FPS is quickly becoming a stagnant genre. Crysis 2 has played a marvelous card, but I cannot begin to fathom how much effort they had to put in to make something fun, but different especially when the sheep and drones of today will play it as long as it has "Call of Duty" on the box. Admittedly, there is not much more you can offer in regards to a game when you have a gun or two and a lot of people to shoot. If you have a good story to run with that then please oblige me. Just don't give me Half Life 2, I will come at you with a knife.
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| No, no. Looks can be deceiving |
So I looked into the backlog of games I had wanted to play at the time but couldn't afford to see if I could find me any gems. I found Haze.
It didn't promise me anything, and therefore I expected nothing. It was kinda like a blind date, only I knew I wouldn't be getting any at the end of the night no matter how generous or kind I was. But I was willing to play nice.
Haze is a futuristic shooter, in which soldiers are equipped with 'Nectar'. A supposed drug that can be induced to enhanced performance in the field. As a player you get 6 in total that replenish over time, and help a great deal in taking out hard to see enemies or large group of enemies at a time. I will be honest, I do not see or understand the benefits much beyond this. It seems to just turn your eyes into enemy seeking beacons. You have been given orders to take out a dictator 'Skin Coat' who is heard to have been ethnically cleansing and slaughtering innocent people. But while on the mission things take an unfortunate turn, and you are left stranded after a betrayal only left to befriend those you were set out to kill.
At first I was pleasantly surprised. The opening sequence offered some relatively impressive voice acting, some decent enough animation considering its year of release, and all in all a nicely rounded script to keep the dialogue intriguing (See What Have I Been Playing: Bayonetta). I got into battle and then it began.
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| Guy in red is upset, so everyone's a target |
Not been given the full tutorial on how to play, and then throwing you right into the fray would be fantastic if indeed it was contextual. But you played a battle-warm-soldier, so you at least want to feel like one! I died within 30 seconds every time I played. My fault you say? Fair enough, but I can back this up later. So not only did I feel completely unequipped to fight, I later found out that the reason I kept dying, was because one of my teammates had his 'Nectar' capsules messed with, and he just got pissed and started shooting everyone. It was good of someone to warn me of that happening...
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| Oh sure, shoot for the photo... |
So once I had figured out why I had kept dying, I was quickly moved on to a driving section of the game. It was nice, as I was a team of 4, so 3 NPCs would follow me around everywhere. They were armed, so played their part perfectly as another target for the opposition. Would they shoot anyone? Would they fuck. If they all went down in seconds I knew it was over for me.
I had by about 20 minutes in gotten myself used to shooting at things, and taking enemies down swiftly. So I felt better about the game, and continued on, determined to reach the end. Then the second frustration kicked in. I came across what I can only describe as a heavy grunt with a flamethrower. Now USUALLY in a game, if you set on fire you lose a bit of health or you burn for a few seconds and eventually you stop burning. In Haze, if you are set on fire, you are dead. Don't worry, they let you burn for a while so you can try and figure out how to put yourself out. But even if there is actually a technique, I am going to go with, you are dead and the time you spend burning is probably a fraction of the time the development team spent laughing at this horrendous mechanic.
As I struggled through more of the game and its' plot I slowly started to ponder to myself whether or not I should even try to finish. I was clearly not even close to entertained, and the game was just short of a disgrace. But then the plot twist kicked in, and I suddenly felt like everything would change, things would be clearer, I would get trained, the story would get more interesting and the game would come back to life.
It didn't, they weren't, I wasn't, it did a LITTLE and it didn't. I was forced to go through it all again, except this time I was up against a different group of guys, and my weapons were a different colour and I kept dying for all the same shitty reasons.
To cut to the chase, I am probably about a 3rd of the way through Haze and I can't stand it. The story is the only redeeming factor, and as I am big on those, I can now see why when I tell people I am trying to play this game, they all respond "I noticed you said trying". I will never know the ending to this game, and I don't care. My character can sit forever on that buggy by the beach for all I care. I don't even think he gives a shit either. He knows there is no point in trying.
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| He must have played the game too!! |
I shall conclude with this statement. I outright refuse to finish a game that the developers couldn't finish either. If they aren't able to put heart and soul into their product, it is almost insulting they ask us to pay for their purile efforts. It's a good thing they released Assassin's Creed or I would have started picketting outside their studios for making me pay for their crap.
to comment or e-mail me at twentfiveand0@hotmail.com
