Hey, so I just finished the game and cannot be bothered to exactly write a formal review so I'll just drop this instead.

For the record (to me): KZ3 was a great 8/10 game and KZ2 a masterful 10/10 game.

SPOILERS ARE BELOW!

Shadow Fall offers amazing visuals (by far the best on consoles I've seen) along with some really great controls due to the DS4 feeling nice and the game generally just has a lot of fun going on with the OWL, secondary fire mode, slow-mo ability etc.. The AI feels pretty damn tough and I died several times despite playing on Easy (the reviews were not wrong on how hard this game can really be). The soundtrack was also pretty damn awesome and really brought up the atmosphere that certain levels oozed from. Shockingly I didn't feel myself having issues at some ..areas certain people had.

However the whole thing goes down by -4 points due to the following stuff:


1)Game design.

Guerrilla were not able to create a well designed wide linear game. It leads to spamming up on the d-pad to see where you are going, along with enemies coming from all over the place. Combine that with the AI being able to flank you + droids flying above you and shit, i mean we're talking multiple enemies from all over the place with your destination being unknown. It doesn't help that the game on a couple of occasions decides to spawn waves of enemies that ultimately feels like a cheap way to increase the length of the game. This increased the closer you got to the end and it only prolonged the story which ultimately ended very weak.

This is really odd because I didn't feel any real issue with this on KZ2 and KZ3. Being linear was clearly easier for them.

2)Story and Characters

I enjoyed the ending and I applaud GG for doing something different, at last. However it also made me realize how little I care for the characters. When Lucas (our main character) was shot by Sinclar (the shadow marshal leader kinda'), I was like: Oh.. okay. I was also really saddened by the fact that Stahl had such a little role in the game and that his voice actor had changed and overall character suddenly had a different perspective (even if its been 30 years). All of that for him to just take a bullet at the end was meh. Then the game ends and we play as Echo. I didn't like the design on that level either so it really killed the experience for me. After killing Sinclair with Echo the game just ends and you don't really get any feeling of resolve regarding the Vektans and Helghast. It's just about the characters and the issue lies within the story being so far greater than the characters are.

If you want to make a game about people, you need to make sure your writing team is up for the task. Because I didn't give two shits about anything that happenend. Now this in general isn't shocking due to GGs past with story but I am still surprised at the fact that they had a chance to do so much and blew it.

3)Multiplayer

It's not a "kill zone" like KZ2 and to a lesser extent KZ3 are. I found myself running and gunning similar to the CoD games and this is a true shame. Perhaps it is due to the odd populated matches but I don't know. It just doesn't feel the way I was hoping it would. I don't see myself spending too much time here really.



Overall, i'd say it is above mediocre but not by much. A decent game.

6/10

I agree with this game was amazing until the last 1/3rd, what were GG thinking with those chapters? Could have been a great FPS turned poor by some really bizarre design decisions. Sure looks pretty though. BF4 is the game for MP, as buggy as it is :).

SPOILERS!

My personal score is currently at a 4/10, which is one point higher than I originally rated it now that I've had time to really think about the single player campaign. The difficulty wasn't that high to me until chapter 9 where you're trapped in a room and you have to take out what seemed like 60 Helghans in close quarters. I actually died more times in that stupid escort mission where I'm escorting that scientist bitch through space and I somehow get a rocket blaster with infinite ammo, but then as soon as I land, that blaster is gone. The fuck!? I also died a lot on the free falling part of the mission where you go to the destroyed Helghan planet.

There were some epic moments, but they were mostly overshadowed by a terrible and frustrating campaign. Also, there was only one chapter that I enjoyed to completion, and that was chapter 4.

The level design would've been better used if you controlled a team of shadow marshals (2-4), and you could send them to flank the Helghans and stuff. It seems like they tried to make it like Crysis (a terrible game that only deserves a 3/10), by having you play the lone badass. The difference being you're up against smarter AI, there aren't any graphical or AI glitches to be found, and the multiplayer is a lot better.

I played a little bit of the multiplayer and so far, I'm a little dissapointed that it doesn't "feel" like an actual warzone. The menu system is also atrocious. If I play a little more, my score MIGHT raise up to a 6 or 7/10.

I actually despised the space chapter (#2 I believe) on Cassandra. I'm all for atmosphere but the running around and finding those thingies you insert to open doors was meh.

Damn, well let me know what it lands on when you're done. Don't feel it gets any better than the start really xD