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WHY THE BEST FIRST PERSON SHOOT 'EM UP IN YEARS JUST HAPPENED AND YOU DON'T EVEN CARE - by Mr Biffo

2/11/2016

26 Comments

 
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I'm a bit sad. Not so sad that I've been unable to get out of bed, and I've taken to the drink, and stuff. Just a bit sad. Little bit. Little bit sad, yeah? 

You see, Titanfall 2 hasn't done particularly great sales-wise in its first week - landing at number 4 in the charts behind FIFA 17, Skyrim Special Edition, and Battlefield 1.

It might be that another first-person shooter, arriving scarcely a week or so after Battlefield 1, is one first-person shooter too many. Not to mention that Call of Duty Infinite Warfare - with its Modern Warfare remaster - is about to thrust its bulb into our paddock.

​See, the reason I'm sad is because of this reason: Titanfall 2 deserves so much better. Titanfall 2 is a proper video game. And by that I mean this: it's full of ideas. They've really, really thought about it, and coming on the heels of Gears of War 4 - not a disaster, and boasting some decent character stuff, but otherwise a slightly depressing tour of standard video game shooter tropes - it feels like someone's let off a party "razzer" between my knees.

And because Titanfall 2 is so good, I want there to be a Titanfall 3, and that's not going to happen if people don't buy this one. WHY ARE PEOPLE ALL STUPID!??
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BORED
For me, perhaps the most significant effect of Titanfall 2 is how it succeeded in highlighting just how bored I've become with shoot 'em ups.

The opening moments - as I described in my review yesterday - take place on yet another outer space aircraft carrier, with the player in a VR simulator pod, followed by crashing onto a planet's surface in an escape capsule.

​There had been a lengthy cut-scene, and I suffered through all of this with a weary sense of encroaching heaviness; here we go yet again.

I mean, I'd really liked the first Titanfall, but it came without a solo campaign, so you can't blame me for assuming that they'd just chuck some token single-player effort in there. I mean, that's what most first-person shooters do these days, right? It's what Halo Guardians did, frankly. The only way that may have deserved the coverage and promotion would have been if we'd wrapped the hype around a brick, and beaten Master Chief to death with it.

But no. Titanfall 2 does something that few video games bother with these days. Something which I have long called The Yoshi's Island Method. Alright, I've never called it that, but when games present the player with a steady stream of new ideas, new gameplay wrinkles, when the developers really think about unique mechanics, it has always reminded me of the way every level in Yoshi's Island, on the SNES, did the same.

Valve's Half-Life 2, I always felt, was a very Nintendo-y game, and Titanfall 2 is a very Valve-y game. After the opening cinematic, there are no cut-scenes - all the storytelling is in-game (as it should be) - and the your character's relationship with BT, your big robot tank chum, is pure Half-Life 2. 

SPECIFICS
I avoided discussing too many specifics of the gameplay when I reviewed Titanfall 2, for fear of spoiling it, but I can't state it enough: it's a fantastic single-player game, with a meaty multiplayer option that I'm only now beginning to scratch the surface of.

To use one example of the way it introduces gameplay elements, and then proceeds to wring every last dribble of value from them, there's a level where, quite unexpectedly, you travel through time.

​That's right: as if a game with big robot tanks wasn't high-concept enough, time travel is thrown into the mix (and this is just one of numerous brilliantly original ideas - others include a mind-bending section in an automated factory that's constructing pre-fab cities, and a level set in and around aerial battleships, with you leaping from one to another).

At first, I think the time travel is going to be just a neat little visual thing, flicking back and forth between time zones against your will - between a ruined installation building, and its pre-disaster incarnation. But no: then you become equipped with the ability to choose when you time travel.

Platforms which aren't there in one time zone may exist in the other - meaning you have to time travel mid-jump, or mid-wall-run, to ensure you don't plummet to your death. And then it goes further; with you fighting battles simultaneously in two time zones, against entirely different enemies.

​It's nuts. It's genius. It's a massive demonstration of next-gen gaming. And I wanted a whole game which did this. But no! Because that's not what Titanfall 2's campaign does: it keeps moving. It keeps changing. It never gets boring.
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BLUNTNESS
And then on the flipside of the Titanfall 2 coin is Gears of War 4. A game so predictable you could've found it streaked on the inside of Nostradamus's underwear.

And let's be blunt here: Battlefield 1 might offer a setting that is far from typical of most first-person shooters, but the gameplay - solid and exciting as it is - remains pretty generic for the most part. Even this year's other great shoot 'em up, Doom, doesn't really do anything new; it's more a throw-back to the series' origins.

Titanfall 2 is different - and, frankly - better than all of these. It's does what video games should do. It let me do things I've never done in a game before.

Plus it isn't ashamed to be a video game. There's a sense that they really, really thought about it, rather than trying to create a series of interactive action movie battle scenes, which felt like they'd been pressed out of a mould. Rather than just look at what every other game is doing, rather than just creating some levels, and some woefully familiar guns, and dumping the player down, it actually, amazingly, feels like they put some thought into it.

Whereas in the first moment or two of the game, I slightly resented the tired aesthetic - because, frankly, it does have that same brutal technology-with-bursts-of-neon look that most futuristic games adopt - I came to appreciate it. Titanfall 2 invites the player in by not being threatening. Its embarrassment of riches are snuck in through the tradesman's entrance. So to speak.

​Unfortunately, if the sales are anything to go by, those visuals might be putting people off. Maybe Titanfall 2 is mistakenly portraying itself as another of those games, when it's actually anything but another Halo/Gears of War/Recore/etc. It deserves far better.

FROM THE ARCHIVE:
REVIEW: TITANFALL 2 (PS4, XBOX ONE, PC - PS4 VERSION TESTED)
​
WHY I'LL NEVER BE CHARLIE BROOKER, AND WHY IT DOESN'T MATTER - BY MR BIFFO
VIRTUAL REALITY WILL BE THE DEATH OF US - BY MR BIFFO​

26 Comments
Cherry
2/11/2016 09:49:03 am

Many Wii U owners feel the same way. Best console hardware (when designed for properly) and games in years...and no one cared--particularly those without a friend base to play local multiplayer with. Literally no one. WHY ARE PEOPLE ALL STUPID!?? :P Technically it's Nintendo fault for not explaining why it was great at launch in terms even the lowest common denominator could understand. Incidentally, I noticed Woolly World introducing great new ideas every level. Was impressed with that game. Shame no one played it. I'm tempted to get Titanfall 2 on PC now...although knowing it's an identical console port makes me not want to actually.

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Cherry
2/11/2016 09:52:03 am

Oh wait...it's an EA game and on Origin... oh well :(

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CdrJameson
2/11/2016 02:58:13 pm

And rated 15 too, so no fun allowed for me as the kids can't play.

cinco boy
2/11/2016 10:54:44 am

The positive word of mouth around this one reminds me of the buzz surrounding Bulletstorm, a game which was initially dismissed as being a generic FPS but actually turned out to be a real good time and something of a breath of fresh air.

I would like to play Titanfall 2, but here's the problem: CoD IW is out this week, and I wanna play that even for the few hours its single player campaign is going to last. Then Dishonored 2 is out, and that's going to be a huge time sink. And then Watch_Dogs 2 is coming in a few weeks, which is promising to be actually good this time.

So I will get round to it but it's not going to be for some time. Whoever chose the release date needs to have a word with themselves.

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GB
2/11/2016 11:25:37 am

It looks great, but on the other hand I can't remember my Origin password.

Oh, and then I remember I have Mass Effect 3 sitting in there and I get hit with a big wave of disappointment and don't want to play video games any more.

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Gordon Freeman
2/11/2016 11:45:17 am

Half Life 2 was a big overrated bag of boring.

It introduced new ideas then bored you to death with them.

Oh when will this hoverboat section ever end? Now I have to stop and solve a stupid physics based puzzle? At least I don't have to drive a hoverboat anymor... ohh no actually it's back :(

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Valve
2/11/2016 12:32:02 pm

You're just upset because we've left you in limbo all these years, aren't you Gordon?

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Gordon Freeman
2/11/2016 12:33:42 pm

At least there's no vehicle sections in limbo.

Little BluevFox
2/11/2016 12:34:23 pm

No.

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Gordon Freeman
2/11/2016 01:31:20 pm

If only Half Life 2 were as economical with its action as Little BluevFox is with his comments.

Spiney O'Sullivan
2/11/2016 12:34:10 pm

Coming into this article, I still had utterly no expectations for a sequel to a game I didn't care about that I assumed would have a campaign glued on just to add content to a multiplayer title.

This article, however, sold me on Titanfall 2 far more than the other one. I know you wanted to focus more on reactions than mechanics, but some of this stuff completely grabbed my attention. The time travel puzzles and battles mark this as the most interesting FPS I've heard about in ages. And settings like the prefab city factory are also deeply interesting. You mentioned that the game contains variety in the other review, but providing examples in this really helped.

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Bruce Flagpole
2/11/2016 01:22:59 pm

Yup. This is now added to the select wishlist of 'games i hope to find in an amazing PS4 bundle on Black Friday'.

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Voodoo76
2/11/2016 01:31:48 pm

Going once, going twice, gone to the lady at the back wearing a dead skunk for a hat.

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Billy-Bob Thornton
2/11/2016 02:01:23 pm

So it's the Soul Reaver of shooty bang bangs?

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Mr Biffo
2/11/2016 06:20:45 pm

I despised Soul Reaver.

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Panama Joe
2/11/2016 02:35:12 pm

I found the first Titanfall game to be very tedious and quickly lost interest. Titanfall 2 would have to be a whole bunch better than the first one before I'd give it the time of day.

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favus
2/11/2016 02:47:26 pm

if it was on Steam people would have bought it, EA and Origin are horrible and PC gamers just don't bother these days (mostly) So yeah, It will sell on consoles and they will keep making them forever don't you worry! with lots of lovely DLC for you to hoover up, If we DO buy it on PC it will be in 4 or 5 months when its a tenner...

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John Meat
2/11/2016 03:30:28 pm

I feel like I'd be interested if the setting was almost anything else. I'm just not interested in big robots/mechs etc, outside of the Intergalactic video anyway. Pity if it's as good as you say. I'll consider picking it up when it's £20 or something.

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Carl
3/11/2016 08:57:53 am

It's also worth mentioning that the DLC for this game will be free. Another deciding factor in it's longevity. Hopefully, more people will pick it up due to good word of mouth.

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Kirby
3/11/2016 10:36:54 am

I mean, this wasn't even on my radar until just now, as I'd heard the first was rubbish and I'm not a big fan of futuristic shooters at the best of times. But on the basis of this article and the beginning and end of that review the other day, I've bought it from Amazon.

WHO SAYS NOBODY READS REVIEWS ANYMORE?!

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Paul Browning
3/11/2016 12:20:08 pm

Problem for me with Titanfall 2 is, at least on PC, it's insultingly expensive.

I have absolutely zero interest in the MP but the Campaign looks great but I won't pay best part of £40 for that.

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Leeder Krenon
3/11/2016 12:23:17 pm

It's £50 quid mate, fuck that!

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Paul Browning
3/11/2016 12:30:26 pm

Bit of hunting around at the usual suspects and you can get the price down to less than that but even so when you are asking more for the PC version than the console ones, despite not having to pay for licensing or certification, then someone is taking the piss.

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Dunc
3/11/2016 09:42:07 pm

Ironic that a game that seems to break shooter conventions in all other ways has chosen the exact same release window as the other bigger, more well known shooters. I wonder if this game would have done better with an earlier release? Or maybe it would just have been eclipsed by Overwatch. Shame as it looks good

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Richard
6/11/2016 09:58:09 pm

You know I don't think I've brought a game this year, had this preordered but cancelled. Maybe I will pick up, maybe not...

The whole £100 game thing gets on my tits tbh. I know I can buy the basic one but all the same the superdooper ones get right up my nose! Long live Nintendo FRO Xbox & PS

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Dave
7/11/2016 12:16:57 pm

Just finished the campaign.here's me take:

I was cautiously optimistic since i saw they were adding a single player campaign onto the multiplayer (i loved the look of the first but couldn't justify paying full price for a multiplayer shoot em up, so i never got round to actually playing it. I however loved the setting and feel).

Let me just state that everything positive said about this game is undermining the pure brilliance of this game. it's fucking fucking fucking fucking fucking fucking awesome.

Never since Portal 1 have i seen such bravado and confidence in direction and letting the player just have fun. Then just throwing tricks and gadgets and ripping them away to dazzle you with something else. In addition to a core mechanic that is utterly sublime to use.
Nothing on the single player feels tacked on or unnecessary every level has the same degree of thought and effort that some company's would wring an entire game out of.

Spoilerish but the highlight for me was when you get the smart pistol. The scene in Kingsman in the mountain base where the guy is running and jumping off walls blowing shit out of people's head is perfectly recreated in game and you feel like a god damn superhero doing it.

It's totally brilliant and it really is a crying sham it had to come out at such a poor time with the big headliners taking main stage.

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