I've been playing FPS games for so many years...probably since I started gaming (well, as soon as Doom and Duke Nukem 3D hit the gaming market)
It's always been a guilty pleasure of mine...
They're not really my favorite genre, not anymore at least, but I can always find some fun playing through a FPS.
I had my Arena/Deathmatch/Multiplayer FPS moments.. But I only like coming back to the scripted/level based games now. Plus you won't find people online playing the older ones, only the current new-cool stuff the kids do these days (Halo 3/ODST/Reach, Left4Dead...) and I prefer the older ones or at least the original new ones over the multiplaying ones.
(...)
I've thinking about these kind of games.. And as generic they've become (*cough*GearsOfWar*cough*) I still like to play one of these every now and then.
But I'm not really into all the cliché mainstream FPS that now invade the market, since the commercial success of Halo.
You see, the FPS have become what the 2D mascot platformers were during the 90s/16 bits era. A very cheap profitable simple-to-build genre of games. Just "buy the rights to use the Unreal engine, find a theme/gimmick, a generic online (team) deathmatch mode or co-op and slap some levels together AND BAM! Profit!
Oh, and either use super-muscular badass over-the-top heroes or make it a military game and you'll double profits!
Anyway, I can see two big types of FPS I use to play.
Very distinct in my eyes, both have their positive aspects. And I seem to prefer a genre over the other.
(not talking about the online FPS or the military realistic grim shooters mentioned above, since I do not play those)
There's the type of games where you play as an offensive type of "hero".
Often a badass over-the-top character, since they're mostly based on the very granpa of the genre, the Doom guy! A soldier, a marine, a cop... Someone of "power".
The hero jumps into the situation, attacks stuff and is fully prepared to kick some ass, YEAH!
They're the type of game you can zip through, the "story" is secondary and split up in levels. Be it lots of levels or a dozen. But it's no big deal, they're fun and you can replay them a lot, mastering your skills and trying your hands on harder difficulties.
This is the kind of FPS I liked to play a lot some years ago. The story is here, but it's not the most important aspect. The atmosphere, the enemies, the fun is.
In Doom, the Doom guy was kickin' Hell's ass all over the planet Mars. Tons of cool weapons, many foes.
Quake, another iD software game using many similar concepts just with an alien/machines backdrop instead of Hell & Mars.
Unreal and it's scifi fantastic space/worlds.
The more recent Condemned (though I could say it's also a bit of the genre I'll discuss below) had a cop going against junkies and killers in the streets.
Turok going rampage on a dinosaur planet.
The Alien vs. Predator series with it's 3 gameplay-types campaigns....
Etc... They're fun, often short (oh well... at least they've a multi for the gamers that won't replay hard difficulties, even if people don't really stick to those once there's a more recent one)
Then there's the more "story-ysh" kind of first person shooters.
The ones that get you involved in the plot not by throwing you against it, but in the middle of it.
These are the more defensive type of FPS games.
The ones that grew up on me, my favorite current type of FPS.
They're often the longer ones to play through. The story takes cente place here, often by scripted events.
It often starts with a normal, simple "tutorial" level where you discover your surroundings.
Then all hell breaks loses.
It's the type of game where the players is thrown into an hostile environment, lost in it and tries to understand things by himself.
They also commonly often use a big gimmick, be it gameplay-wise or just in the engine or physics of the game.
Half-Life started like a normal day for Gordon Freeman, scientist in undercover experimental laboratories in the Grand Canyon. Then during an experiment, a portal was opened... everything went from bad to worse..
These games thrown surnatural, magical, alien or scifi-ysh events at you. You are in a story. You're thrown into a journey in the unknown, discover little bits of info here and there and most of the time end up in a very distant place at the end....
Half-Life 2 did simply "spawn" Freeman in a complete different world, with new rules, new enemies, new cast of characters.. A different story altogether.
TimeShift, a sadly underrated early "next gen" game, threw another scientist, into a time warp, a different era in a war and a world that wasn't the protagonist's. And while Freeman could play with a gravity gun in platforming sequences, TimeShift allowed the player to freeze, revert or speed time around.
Then, the most impressive result of this type of game this generation really was Bioshock for me. It uses everything I like about this genre, a normal beginning that puts the player in the hostile environment quickly, a whole universe to discover, original gimmicks (the "drugs"/powers of this game, the Big Daddy...) and an ambiguous turn of events..
It's a type of game I really started to appreciate lately...
Anyway, that's my own take, my views on the whole FPS genre. Sure, I might not have as much FPS as fighting games, or have most recent ones like parkour platformers, nor played as much of those as 2D platformers... But it's a guilty pleasure of mine~
About BioShock 3?
Early impressions: Oh, I really loved the trailer, the concept, everything really!
I sure will appreciate it more than the few I know about BioShock 2 (still plan on playin' through it soon, as soon as I can get my hands on a cheap copy).
My problem about BioShock 2 is that it takes out exactly everything I love about Part 1. Meaning the strange unknown universe, it's mostly a BioShock 1 bis. All the surprises are out from the go, same mecanics, same concept, same weapons, etc.. It's more like revisiting BioShock 1, again! Cause everybody loved it you know!
It's more like additional levels, something that works better with the offensive type of games I've talked about above.
While BioShock 3 will actually be about a new story, new settings, surprises again!
An uncharted Mystery Box is about to be opened!
So, yeah, quite anticipating this game!
