13 (permalink)
Fruitonica Pale and Wan Join Date: Aug 2008 Location: Aus Posts: 917	Half Life series is definitely my favourite of all time. I'm not sure whether I prefer the original or sequel. One the one hand, HL2 is overall more polished and has the grav gun, and I'm one of the few who really enjoyed the vehicle sections. But the original just feels more intense when you play it, for some reason the combine troops actually feel like a step down from the marines. Basically because you can kill them so quickly they don't get a chance to do much cool stuff, whereas the marines could live long enough to flank you and flush you out. Will the Thief series or Deus Ex make an appearance? Or are you going to focus on the strictly 'shooter' games?