Brink: Why You Should Care

Today was a busy day for things I care about.  Along with the major release of the 1.2 patch and all related trappings in Rift, another game came out that I have been waiting for a very long time.   Brink is a game I have been watching the progress of for months.  I realize that traditionally this is blog has been about MMOs and related titles.

Why I have been waiting

Once upon a time there was this amazing game, given away for free to the public.  It featured a unique way of playing an FPS.  Instead of being concerned about racking up kills, the gameplay was solely based upon whether or not your team completed an objective.  Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory was class based, like Team Fortress, but instead of just changing what your weapon load out was, these classes actually mattered.

As you played through a map it progressed a storyline.  Engineers were actually needed to build bridges, gun emplacements, and vehicles.  Basically the role you played in the game actually mattered to the objective at hand, and how good a shot you were really didn’t matter at all if your team was not working together.  Basically I like to think of it as a thinking mans shooter, needing the same kind of fast paced thinking that many MMO fights do.

A Studio Called Splash Damage

This game studio continued onwards, and I followed their progress.  They worked with id Software on the multiplayer in Doom 3.  Problem is, this form of multiplayer did not really allow them to shine as a company.  Some time after the release of Quake 4, it was announced that Splash Damage would be working on a spiritual successor to Wolf ET, Quake Wars: Enemy Territory.

The game was extremely fun, but I feel it got caught up in the Battlefield 2 era of games.  Departing from their core gameplay, they added in multiple vehicle elements.  While well done, it didn’t feel nearly as elegant as Wolf ET was.  Long gone were the stalemates where each side controlled equal footing.  It was replaced by a much more run and gun style of gameplay.

Along Comes Brink

Now we have the release of Brink, and with it Splash Damage feels like it is returning to its roots.  Gone are the gimmickry of Quake Wars, and replaced by it is solid character driven combat.  Borrowing from Borderlands, Brink has a character development system.  As you complete objectives and score kills, your character collects experience points.  These can be spent powering your character up, earning abilities like faster reloads and more hit points.

As you complete various objectives and unlock achievements you start getting various interesting costume bits.  So as you can see from the above two images, after a few times playing the game your character starts looking just as unique as you want it to.  There are two kinds of unlocks, one is account wide, and the other character specific.  So by playing one character, you ultimately will unlock a few items here and there for your other characters.

But What About The Gameplay

As you can see in the above image, the game is gorgeous, and luckily for us it plays equally well.  I am playing it at 1980×1080 high settings and get no lag whatsoever.  I am hearing some reports that the console versions are currently a bit laggy, but since playing a shooter with a controller feels like an abomination, this doesn’t really effect me.  However I am sure considering this is release day, it will shake out over time.

Basically in this game you take the side of the Resistance, or the ARK as you are given the decision, do you save the ark, or escape it.  Each faction consists of classes, for mirror balance.  The Soldier is your traditional run and gun player, with the added effect that they can plant explosives and resupply ammo.  The Medic is your archetypal healer role, with the ability to revive players and npcs, and buff the health of nearby players.  The Engineer is your fixit operator, being able to plant mines, repair machinery, and diffuse bombs.  Last we have the Operative, that is your traditional infiltrator class, having the ability to assume the look of any fallen player as well as perform hacking objectives.

As you enter the map, each team has a number of objectives.  You select the objective by either pressing tab or hitting the middle mouse button.  You get extra experience for completing whatever your selected objective is.  Each objective requires a specific class, and the players can change their current role from any of the command posts. 

Most of the objectives require the player to interact with an object for a few minutes, this means your team mates need to get your back.  If you are on the “attacking” team, each time you complete a primary objective your side gains additional time on the clock.  The maps are finished when either the attackers complete all of their objectives, or when the defenders manage to run the clock out.  So the average map lasts between 10 and 25 minutes as far as a time commitment goes.

Wrapping Up

What we have in Brink is a return to a thinking mans FPS.  You can customize your character to play how you want, and this includes the weapon choices.  Gone are the annoyances of being killed by planes you can’t even see, and with it comes a very close quarters and personal skill based shooter.  If you were a fan of Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory or Quake Wars: Enemy Territory you will love this game from the start.

If you however cut your teeth on Call of Duty, this might be a little slow paced for you.  You might find being constrained by objectives and having to rely fully on your team members for success frustrating.  However for those of us who prefer team based games like MMOs, this is a shooter for us.  This is the perfect game to get in with a bunch of friends on voice chat and talk through situations.  Some of my most enjoyable times were playing Wolf ET with my clan, and here is hoping that Brink will revive those moments.

A Good Review Video