[HEADING=1]Sub/jective Reviews[/HEADING]
I am starting a new review series that I am going to do every holiday/time off from education. The series will be split into segments, where I discuss the different aspects(gameplay, visuals, audio, story, multiplayer(if any)) of a game in their own given category. Most notably, I will provide what I find to be an objective assessment of those different sections. What this means however, is that I will provide any objective information that I can, which will usually be limited to a list of features, a bug/glitch count during my playthrough and a run-down of the options. I will take both the subjective portion of the game and the objective into account during the final assessment. I will not provide scores, as I am opposed to that idea to begin with, as it causes readers to glaze over key information in any review.
Why am I doing this? Many people are clamouring for game reviews to be more 'objective', so I'll address that wanting, if only to highlight exactly how limited true objectivity is in application to reviewing.
For the time being, I will focus on indie games. I am open to suggestions, so long as the games are available on PC/Steam and so long as they aren't something that has been talked about too much, as I don't believe that I will add anything significant to that discussion.
Why am I doing this? Many people are clamouring for game reviews to be more 'objective', so I'll address that wanting, if only to highlight exactly how limited true objectivity is in application to reviewing.
For the time being, I will focus on indie games. I am open to suggestions, so long as the games are available on PC/Steam and so long as they aren't something that has been talked about too much, as I don't believe that I will add anything significant to that discussion.
Critique is encouraged and appreciated. If you see something you'd like to be added/improved, post ahead!
The PC that the games will be played on:
[li]Intel i5 3470 @ 3.2Ghz Quad Core Processor[/li]
[li]Kingston Hyper-X 2x4GB DDR3 RAM @ 1337Mhz[/li]
[li]Zotac Nvidia Geforce GTX 670 2GB[/li]
[li]Acer 23.6" Monitor 1920x1080 @ 60Hz[/li]
[HEADING=1]Receiver[/HEADING]
[HEADING=2]Intro![/HEADING]
Receiver was created by Wolfire Games as part of the 7 Day FPS Game Jam. The company, or rather, group of individuals has a history of contributing to open-source game projects. What makes Receiver stand out however, is that it was developed sufficiently enough to garner a full Steam release: most other contributions rarely get to this stage of development, though Receiver certainly isn't the sole exception. SupaHot is also on its way to getting a digital release, and there are quite a few parallels to be drawn between the games. Both take classic FPS action and tweak things just enough that they require an entirely different approach in the game. Receiver changes up the way we handle guns in FPSes and SupaHot uses bullet-time to an extent that shootouts become strategic bouts.Receiver is certainly an interesting experiment, and as a game with a few roguelike elements, it can be a bit hard to pin down its value. Nonetheless, in this assessment, I shall discuss the areas in which the game succeeds and fails in, and what the game can represent as an idea.
[HEADING=2]Story![/HEADING]
This certainly won't be an easy section to assess. Due to the deliberately tight development schedule, Receiver is game that focuses on its mechanics, rather than its story. A la [a href=]Fez[/a], it offers a vague narrative, which is presented through an indirect manner.
Receiver doesn't strictly have an end goal or any direct motivation to pursue it. An omni-present status line on the top right informs you that you need to find 11 tapes, scattered all around the level, and then listen to them. I'd better disclose that at the time of writing, I have not collected all the tapes. If this reflects a lack of professionalism on my part, then I wholeheartedly apologise for this, as I imagine it will factor into my assessment of the final product. In spite of this, I have played the game for approximately 2-3 hours, and I looked up the completed tapes on YouTube. I feel that I have a solid enough grasp of the game to execute judgement, but your perceptions may vary. I advise against doing this, if you plan to play the game for pure enjoyment.
The story pits you as a prospective Receiver, someone who is able to freely shift between realities and be able to interact within both the subconscious reality(called reality B) and the normal, every-day reality(called reality A(in game)). There is no narrator per se, but the voice in the tapes tells you that upon collecting all 11 tapes, you will be able to achieve an 'awakened' state. It's...not exactly clear what that entails, and without wishing to spoil anything, I'll just say that the story isn't the main attraction. The 11 tapes are your primary motivation, despite how uninteresting the story ultimately is, but the uncanny atmosphere(spurred on by the bare-bones level design) mixed in with equally ominous music does seem to suggest an intricate plot involving doomsday events and cross-dimensional warfare. It seems to, but that potential isn't capitalised upon. Instead all the writing and atmospheric detail serves to place you in an odd world where you are constantly on edge. Playing a tape dulls out all other sounds, and the voice acting is suitably neutral to really unsettle you whilst you ponder the reason you have been placed in that world. Though the story could've been about a twitchy paranoid type with a gun leaving his shopping list recorded on cassette tapes and it would've still carried about as much impact.
There are other details I could mention, but due to the nature of Roguelike elements, it bears investigation on your part. Going for a completionist run of the story can take you up to maybe 8 hours(due to the levels being randomly generated: accounting for increasing competence with each seed and occasional slips resulting in death) to find all the tapes(sadly, there are no other collectibles to be had). Whilst the story itself isn't effective or even all that interesting once you fully uncover it, it does add a pinch of immersion to the game and contributes to the alienating atmosphere that you're likely to experience for the first few hours. I'm not going to lie, my first moments with the game provided me with one of the most tense experiences with interactive media that I have experienced in recent memory. However, this is due to the masterfully simple level design and ambient audio production.
[HEADING=2]Gameplay![/HEADING]
This is the meat of the title. Remember how I said that the game tweaks things just a little to completely change the way you play FPSes? Yeah, Receiver goes for a realistic depiction of guns. No, it doesn't have bullet drop-off like Battlefield or the assorted realism elements found in the ARMA series. Instead, the gun is used like an individual tool separate from the player. What I mean by this is that everything is manual. In order to reload, you have to: eject the magazine, place it in your inventory, select another magazine, insert it, check the slider to make sure the gun is loaded and pull the hammer down.
The controls take some getting used to at first; my own experience had me running with the controls constantly on my HUD, and fumbling my way through trigger discipline. Whilst initially it may be a bit cumbersome to what you'd be used to, the mechanic is expertly designed in such a fashion that the simple act of reloading is satisfyingly visceral. You really do feel the weight of the gun throughout the game, and it's amazing how much detail they've put into the gun physics.
There are about three different handguns that you can start with. Every time you die or when you start a new game, you have a chance to end up with a different firearm, and all three are distinct from one another. The Revolver(Smith & Wesson Model 10) is extremely powerful, but reloading can be a hassle as the spent bullets can sometimes get stuck, so you need to mash the 'empty case' button a few times. If you're also lacking on rounds, then you'll become quick friends with the 'pull hammer' button as well(the chamber doesn't automate to the next bullet). The Colt M1911A1 has relatively small magazines, but it's reasonably powerful and easy to aim, even if you often end up with more bullets than the magazines can take(resulting in you finding a corner to hide in and re-filling the magazines, bullet by bullet). The Glock 17 is a bit of a pain in the ass when it comes to pure power, but it has large magazines, and burst-fire can down an enemy quickly. You'll quickly learn to adopt specific approaches tailored to each one of these guns, and all are equally as fun to use and mess about with.
Speaking of the levels, the level design isn't amazing. Mostly barren warehouses and apartment blocks:nothing terribly interesting to look at. Ammo and tapes are scattered throughout, but they're not particularly difficult to find, as the bullets emit a yellow glow. Whilst they are generated at the start of every game, each session follows a specific pattern that you'll be able to identify fairly quickly(in direct proportion to how often you play the game). However, they do provide an eerie atmosphere because they are so bog-standard but also barren. It feels like the buildings have been deserted, not just empty from the get-go, which adds to the layer of unease that the game builds up as you progress through the level.
In terms of upgrades(since the game does borrow from Roguelikes) and random loot... there isn't any. You always find ammo for your gun(and only ever for the specific gun you have on your person, but that's for the best, as the ammo is scarce throughout), tapes and maybe a flashlight. The flashlight is there to help you deal with the lesser lit areas, but it feels arbitrary. There are no enticing rewards to be found aside from more ammo and cassette tapes, but the latter are finite. Since you die in one hit and that you are only as powerful as your current skill with the weapon on hand, there isn't any in-game progression either. It feels like the random generation of the levels is there less so to spur on the central concept behind Receiver, but more so to accommodate for the lack of content on offer. Given more time, the game could've probably been properly fleshed out, but a counterpoint can be made to the effectiveness of the levels. Since the atmosphere of the game is supposed to be unsettling and creepy, dying and starting again means that the level design doesn't lose it's effectiveness in assisting the atmosphere. Sprucing this up with additional content might be detrimental to the game's simplistic, but oddly effective presentation, so I'm undecided on whether or not I feel that the game is anaemic or okay as is. It does help that the game is pretty hard(you die in one hit), as that both prolongs the runtime, but also encourages on the player to improve their own marksmanship to be able to beat the challenges on offer.
My biggest gripe however, is with the enemies. Like I said in the story section, the game suggests at a really interesting narrative, but fails to deliver on it. Well, the antagonists are robots. Not big and scary robots that try to impersonate human behaviour, like the Working Joes in Alien: Isolation, they're just stationary turrets and flying taser-drones. That's all. To take down the stationary ones, you do require to have a decent amount of skill in aiming(just firing at it is wasteful: you need to hit a specific part of the turret to disable it), but they never evolve as a threat or to address your growing skill with the guns. Similarly so, the flying drones are annoying and often cheap. They can incapacitate you really quickly, and whilst one shot is all it takes, the random nature of the game makes it a crapshoot if it's just one drone you have to deal with, or four. Oh yeah, and the reloading is cumbersome as hell, particularly with the Revolver. One shot is all it takes to kill you, so the machines are a constant threat, but they're not terribly interesting to fight. The game can also spawn you in unfair circumstances, where your exits are surrounded by four stationary turrets and at least one drone. They fail to properly evolve to provide organic difficulty (a la Dark Souls), so your deaths often feel cheap rather than resultant of negligence.
[HEADING=2]Objective Assessment:[/HEADING]
Controls are fully re-bindable through a pre-game launcher, including secondary functions. No FoV slider, though no problems in regards to sickness were reported using the above setup.
[HEADING=2]Visuals![/HEADING]
Rudimentary at best. Low-fidelity blocky textures throughout on everything but the guns, and the lighting effects are pretty sub-standard as well. From the pre-game launcher, I hazard a guess that it might be running a modified version of the Unity engine though I'm not entirely sure. Nonetheless, the pure visual presentation is not memorable in the slightest. Drab level design and a perpetual night do not make this game easy on the eyes, and the enemy design is pretty drab too.
From the pure graphics, the game looks a older than it actually is, but I feel that this might contribute to the sense of the uncanny that I mentioned before. It's familiar, but not too familiar: something is just so slightly off. Graphics borrowed from an earlier stage of PC gaming aren't too alien enough that they detract from the experience, but just different enough to unsettle.
[HEADING=2]Objective Assessment:[/HEADING]
Presets available at start-up launcher, but nothing else beside resolution options and windowed mode. Game runs smoothly regardless of settings on the setup.
[HEADING=2]Audio![/HEADING]
The sound assets of the guns are pretty good. It adds to the sense of satisfaction you get when you manage to quickly reload a rifle and face off against a new-found foe. As for everything else, it's standard and basic. The enemies have their own distinct sounds, which help you in determining how close you are to a turret or a drone, but it's nothing great either.
The music is interesting. It's just one constant track, but it changes and escalates as you progress through the game, only stopping when you've bitten the bullet. It's sometimes interlaced with nonsensical mumbling/chanting, but that's to do with the story: one of the tapes mentions that during the process of awakening, you gradually begin to hear a strange voice that becomes clearer over time. That's all though. It's a cyber-punk track that keeps you on your toes, but as an actual article of music, it's not amazing. I imagine that it can become quite grating after a while too.
[HEADING=2]Objective Assessment:[/HEADING]
Separate Audio sliders for voice, sounds and music. Master slide included.
[HEADING=2]Tangent/Thematic Discussion![/HEADING]
Beyond the pure mechanics, there isn't too much to say about this title. It's an admirable effort that was done over the course of seven days, and it's an interesting exploration and experimentation of classic game mechanics.
It offers an interesting atmosphere though, that keeps the game afloat and the player engaged. You feel constantly on edge, to the point that this game could be classified as having light survival-horror themes. Specifically, akin to the ones present in the original Bioshock. It's not that you don't have agency, it's just that the means through which you execute it are difficult and require a certain amount of finesse. The controls aren't bad by any means, they're just sufficiently non-standard enough to make combat less certain than the ones given in other shooters. I'd love to see this sort of thing done in an actual survival horror game, as Receiver manages to unsettle the player with minimal level and sound suggestion: I'd like to imagine that a game based around psychological torment could get a lot of mileage from this sort of design philosophy in regards to gameplay.
[HEADING=1]Final Assessment![/HEADING]
Receiver offers up an interesting enough spin on the traditional formula for FPS mechanics that it is instantly engaging. Peppered with an intense atmosphere and a vague story that hinges on determination and continued playing, the game has a decent amount of mileage for most people. The mechanics are enthralling enough that I would consider the asking price sufficient as is, and make it a definite game to try if it ever gets the sale treatment. An interesting experiment in gun physics garners the game a recommendation.
[HEADING=2]Final Objective Assessment![/HEADING]
Lacking video options, but decent audio options. No FoV slider may be problematic. Game is stable, and playthroughs were bug-free. At the current price, the game doesn't have a value per hour due to consistent play nature. HowLongToBeat states that average time for completion is 6 hours(however, there is only one submission on the site). Taken as an average, the game has a value of £0.67 per hour.