Spec Ops: The Line
The human mind is pretty annoying thing. It likes to trick you and turn against you, usually at all the wrong moments. It's probably the best-worst thing about the human body. Spec Ops: The Line understands that. It gets you inside the protagonist's, a Captain Walker's, mind. It isn't a very pleasant place to be. A normal soldier gets pushed to the extreme and you're caught along in the ride. If your idea of a fun game is one that leaves you full of smiles and rainbows, this isn't the game for you. It's gritty and depressing and a barrel full of awesome.
Spec Ops begins with three soldiers, you, Lieutenant Adams and Staff Sergeant Lugo, being sent into a wrecked Dubai. I'm gonna stop the story recap just to point out how damn amazing Dubai looks. If you crank the graphics up to high it looks like a tourist photo. When you first arrive you get to see the city framed against the sun. From the outset, it looks beautiful. When you get inside it though, it's less so. Unless tunnels of rotting corpses is your thing. In which case, you're pretty screwed up. Anyway, their mission is to recon the area, look for survivors and get them the hell out of there. Dubai has been hit by a massive sandstorm and the only sign of human life is a faint distress signal from a Colonel Konrad. As things go, it's not exactly a holiday resort. Not long after arriving you're set upon by a group of armed men, who don't take much coaxing before they open fire on our boys.
The shooting is standard third-person shooter affair. When the enemy opens fire you dive into the nearest cover and begin returning fire. It begins to feel rather repetitive really. There isn't much variation in the enemies, so it compensates by throwing a large number of them at you. They bring in a close-combat specialist at one point, but they are extremely rare and easily dealt with, and there are a few Heavy weapon specialists floating around. It's main gimmick is sand, which Dubai currently has an overabundance of. You can occasionally shoot out windows so that sand will smother your enemies. That's the theory, anyway. Usually it's quicker just to the cap them. The only time I used the sand was when my squadmates wouldn't shut up about it. Ammo is strangely scarce in Dubai though. Guns despawn quicker than you'd expect, meaning your weapons will often run out in the middle of a firefight. Combined with the sheer amount of enemies, it can make simple encounters pointlessly difficult.
On the other hand, your two comrades are there to help you out. You can order them to take out priority targets, through Adams' grenades or Lugo's sniper. Usually, they're pretty good at it. Lugo will be very useful when it comes to countersniping and Adams is irreplacable as a turrey destroyer. The problem with this is that the AI of your two squad mates isn't exactly what you'd call adaptable. When you point out a target in the middle of the field they'll often simply run out of cover. Usually into heavy machine gun fire. It doesn't end well. Then the other one goes to revive them and gets swiss-cheese'd too. They also enjoy pointing out soldiers that are flanking you, while stubbornly refusing to shoot them. Dicks.
Thankfully, the game redeems itself in the story aspect. It's incredibly dark and really well written. Even the dialogue, which can tend to feel cheesy in this genre, is believable and even funny at times. The characters have a good back and forth and change in believable ways. Lugo's all happy and chirpy in the beginning. By the end, he sounds more in need of a hug than anyone I've met. I won't spoil anything, but about half-way through the story something bad happens. Something really incredibly bad. It shakes the characters to their core. You learn more about Walker as a person. You learn his head isn't a nice place to stay. A good story is one that can provoke emotions. Spec Ops does that. I've never felt so conflicted towards a game before. It continually puts Walker on the spot, making him choose hard decision over hard decision. Even his men become distant as they watch Walker walk a fragmenting line.
Spec Op's story is so good that it's a shame that it ends so quickly. You can probably finish it in an evening. For once I wanted a war game to keep on going. The dark parts of the story would come across so much more strongly if it was stretched out a bit. We can't feel sad about bad things if we don't care about them. A sand-destroyed Dubai is such an interesting setting that I wanted to spend a bit more time there. As it is, it's a strong and moving story but one you can probably just tell over a drink at the pub. If we stayed in Walker's mind a bit longer, it would be one we could read in a novel.
Still, it's well worth a look in. It'll let you look into the mind of a breaking man. Hell, you'll enjoy it. But it'll set you thinking. It's a short but incredibly bumpy ride. Dubai is a conflicted place full of factions and intrigue. Walker and his men get put right in the middle of it, trying desperately to find Konrad, who seems to have gone off the deep end. They try and do the right thing, but what the 'right thing' is is clear to nobody. Are all these factions the real enemy in Dubai? Well, I'll let you figure that one out yourself.
Game: Spec Ops: The Line
Developer(s): Yager Development, Darkside Game Studios
Publisher: 2k Games
Platform(s): PC, XBox 360, PS3
The human mind is pretty annoying thing. It likes to trick you and turn against you, usually at all the wrong moments. It's probably the best-worst thing about the human body. Spec Ops: The Line understands that. It gets you inside the protagonist's, a Captain Walker's, mind. It isn't a very pleasant place to be. A normal soldier gets pushed to the extreme and you're caught along in the ride. If your idea of a fun game is one that leaves you full of smiles and rainbows, this isn't the game for you. It's gritty and depressing and a barrel full of awesome.
Spec Ops begins with three soldiers, you, Lieutenant Adams and Staff Sergeant Lugo, being sent into a wrecked Dubai. I'm gonna stop the story recap just to point out how damn amazing Dubai looks. If you crank the graphics up to high it looks like a tourist photo. When you first arrive you get to see the city framed against the sun. From the outset, it looks beautiful. When you get inside it though, it's less so. Unless tunnels of rotting corpses is your thing. In which case, you're pretty screwed up. Anyway, their mission is to recon the area, look for survivors and get them the hell out of there. Dubai has been hit by a massive sandstorm and the only sign of human life is a faint distress signal from a Colonel Konrad. As things go, it's not exactly a holiday resort. Not long after arriving you're set upon by a group of armed men, who don't take much coaxing before they open fire on our boys.
Dubai looks pretty nice. At first.
The shooting is standard third-person shooter affair. When the enemy opens fire you dive into the nearest cover and begin returning fire. It begins to feel rather repetitive really. There isn't much variation in the enemies, so it compensates by throwing a large number of them at you. They bring in a close-combat specialist at one point, but they are extremely rare and easily dealt with, and there are a few Heavy weapon specialists floating around. It's main gimmick is sand, which Dubai currently has an overabundance of. You can occasionally shoot out windows so that sand will smother your enemies. That's the theory, anyway. Usually it's quicker just to the cap them. The only time I used the sand was when my squadmates wouldn't shut up about it. Ammo is strangely scarce in Dubai though. Guns despawn quicker than you'd expect, meaning your weapons will often run out in the middle of a firefight. Combined with the sheer amount of enemies, it can make simple encounters pointlessly difficult.
On the other hand, your two comrades are there to help you out. You can order them to take out priority targets, through Adams' grenades or Lugo's sniper. Usually, they're pretty good at it. Lugo will be very useful when it comes to countersniping and Adams is irreplacable as a turrey destroyer. The problem with this is that the AI of your two squad mates isn't exactly what you'd call adaptable. When you point out a target in the middle of the field they'll often simply run out of cover. Usually into heavy machine gun fire. It doesn't end well. Then the other one goes to revive them and gets swiss-cheese'd too. They also enjoy pointing out soldiers that are flanking you, while stubbornly refusing to shoot them. Dicks.
Thankfully, the game redeems itself in the story aspect. It's incredibly dark and really well written. Even the dialogue, which can tend to feel cheesy in this genre, is believable and even funny at times. The characters have a good back and forth and change in believable ways. Lugo's all happy and chirpy in the beginning. By the end, he sounds more in need of a hug than anyone I've met. I won't spoil anything, but about half-way through the story something bad happens. Something really incredibly bad. It shakes the characters to their core. You learn more about Walker as a person. You learn his head isn't a nice place to stay. A good story is one that can provoke emotions. Spec Ops does that. I've never felt so conflicted towards a game before. It continually puts Walker on the spot, making him choose hard decision over hard decision. Even his men become distant as they watch Walker walk a fragmenting line.
Here is a visual representation of the fragmenting line.
Spec Op's story is so good that it's a shame that it ends so quickly. You can probably finish it in an evening. For once I wanted a war game to keep on going. The dark parts of the story would come across so much more strongly if it was stretched out a bit. We can't feel sad about bad things if we don't care about them. A sand-destroyed Dubai is such an interesting setting that I wanted to spend a bit more time there. As it is, it's a strong and moving story but one you can probably just tell over a drink at the pub. If we stayed in Walker's mind a bit longer, it would be one we could read in a novel.
Still, it's well worth a look in. It'll let you look into the mind of a breaking man. Hell, you'll enjoy it. But it'll set you thinking. It's a short but incredibly bumpy ride. Dubai is a conflicted place full of factions and intrigue. Walker and his men get put right in the middle of it, trying desperately to find Konrad, who seems to have gone off the deep end. They try and do the right thing, but what the 'right thing' is is clear to nobody. Are all these factions the real enemy in Dubai? Well, I'll let you figure that one out yourself.
Game: Spec Ops: The Line
Developer(s): Yager Development, Darkside Game Studios
Publisher: 2k Games
Platform(s): PC, XBox 360, PS3