Red Faction
August 1, 2000
Volition’s second PS2 project has finally hit the shelves, is it as good as they promised? Read on to find out!
In Red Faction you play the part of Parker, a miner working for the ULTOR corporation on Mars. ULTOR promised miners from Earth a great job and a nice life on Mars, as it turns out, nothing could be farther from the truth. Working conditions in the mines are horrible, and the workers living quarters aren’t much better. Miners work long hours, and they must share clothes and beds. Food is scarce, and recently an epidemic known as The Plague has been spreading throughout the mines.
A group of rebels lead by a mysterious person named Eos has been stashing weapons and plotting a revolt for some time. All they need is an opportunity to stike. The chance they’ve been waiting for suddenly arises when a miner is bullied and then beaten after a hard day’s work. Parker is on the scene by chance, and has no choice but to grab a weapon and defend himself, the revolution has begun.
Gameplay in Red Faction is fairly standard. You must shoot enemies before they shoot you. However, the enemies in the game aren’t as stupid as the foes in most other games. Red Faction’s enemy AI can be brutal. The enemies will call for reinforcements, and they’ll run around trying to avoid your fire. Luckily, you have a ton of different weapons at your disposal. One of the coolest being the flamethrower, but you’d better watch out. If you torch an enemy, they won’t just drop, they actually run towards you trying to get close enough to burn you as well!
Play control is not even an issue with Red Faction. There are a lot of presets you can choose from, or if you don’t like any of them, you can customize your own setting right down to the last button! You can even tweak the sensitivity of the analog sticks, so just remember, if you make a mistake, you can’t use the controller as an excuse!
Red Faction’s story is quite immersive. As the game progresses, Parker gets more and more involved in the struggle between Ultor and the miners. Parker will meet up with quite a few characters in the game, including Eos herself.
Graphics and sound serve the game well. Characters look good, and the environments are cool too. Shattering glass has never looked better in a video game. The music, which does not play all the time is OK, but the real benefit of the game’s sound can be found on the battlefield. There are times when you’ll hear an enemy before you can actually see it coming, and you can also eavesdrop on enemies in a nearby room.
Surprisingly, the game’s greatest strength was also it’s greatest weakness. The Geo-Mod engine was being praised for letting players damage the environments and blow holes through walls. Well, I was somewhat disappointed by how sparingly this was actually used. In most cases, you can’t even go through the walls. Sure you can blow them up, but all you’re actaully doing is wasting weapons and ammunition shooting through a wall that never ends. On occasion you will come to a locked door, and the only way through (surprise!) is to go around the door by blowing up the wall next to it. Another problem was the load times. There are no levels in Red Faction, it’s just an adventure that is frequently interrupted while the game loads what’s up ahead. Luckily you can save whenever you like, but I think you’ll find yourself saving quite often, and this only adds more interruption. There are also some insanely tough parts in the game that make you feel like your just running to get out of the area and hoping you don’t take too much damage on your way through.
Overall Red Faction is a great game, but I was hoping for something more. The Geo-Mod falls a little flat, but the storyline makes you want to keep playing and find out what happens next. I would recommend renting this one first. If it suits your tastes then pick it up, if not, be glad you kept your fifty bucks.
CVG Report CardRed Faction
Rating: B+
Platform: PlayStation 2
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