RAGE Reviews

  • SlackerchanSlackerchan295,338
    04 Oct 2011
    104 24 25
    When I was six years old I remember sitting on my dad’s lap at his 486 computer watching him play Wolfenstein 3D. For me, id Software has always been a unique studio that doesn’t so much adapt to the times as it forges its own interpretation of what they feel a good game is. Say the names Wolfenstein, Doom or Quake in a crowded room of gamers and you’ll have a hard time finding someone that hasn’t played or at the very least knows about these amazing franchises. After Doom 3 was released in 2004 id all but disappeared from the development scene, really only appearing at their annual QuakeCon convention in Dallas, TX while letting developer Raven Software continue the Quake and Wolfenstein franchises. Raven’s continuations didn’t capture the magic id Software can bring to a game however and as such desperate fans like myself were left waiting in the wind.

    Rage, id’s first new IP since they introduced Quake in 1996, is something of an event for me. In addition to being the first time anyone will have been able to play a core id Software game in seven years it is also my first opportunity to review an id title since I started writing about games. After seven years though one must ask: is the magic still there?

    Welcome to the Wasteland
    Many have the justified fear that the end of the world will come from above in the form of an asteroid that will bathe our planet in fire. 99942 Apophis, an asteroid that’s 270m in diameter will pass by Earth in 2029 and 2036 and presents as a level 1 threat on the Torino impact hazard scale. In the world of Rage however the threat is far greater as it is the size of Manhattan. Five years prior to its 2029 impact date the international community rallies together for the Eden Project, a program designed to ensure the survival of our species beyond the collision. Arks, underground containers designed to house the best and brightest amongst us, are constructed all over the world and while thousands are built it isn’t enough. As the asteroid hurtles past the moon the Ark program initiates and you, the player, are sent into cold sleep.
    You awaken with a start to a ghastly sight. Over a hundred years have passed and everyone but you who were placed in your Ark is dead.

    Stumbling outside, you are besieged by a group of bandits only to be saved at the last minute by Dan Hagar, a man who lives nearby and has gotten along by staying out of trouble. Saving your life has changed this though and as you drive off with him toward his settlement one thing is clear: the rules of the old world are gone and you must do more than live to get along. You must survive.

    Rage’s post-apocalyptic story is about your journey to find your place in the Wasteland. Ark survivors are a rare order to find and as one you have the skills and know-how to make the Wasteland a safer place. The ultimate threat to the safety of the remaining human population isn’t the clans of bandits or the mutant hordes that have arisen since the fall of Apophis. Rather, the prime threat is actually the Authority, an advanced military body that thrives on pre-impact technologies and since you happen to be an Ark survivor they want you bad.

    The Rage singleplayer experience is one that will draw many comparisons to another post-apocalyptic game series: Fallout. While the two share many traits in both story and gameplay Rage is an entirely different affair as it is a directed narrative instead of a non-linear one like Bethesda’s juggernaut title from 2008. Rage does allow you to explore the Wasteland as long as you see fit but only by completing quests does the plot advance and allow you into sections of the map you couldn’t access before. While some may lament the lack of being able to go anywhere and do anything id is able to deliver a stronger story than can be told through a game like Fallout. Fans of Bethesda’s wonder-series should be pleasantly surprised by id’s offering.

    Rage’s campaign, despite being a directed experience, is still quite long, offering in excess of twenty hours of gameplay in a single playthrough. While the overall experience in the singleplayer is quite entertaining you’ll find that the ending is a disappointing affair that feels like it was cut halfway through development. Perhaps this is a sign that id has decided to capitalize on the success of the post-release DLC that made Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas so successful but, as it stands, you’ll be left wanting more.

    The Art of 22nd Century Combat
    When I graduated from high school one of the things I did with my graduation money was build my first computer. This seemingly daunting yet easy task was done in excitement for two of the biggest PC games of the year: Half-Life 2 and Doom 3. While I loved Gordan Freeman’s unique journey I found myself enjoying Doom 3 more as it was both a wonderfully scary experience while having some fantastic gameplay. It was the first major release for id since Quake 3 Arena and the first singleplayer-oriented experience in seven years. It was dramatically different from everything id had done before and this change in design felt, well, fantastic.

    I bring this up because, in many ways, Rage reminds me of Doom 3. At its core it is still that wonderful corridor-fest shooter that left me with unfortunate stains in my underwear and while the scary element isn’t nearly as present in Rage (though there are moments that will make you jump) it still plays much like it did back in 2004. You will find far more larger portions of a level than the decidedly claustrophobic buildings of Doom 3 but in the end it is still what it was seven years ago which isn’t a bad thing at all.

    What I really enjoy about an id title is just how unique it feels compared to the rest of the shooter genre. The characters, weapons, tools and levels you explore seem familiar and yet have a unique spin on them that identifies them as an id Software creation. For example, it is a common practice in games with creatures like zombies and mutants to have them charge at you but in Rage they’ll climb the walls and ceilings, leap form great distances without warning and even accurately throw their weapons at you, negating an attempt to circle-strafe. It is really hard to describe in print what id Software brings to a gameplay experience but once you’ve cut your teeth on Rage or Doom 3 you know what I’m talking about.

    Weapons in Rage run the usual gauntlet you’d expect in a shooter as you start with a pistol, graduate to a shotgun, and eventually get rifles, machine guns, rocket launchers and the obligatory alternate weapon in the form of a crossbow. What makes them different however is that they allow for different types of ammunition that can be utilized and changed on the fly, much like what Irrational Games and 2K Marin have done with the Bioshock series. Feel that a well-armored enemy is too tough? Switch out your buckshot for some Pop Rocket rounds that will make short work of them. Too many enemies? Thin them out by using the Dynamite Bolts for your crossbow. The mix of different ammo types allows you to give more personality to your play style and definitely compensates for the game’s compliment of only seven primary weapons.

    What truly adds to the gunplay though is the ability to deploy quick use items that aid you in battle. Using a relatively simple crafting system you can build a wide assortment of items such as specialty grenades, bandages and even sentry turrets and bots to aid you in case the combat gets too much for you. The sentry turret by far is extremely entertaining in that it, both in design and functionality, operates exactly like the spider bot from Doom 3. Having an extra gun firing at the enemy is always handy but when this robot has the ability to move around, do melee attacks and comes back to you when the firefight is over, looking at you like a happy puppy ready for you to throw the ball again, you can’t help but fall in love with your little spider friend.

    Death Race Anyone?
    There is one more significant portion of the game that must be addressed: the addition of vehicles. Vehicles have never been featured in an id Software title in a functional capacity and so their inclusion in the game’s initial marketing overshadowed the gameplay on display, an act that still has many confused. I can safely report that, while you will spend a lot of time in a car, the use of vehicles in the game only amounts to roughly a third of the overall gameplay experience. You will be using one of four different vehicles to travel about in the Wasteland and each has a different feel to them but not in a way that will make you prefer one over the other. Handling across the board is quite arcade oriented and only during combat do they take damage so you don’t have to worry about running into walls all the time and banging up your ride.

    Vehicular combat in Rage is a surprisingly fun affair as you have a variety of weapons and quick use items available at your disposal. These combat sequences appear at random throughout the game and are encouraged by NPCs in the various hub towns you find. Ramming, gunning and chasing are the order of the day when fighting off attacking bandits and fortunately it never really gets old. The end result is a deliciously Mad Max-esque experience that really doesn’t drag down the overall gameplay at all.

    Outside of combat you can also compete in races. Time trials, standard races and rally events are what you’ll be competing in and, with the exception of some rally events, you’ll find them quite enjoyable. The races can be of both the unarmed and armed varieties and the rally events, which are similar to flag collection events (think Rocket Race from Halo 3), are completely weapon focused. You will die in your races, rest assured, but you respawn almost instantaneously in a manner similar to what is utilized in the MotorStorm series.

    The inclusion of vehicles in Rage is something that still puzzled me until I got my hands on it but if id can keep the formula as simple as it is now and retain the fun factor it already has I’ll gladly play a racing game with their name on it.

    You Aren’t Alone Out There

    Id Software has a varied history when it comes to multiplayer. While the Quake series has seen massive success on this front its other series never really hit the ball out of the park. Doom 3’s multiplayer seemed like an afterthought done boring but with the way most shooters are going these days you are all but obligated to include a multiplayer component in your AAA title. Rage is no exception to this rule and it is here where you’ll find that id hasn’t been rather successful.

    Variety is something that’s easily acquired in Rage’s multiplayer as you have almost every flavor under the sun available to you in the form of cooperative play as well as competitive car combat. The co-op, entitled Legends of the Wasteland, places you and your partner in the roles of NPC characters from the singleplayer campaign in missions that take place canonically before the singleplayer begins. Each of the nine missions detail a story or event hinted at during the game and are unlocked progressively meaning you’ll have to play them in order to experience them all. The end result is what you’d expect: fun, but clearly needing more to flesh it out. Experienced Rage players will enjoy themselves but those looking for more will find themselves not coming back after completing them.

    The competitive part of the multiplayer is Road Rage, a four player affair spread across three rally modes and a classic vehicular combat mode called Carnage. The meat of the experience is Carnage wherein you battle one another to get the highest score before the time or score limit is reached in a decidedly id Software take on classic Twisted Metal. Rally events are fun but won’t keep you excited for long as they all feel the same and with only a very limited level of customization for your ride and a handful of maps you probably won’t be playing it past a week or two.
    The thing about the multiplayer is that it has so much potential that it is squandered by just how little there is to do. Traditional deathmatch play screams for inclusion and yet it is frustratingly absent. Races too would have been quite fun and probably would have felt like a post-apocalyptic Mario Kart had they been included. As it stands however it is quite a wasted opportunity.

    The Attractiveness of Desolation

    Seven years is a long time to go without releasing a new game but id found justification in the creation of their new game engine. Called Id Tech 5, this behemoth of an engine has Rage as its flagship title. While the full capabilities of the engine are never explored in its initial outing (developers are still pushing the Unreal 3 engine) it is clear that Id Tech 5 can do amazing things.

    Texture detail, especially in the Wasteland’s rock formations, can be incredibly impressive at times and really make you wonder whether what you are looking at is an artist’s creation or a photo taken at Monument Valley. Animations for NPCs and enemies are wonderfully well done with very well hidden transitional animations and movement patterns that make you sit back and go “wow.” As you blast into a charging mutant and watch as they elegantly leap off a wall toward you only to be at the wrong end of some buckshot you will find yourself agreeing with me that this is only of the most beautifully animated titles since Uncharted.

    What really sells Id Tech 5 however is Rage’s fantastically smooth framerate. Id was able to deliver a sold 60fps on the home consoles, something that is an increasing rarity in games these days if your name doesn’t include the word “Duty.” Blazing along the trails of the Wasteland and hitting a bandit car head-on yields absolutely no drop in framerate and, despite my best efforts, I could not find a single instance of lag. Id has done a masterful job on their new engine and I can only hope that it gets the attention from the development community it much deserves.

    One final note I must mention is that I love id’s style in Rage. Every developer utilizes old assets in their games but id Software has the habit of reinterpreting them for the world they are making next. Within Rage you’ll find a remarkable number of textures and geometry (a style I would call Techno-Gothic) that comes directly from Doom 3. Dan Hagar has a Doom marine bobblehead on the dash of his buggy and one character you meet later in the game even has the Martian drawing of the Cyberdemon tattooed on his head! Id is clearly aware of its heritage and, while forging onward with their technology they have still found a way to make the old still relevant.

    Contain Your Rage
    When you sit down to name a game its designation has to be something that resonates with the core theme of the game. Wolfenstein told you that you were going up against the Third Reich. Doom told you that you were about to face the minions of Hell and probably wouldn’t survive. Quake, in so far as the original title goes, placed you in the role of a god-like character who made enemies tremble before you. With Rage however it seems that naming your game after a raw emotional state just doesn’t quite translate to the overall experience. The game’s great singleplayer experience feels excellent until it drops off abhorrently at the end in a manner that is sequel-mongering at its finest and the multiplayer seems almost tacked on at times.

    Rage is a solid experience but it shames me to say that the game isn’t as true to id Software’s legacy. While the development of a new engine is an almost adequate excuse for the game’s shortcomings it doesn’t make up for them. You’ll enjoy Rage for what it delivers on the singleplayer front but for those looking fun with friends should hold off to see what the game’s DLC is like. Maybe one day I’ll get to have a son who sits in my lap and helps me play Rage 3 but unless id Software really delivers with Doom 4 I fear that the magic may be beginning to fade.
    4.0
    Showing most recent comments. View all comments.
    EarthboundXWow, I didn't realize this was 60 FPS on the 360.

    That's damn impressive ID was able to do that, along with the great graphics.
    Posted by EarthboundX on 27 Jul 14 at 11:04
    Damir Maliceomg to much info and trash talk cry
    Posted by Damir Malice on 24 Mar 15 at 16:13
    zoilus68Great review--screw the haters. I couldn't agree more. I think it should come with a big red sticker on the box: WARNING FPS pretending to be an RPG!
    Posted by zoilus68 on 27 Jun 15 at 17:49
  • IGutlessIWonderIGutlessIWonder428,149
    13 Oct 2011
    23 7 3
    First off, let me just say that Rage is a very solid game and has some of the smoothest gameplay and graphics for any Xbox 360 game. Rage is an open-world game similar to Borderlands. Gameplay is smooth at 60 frames per second and have only one single time I noticed the slightest choppiness in the game.

    There is an option to install the game to your hard drive, requiring 22GB of storage for each of the 3 discs (2 for campaign, 1 for MP). I played for a couple hours right away without installing the game and then the next day I installed the first 2 campaign discs and the played some more and I did NOT notice any difference in gameplay or loading screens.

    The gameplay throughout Rage is one of the the most flawless games I've ever played. The moment you start a new game, look at the first cutscene and diagnose how realistic that hand looks then you'll know your eyes are in for a treat. When trying to describe Rage and its graphics and the seemingly flawless landscape and character models, it's hard not to say that this is one of the best looking games for a console.

    One may think that this being an open world RPG/FPS that there are going to be some long loading screens, but bluntly they are normal. They aren't excessively fast by any means but for what your eyes are looking at, you can't complain.

    Each and every character you come across has great style and detail to them. Studying a character while they're talking to you and watching their facial expressions and mouths moving is really good. The one downside is that their voice doesn't always match their mouths, which is minor and nothing to worry about. Along with characters, the landscape and detail of all of the areas that you explore really look fantastic. From cold, dark, wet places to dry, hot, desert places are awesome.

    There are several primary weapons including a pistol, assault rifle, machine gun and shotgun. There aren't any specific gun name weapons. You also have the option to take out enemies tactically with sentry guns and sentry bots and add that to a solid amount of throwing weapons, you have yourself an awesome armory. By far, my favorite weapon are the wingsticks. They're like boomerangs but when you throw them they have an act for going towards an enemy if you didn't throw it straight enough because how you put wingsticks together.

    Explosions go boom, shotguns go bang, with those and all the rest of the noises you hear sound good. The vehicle engines sound good, along with foot steps and the voice work is top notch from te likes of John Goodman as Dan Hagar and the guy who does Dempsey (from COD: WAW and COD: BlOps zombies.) as Marshall.

    Driving is a bit touchy, you have the same sensitivity settings for both your player in and out of the vehicle, so when driving, a good suggestion is to just use the LS to turn and not bother looking around with the RS because it's hardly useful. Racing, both single and multiplayer, takes some getting use too but are a decent enjoyment. Vehicles also come packed with upgrades for you armor, different paint jobs and the option to either use dual mini guns or rockets.

    Enemies are smart and killing them is fun, whether blowing up a vehicle with homing rockets from your ride to slicing someones head off with a wingstick from 50 feet away.

    There are a few key things that the developers at id could have added however. There is a lack of any type of map when you're on foot. There is no world map or area map. The only map you see is a mini-map when driving from place to place.

    Without any type of map in a new area to explore you are S.O.L. Any given area can look a lot alike so trying to find your way is difficult. You have your objective but that is unfortunately your only guide to get through any area. On my first playthrough and throughout the first couple of missions, every area I went to I got lost or I couldn't find what I was looking for when I got there. Even trying to pay attention to where you're going has a small challenge. With that said, there aren't a whole lot of areas to get lost in, remember where you came in and where you haven't gone yet and you should be alright.

    Another thing that got to me was the amount of time Rage took to complete. Two discs just for the campaign and I was thinking "Oh, hell yes" Then I got finished and I was like "that's it?" Of course this is totally my opinion but to finish 2 discs in just under 18 hours while playing on Hard difficulty is just way too short.

    You may want to wait until this one goes on sale, but, if you love the post-apocolyptic era like me, then go ahead and buy Rage.

    You'll have fun with this game if you like any type of shooters or RPG's.

    My final verdict for Rage is:
    8.75/10
    4.0
  • Removed Gamer
    Gamer has been removed
    14 6 0
    Fun with guns.

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    INTRO
    For many, Id Software is a household name, conjuring up hallowed memories of beautiful sci-fi violence and “kindly turn on the lights” scarefests. It seems like just yesterday my freshman suitemate and I were huddled over his 15" laptop with Doom 3, restlessly anticipating what lie in wait for us around the next corner. Id’s archetypal Doom and Quake series popularized the first-person genre and pushed forward the roadmap for technological innovation. With fanfare for the Texas-based developer largely focused at the feet of these two cherished franchises and the technovisual prowess they represented, any new IP is guaranteed to receive broad attention. True to form, with its penchant for monosyllabic game titles and quick-twitch gunplay, Id has now dropped Rage into the first person fracas. It is their first major release in six years and is the first product built with Id’s new game engine, Id Tech 5. Let’s see if Rage makes the cut.

    STORY
    It’s no secret Id’s creations leave little to recommend them story-wise, and Rage is unfortunately no different. Following an historic collision of earth and asteroid, our “pale blue dot” is reverted to an unrecognizable state of ruin, with life’s remnants operating under terms of tribalism and disaccord. Besides a few sparse pockets of settlements which survived the blast and mutants roaming the wastes for flesh, there is you. A contigency plan called the Eden Project was enacted prior to the impact, in which a select few were stored in subsurface cryogenic pods. Once disinterred, their intended task was to repopulate the earth. The project was largely a failure, and you are its sole survivor, with nothing but corpses and a looped recording in your midst. It is in this maelstrom of post-apocalyptic desolation that you emerge from your pod and take your first, squinty-eyed look at the new vista.

    Architecturally, the plot packaged here is a bit like a construction site that is never fully developed into a home. This is made more unfortunate because all of the brick and materials are there; a totalitarian state known as “The Authority” has formed above ground, with the inevitable resistance movement poised in opposition, and a race of mutant creatures add a darker dimension to what could have been. Yet you’re never introduced to the leader of your enemies or their motives. Nor are there any memorable clashes between the two factions. This skeleton of a plot could have been bolstered by a palette of interesting characters who are just never unpacked. The first character you meet, voiced by John Goodman, stands as the high point in the cast, but his involvement in your quest is fleeting, along with the rest of the game’s narratival elements. None of the game’s back story is revealed, the quests are loot-driven rather than plot-driven and, through it all, you’re only rewarded with one incoherent fizzle of an ending.

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    GAMEPLAY
    Those less interested in the story than Id’s tried-and-true weapon combat have a lot to look forward to here. While Rage is three-parts shooter, one-part buggy racer, the majority of your time will be spent pulling the trigger. You’ll be taking aim with the conventional assortment of goods – shotguns, crossbows and scoped pistols – which can be modded with BioShock-esque secondary ammo like electro bolts for your bow and explosive ammo for your buckshot. To aid you in trickier situations, you’ll also amass a number of blueprints you can use to build various types of support fire, the most notable being a sentry turret, sentry bot and RC car. Having two sentry bots follow you around makes for an interesting battlefield.

    As you advance from fetch quest to fetch quest, you meet a generic but sufficiently diverse set of enemies, all of which react fantastically to each well-placed shot. The force of Id’s new engine is realized most completely in the way your arsenal sprays violence on enemies in creative ways and in the sheer tightness of the controls. Each of your AI foes recoils realistically in sync with shot placement, and the AI interacts with cover effectively enough to keep the combat interesting. Somewhat paradoxically, it’s easy to ignore the insipid storyline when the shooting mechanics approach this level of vibrant satisfaction.

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    The balance of Rage is spent in the driver’s seat, zooming to the various locales around the wasteland. The game is navigated via two separate overworlds, split between discs 1 and 2 on X360. The regions themselves are much smaller than I had expected, and there’s frankly little to see. While the compressed landscape means you’ll be visiting some areas multiple times to accomplish slightly different tasks, it also means you’ll become quite familiar with vehicular combat and racing. As you near the middle segue of the game, both become repetitive, and the touchy steering controls leave a bit to be desired. The races in the city hubs are mildly enjoyable, but since their only purpose is to acquire new cars, it seems like an afterthought shoehorned in to add play time.

    It won’t be too long before you notice the omnibus of missed opportunities that must have been left on the drawing board. There are simply not enough interesting activities or areas to explore outside of the hackneyed missions. No secret areas, no meaningful side quests. The main quests never dip too far down into the innovation jar, either. While the environments are beautiful and built for firefights, they are linear to a fault, never giving the impression there might be more to see. Besides a handful of interesting areas and boss characters, the game world is overall less than memorable.

    VISUALS
    Silky smooth. Disarmingly handsome. As Id’s first console game built with their proprietary Id Tech 5 engine, Rage’s announcement was met with high expectations and the team has delivered. As you step from your cryo pod, you are greeted by one beautiful view of the wasteland after another. This is the game Id had in mind when building their engine. Skylines approach photorealism. Every mountain ridge and stress fracture in the deformed planet is bursting with detail. While the variety of environments are fairly limited, what is here is rendered gorgeously and stands in stark contrast to the cel-shaded pseudo-realism of Borderlands.

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    Performance never dips as combat heats up, either, as Id uses an innovative frame-rendering technique that guarantees a rock-solid 60 fps experience. This is easily one of the smoothest, most responsive shooters to grace the console market. Two gripes, however. First, there is absolutely no environmental destruction to speak of, and second, there are simply too few character models to go around. Some of the NPCs are shamelessly reused even in the same city hub, as if we wouldn’t notice. All in all, Rage fills the shoes of its predecessors admirably given the limitations of the hardware.

    Technical specs: native 720p at 60 frame/s. Vertical resolution is always maintained, while horizontal resolution is adjusted dynamically to maintain 60 Hz refresh. (applies both to X360 and PS3 platforms)

    AUDIO
    Production values remain high across the board, with each weapon emitting its own guttural, wasteland-style oomph. The voice acting is hit and miss, however. While your first contact in the game is masterfully voiced by John Goodman, the later characters, particularly those of the resistance movement, fail to capture any interest and none of the characters have much to say. NPCs, likewise, are tight-lipped and tranquilizingly dull. It’s as if the writing team scheduled a brainstorming session to outcompete one another for the most generic lines. To the game’s detriment, you can proceed through the entire game without speaking to any of the characters other than the ones you’re forced to and never miss a beat.

    MULTIPLAYER AND CO-OP
    Disc 3 contains the multiplayer and cooperative modes. Looking forward to hopping right into a deathmatch, I quickly discovered that Rage offers no non-vehicle multiplayer component. All of the match types are vehicle vs. vehicle, ranging from strictly combat to rally mode to some banal version of capture the flag. This, understatedly, is a massive disappointment considering the legacies of the other titles in Id’s canon. The two-player co-op missions hardly raise the incentive to pop in the third disc. There are nine missions in total, many of which can be finished in a matter of minutes, and feature re-used locales from the campaign.

    CONCLUSION
    From the fountainheads of technical ingenuity who brought first-person shooters to the gaming masses come the handsome and addictive Rage, clearly modeled after Doom and Quake, but reimagined for the current gaming market. While the more seasoned gamers will likely find many of the elements lacking, including the lack of depth, incohesive story and contrived questline, those looking for some simple mindless fun with deadly firepower will be plenty appeased. Thanks to Id’s new engine, Rage is peerless in terms of sheer fluidity of combat and hyper-detailed visuals. Although I enjoyed Rage while it lasted (around 15 hours if you complete every side quest), overall I found its by-the-books, stubbornly linear nature lacking next to the batch of superior shooters in recent years. The multiplayer and co-op modes are disappointing to say the least, and I simply see no reason to come back to the game after playing through once. Short on depth but high on beauty and fun, give this one a rental rather than a buy.

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    Note: This review is reposted from my website at: http://www.techthoughts.net/2012/09/21/review-rage/
  • iAmTheTotiAmTheTot104,713
    15 Jan 2013
    9 2 4
    Rage Against the Authority

    By reader request, I will briefly touch base on the game's achievements. However it cannot be stressed enough that achievements do not affect the final score I give, ever.

    Rage comes from a name that pioneered first person shooters in the early nineties. Legendary id Software titles like Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, and Quake defined a newly emerging genre that we oh so often take for granted in the twenty-ten's. First person shooters are a dime a dozen these days, but surely a company so in tune with the genre can still make a stand-out hit... right?

    id Software isn't exactly known for new IPs. In the years leading up to Rage's release the company had only been releasing sequels and remakes of their big established franchises: Wolfenstein, Doom, and Quake (with a little bit of Commander Keen thrown in there too). And when id decides to try a new IP, they really pull out all the stops; the id Tech 5 engine was first showcased playing a very early version of Rage in 2007, and is the first game to use the engine. So we have a legend of the genre using a brand new game engine to produce a new IP – what could go wrong?

    The first thing you're likely to notice when you start up Rage and reach the title menu is the outstanding views the game can offer us by using id's new engine. After a brief opening cinematic explaining that Earth has been nearly obliterated by a hulking heap of space rock, the player awakes in a stasis pod to the voice of the facility's AI. Something's not quite right; you're the only one to come out of the pods and everyone else is dead. Exiting the small room, the player is met with the glare of the beating sun – and not much else.

    The player is quickly introduced to Dan Hagar who explains some plot basics to the player: the world's a lot different now, an organization called The Authority calls most of the shots these days, and what they don't control is ravaged by bandits and mutants. Alright, so it's not the most original post-apocalyptic plot you've ever heard, but it actually pulls it off very smoothly for the most part with an original twist here or there.

    The game is open-linear, and by that I mean there's a very linear main questline, but you don't have to do it until you want to. The player is free to explore the world to their heart's content, but to not much of an end. There are some collectibles and the like, but free exploration is hardly ever actually rewarded as much of the map is intimately involved with either the main story, or a side quest (which usually just entails revisiting a main story location with a different objective). It's so linear that enemy spawns are identical each playthrough, regardless of difficulty.

    But Rage definitely takes a departure from the FPS norm in a few departments. A quirky selection of guns, each with varying types of ammo, and an arsenal of wildly entertaining gadgets like “Spider Bots” or “Wing Sticks” (all of which can be made on the fly, given you have the correct components) almost always leads to a multitude of methods for felling your foes. id didn't stop there; the addition of hectic over-the-top vehicle warfare and races coupled with everything else give Rage enough flavour to stand on its own two feet as a unique FPS experience, from a gameplay perspective.

    Rage is often hailed as a visual masterpiece (even I admitted it's likely to the be the first standout thing you notice), but in reality what should really be hailed is id's new id Tech 5 engine. The character models are good and much of the design is quality, but the textures are par for what you'd expect in this day and age and, often, are even below par. What's so standout is that Rage is likely to be the smoothest game you've ever experienced on a console – I'm serious. Little to no tearing and through my entire play not a single frame reduction.

    The game's music was forgettable enough – maybe I was just too busy shooting bandits in the face to notice, but it's still not a good trait. The voice acting, conversely, is quite solid. Some names like John Goodman, Claudia Black, Nolan North, and Phil LaMarr may jump out at you – I particularly enjoyed Goodman's performance portraying something that wasn't a cartoon.

    Investing in a new IP is always a risk, even when a company does it with a genre they're very familiar with; even when a company is using a newly developed (by themselves) game engine. While Rage tries to appeal to as much of an audience as possible, many of its sort of tacked on features fall short (like the coop missions, or online vehicle warfare). But Rage succeeds where id is most comfortable: single-player experience, and innovation in gameplay. The side missions may be paltry and the gadgets may be arguably unnecessary, when the player really embraces all the features Rage has to offer it definitely provides an experience they won't get from the other dime-a-dozen shooters on the market.

    Achievements
    Rage's achievements are pretty straightforward: complete X mission, beat the game on X difficulty, execute X situation (e.g. 10 headshots with a sniper), or collect X collectibles. Seriously, I think that about covers it. The collectibles will probably offer the most difficulty as some are actually well hidden – some are even hidden in plain sight but very easy to miss. With only a handful of multiplayer achievements (only one or two of which actually requires online – the others can be obtained through offline coop), Rage shouldn't be a very hard game to get all the achievements for. The Scorchers DLC does have some achievements, but is only 400 MSP.

    Summary
    Graphics: Par or sub-par textures in the smoothest game you will ever play on console – really.

    Sound: Forgettable music, but solid voice acting from some interesting characters. Gunplay is satisfying loud.

    Plot: Post-apocalyptic plot has a lot of potential but is extremely subdued and underplayed – as the credits roll, you may ask “...what?”

    Gameplay: Gunplay dominates, but don't be afraid to check out the awesome gadgets. Vehicle warfare and races play a decent role but don't intrude too much on the core FPS gameplay.

    Length/Replay Value: Linear storyline with occasional side content should lead to a play of around 20 hours. With a seriously next-to-nonexistent online playerbase, you'll probably play this once and be done with it unless you go through on a harder difficulty.

    Yea or Nay? I'd have to say yea for fans of first person shooters. The game offers something new to the table, which isn't easy to do these days in this genre.

    Final score: 7.4/10
    4.0
  • b30118218b301182183,778,172
    20 Oct 2011 20 Oct 2011
    16 15 6
    Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
    Developer: id Software
    Genre: First Person Shooter
    Players: Players – One Co-Op - 2, Multiplayer – 2-4
    Platform: Xbox 360
    Launch Date: 7th October 2011

    Nearly six years after id Software released Doom 3, they have returned and gone multi-platform to release RAGE, the game that has been in development for the better half of five years. Not only have they returned with a new game though they have also brought along their brand new engine id Tech 5 which adds a shadowy doubt as to how well the game will look and perform seeing as its all new technology. Have id Software really managed to reinvigorate the first person shooter scene again though after spending so long out of the spotlight, or does RAGE whimper quietly into a corner like a dog that has lost its bone?

    The only way you are going to find out is if you carry on reading our definitive in depth full review on the game!

    Game play - 7/10

    Being a first person shooter and coming from the masterminds that brought us Doom, Quake and Wolfenstien, it is no surprise that RAGE would have to have amazing game play to help id Software prove to the gaming world that even though they have been away for five years, they are still the masters of the genre.

    Well in some respects they did manage to pull off some pretty decent gameplay mechanics, but on the other hand some of them felt really lop sided and unneeded or that the game could of done without them, this is where we now delve into how the game operates and works and what areas of the game work well compared to others.

    Upon first glance of RAGE everything feels so in place, so finely tuned and that given the time you will be able to easily master this game just like every other shooter that is currently on the market, well unfortunately that’s not the case.

    The game itself is very much tied to the old school era of shooters, what I mean by this is that the difficulty is rather intense at certain parts and enemies wont just drop to the floor whilst your shooting at them, its going to take some very precise shots to drop your enemies quickly, efficiently and with ease.

    Not only that though, the way the game has been designed is that it will ultimately refuse to hold your hand, it wont guide you or tell you where to go. It won't even offer you the slightest hint as to what your supposed to do next apart from a mission objective, and the way some of the levels are set out are very much puzzle like, for example you may find yourself looking around the local scenery trying to find a way past a door or through a locked gate.

    These are rather nice touches, because even though the game isn’t completely old school in the way it handles, id Software have actually managed to take some of the newer elements from shooters such as Call of Duty and Battlefield and implement them into RAGE with an added twist.

    One of the main twists is that when you die, it isn’t a case of you just die and you restart. You find out in the storyline that your body is fitted with a defibrillator and that when you're in trouble and you can't manage to find a place to heal in safety or you can't patch yourself up and eventually die, you will enter a meta game where you have to revive yourself using your defibrillator. This doesn’t mean to say you can't ultimately die in the game, as you only have so many chances in a certain time limit that you can use this item.

    The rest of the time you will need to make good use of your ammo you take your foes out with and even better use of the bandages that will heal your character back up to normal with, unfortunately though this springs two problems.

    The first problem is that you can't run in and treat RAGE as if your going to be spraying your ammo all over the place. If you do this your going to end up in some serious problems as ammo in RAGE is rather scarce at times and the last thing you want to do is go into a shoot out using only your fists as your only weapon of choice.

    If this does seem to happen to you then you may then spring into the second problem and that is healing yourself with bandages that you may have found. Again just like the ammo you need to make good use of the bandages that you find lying around or you're going to run out rather quickly. If you can’t find any bandages though you may be able to make some with items you have looted throughout the game.

    You may recall that I pointed out before that you will need to make good use of your ammo to take out your enemies with, I mentioned this because the enemies in the game are rather tough and not only that they can be very fast and charge up to you and attack you with some serious power. If you shoot for the body your going to end up wasting a lot of your ammo, so you really need to be trying for the head whenever you have a chance to, if you can get a clean headshot then you will no doubt save yourself a little trouble but also that precious ammo.

    There are many different areas that you can visit whilst your playing the game, some you will come to whilst playing missions whilst others you can go out of your way to find, one of the main problems with the game though is that the missions the game offers suffer from being very linear and not really offering the player a choice of where they would like to go or how they are going to get to there next objective easier or quicker or maybe even taking a stealthy route.

    Moving around the world is easy enough to do though and there are no real glitches that will stop you from progressing to where you need to go, climbing ladders in the game though could have been improved more by possibly creating an animation of your guy climbing up them, rather then just sliding up the ladder to your next destination.

    Finding quests and accepting missions in the game is rather easy also, all you really have to do is walk up to the quest giver and they will automatically look up in your direction and start talking to you, this will then eventually lead to an accept quest screen at the side of your television in which you can choose to accept or not, if you choose not to accept then you can either return at a later date or press A on the quest giver to be offered the chance again.

    As your talking to the quest givers, you are allowed to more freely around and explore within a certain distance, if you move too far away then the quest giver will automatically stop talking then start from where he left off once you return. It’s nice to see this implemented as well as it has been.

    The gun play in the game is rather stellar and faults are hard to come by, each individual weapon has its own system of firing and you will need to learn each system effectively to be able to take out the tougher enemies easily. Each weapon also comes with the iron sight zoom which lets you give off a more precise shot, and one of the features that seems to have been included is that with your pistol and machine gun you are given a zoomed in sight.

    This for me was a real deal breaker as I didn’t really want to have to zoom in with a machine gun to take a decent shot at an enemy who was moving towards me, as it takes time to not only zoom in but then to find a good shot on your opponent afterwards.

    If you don’t feel like aiming properly though, you will be glad to know that firing from the hip is rather effective and strangely accurate and quite often I was able to acquire a headshot with the crossbow without really trying to get one.

    It was nice to see that there are a few RPG elements that have been thrown into the single player, I touched upon the fact that you have to heal yourself with bandages earlier on, and these can either be found or created. This means that little things you loot whilst your playing the game, may or may not be combinable with other items in your inventory which you can create to make certain things.

    Maybe you will want to make a normal grenade into an emp grenade, or maybe break into sealed doors with lock grinders, or take a stealth approach and blow up enemies with RC cars. There are many ways you can combine two very different things together that will ultimately help you out in the end.

    If you don’t have any items that you can combine, you will be glad to know that you can also loot money in the game, which can then be spent purchasing upgrades for various things including your character, vehicles and even weapons. But you can also buy other little random tid bits as well if you fancy, like for example more clothes to create bandages for your next mission or maybe some more ammo if your running low.

    These RPG elements are rather nice and maybe it would have been nice if there was some sort of levelling up system that was included within the game to make the player feel like they had a more powerful character with each mission they completed.

    With a few of the basics mentioned though lets move onto some of the other more random elements of the game such as the meta games for instance. Whilst you're travelling you will often come across little side games that you can take part in and often bet your money on. These are nice little additions and often work well. When you get into the town of Wellspring you will notice if you take a good look around that there is plenty of side stuff to do if you don’t fancy taking on a mission at the time.

    You could choose from a zombie game where you have to roll dice to depend on how many zombies your sheriff will shoot, or how about taking part in some five finger fillet to name but a few. Not only are these games present in RAGE they actually work really well and at times can work too well as they can be hard to win at.

    Seeing as this is id Software’s first real attempt at creating something other then a shooter, and adding in the ability of vehicles that you can move and drive around in at your own pace and use for quite a lot of the story, then you will be glad to know that they do all handle quite well, the racing parts of the game also have there own unique individual twists.

    Not only are you able to take your own weapons into the race and cause some destruction upon your opponents, you will often find that you have a special and unique weapon sometimes that you will be able to use also which will have various effects depending on which special weapon you have equipped.

    With all of the gameplay elements combined for the single player, it is easy to see that id Software really have created a masterpiece for single player gaming, there are flaws but these are easily overlooked with everything that is on offer.

    Moving swiftly on to the multiplayer portion of the game it would be an underestimate to say that anybody who knows the history of id Software would be more then intrigued to find out what goodies have been placed in the RAGE multiplayer portion of the game.

    Now the problem is that there is really barely anything that has been placed in multiplayer, with the game only offering two forms or multiplayer modes some gamers may feel ripped off or cheated in some respects. Whilst there are only two different modes, each mode is completely different to the last which will help soothe that hurt even more.

    The first mode you will be greeted with when playing multiplayer is called Road Rage and if you have twigged onto the name yet, yes this mode uses vehicles, and more importantly then that it uses vehicles with weapons. Don’t mistake this mode for a simple race game type as it is far from it, in fact what you do get is a simple sort of checkpoint race style.

    The whole idea of Road Rage is to drive as fast as you can do and pick up all the markers that on are on the ground and try to earn a x5 multiplayer all whilst killing your foes and trying to get to a score of two hundred to end the game, whilst this mode may seem rather easy when you read about it, it's far from it as you have to focus your attention all around and not just on getting the checkpoints, you will also need to have good knowledge of the maps if your going to get the upper hand.

    The second multiplayer mode is entitles Wasteland Legends. This is a simple format with a few different variations of game type, each different game type that you plat will have you doing various different tasks, like taking on mutants to try and raid something or even going though a horde system in the Mutant Bash arenas to get to J.K Simmons.

    This is easily where most gamers will spend a lot of there gaming time whilst playing multiplayer as there is more of a selection of things to do other then that of Road Rage. Even with these different game styles combined for Wasteland Legends its hard to see why they didn’t just try to make all of these there own game type styles.

    When playing the multiplayer of the game, id have been sure to make things a little more modern with being able to customise your player cards emblem with new unlockable logos and signs, there is also a simple experience system in place that will unlock for the player various new toys to kill with and better vehicles to use whilst playing the game.

    All in all what is on offer in the multiplayer section of the game is really rather tame I feel a lot more could have been put in here to help bulk it out, it’s a shame no death match type of modes were entered but I can also see and respect why id Software decided to leave them out. Whilst they have also managed to bring things into the modern day era with how multiplayer works, its also nice to see some of the old factors of multiplayer making a return.

    More modes could easily be inserted into the game though with future DLC and we can only hope that this is the case, as it’s a shame to see the multiplayer offering get left out like it has done, its obvious to see that a lot of the attention to the game went on the single player experience.

    If more modes were added in the future though I could easily see they would go on the Wasteland Legends match type system seeing as that is the closest you will get to capture the flag, horde or even just shooting things for points.

    Graphics - 10/10

    Using the id Tech 5 game engine, RAGE really doesn’t disappoint in the graphics area, it would also be a safe bet to say that bar for the upcoming Battlefield 3, RAGE really is the prettiest looking game to ever grace a console. Everything about the game shines detail and lots of attention to it also.

    No matter if you are walking around the desolate wasteland having a stroll around to see what new areas you can find, or wandering around at a higher pace in one of the many vehicles the game uses. Or if you would like a slower pace to walk around the different towns and take a wander into a nearby bar.

    It really does become apparent that id Software spent a lot of time drawing up different storyboards of how they wanted a certain place to look and then actually reworking that into the main game, not only that though but everything seems to match up perfectly.

    Say for example you enter the nearby town of Wellspring, it’s a dusty and sandy town that seems to have been built up from scratch over the years to help house survivors and anybody that isn’t a mutant. No matter where you head in Wellspring, everything just seems to match up and have a coherent graphical factor to it. The bar looks like an old time bar and even the mayor’s office has a western twang to it. Whilst these may seem like two totally different genres, under the bright sun and dusty set up they both fit really well together.

    I pointed out in the last paragraph that the towns seem to have been built up from scratch; from this alone the game has a very Fallout’esc factor to it. Most structures look like metal shanty towns, and even the town looks like its seen better days.

    The graphical structure of the game looks to be a cross between both Borderlands and Fallout, this isn’t a bad thing though as with the added graphical powress of the id Tech 5 engine, everything just looks so much better. And with id putting their own stamp on the settings of the game world it just feels so right but yet so different.

    The characters in the game are all individually crafted which is a nice thing to add to the game, there are so many games out there that when you walk up to an NPC and listen to what they are saying, it just feels like they all have the same kind of face build, which at the end of the day just gets old and boring really quickly.

    With RAGE though as I just previously stated every NPC you come across whilst making progress in your story has a different body and face build, which helps make each individual unique and not the same rehashed character from earlier on in the story. This again just shows how much time and attention id have really spent mastering how they wanted the game to look and feel.

    Unfortunately though the same cannot be said for the enemies that you will encounter during the game, granted there are a lot of choices of enemy that you will no doubt be dealing with, but this doesn’t make up for the fact that there are only a few different sets of each enemy type, possibly three or four builds per a separate enemy, which when you play a game for twelve hours, can start to look boring quite quickly.

    Going swiftly back though to my point I made a few paragraphs ago about the NPCs that you will talk to, the animations that have been applied to the way they talk, move and even look at you have all been perfectly made. When you're in talks with a NPC whilst they are talking you will notice that the lip syncing isn’t perfect, but its pretty good for what they have tried to do, but also you will notice how parts of the facial features will also move whilst the character is talking to you.

    Seeing as this is the first proper game id have spent time developing vehicles for mass use in, its nice to see that the vehicle builds match up rather nicely to the rest of the overall feel of the game.

    What I mean by this though is that remember how I describe the towns as shanty towns or built up from scratch after the devastation that the world had been through. Well the vehicles look pretty much like this also, they look hand made and also made to be able to have modifications such as weapons and such attached to them to help make there journeys across the wasteland all that much more easier.

    As the vehicles take damage though its nice to see that parts of your car or quad bike will start to fall off, wheels will start to throw off sparks to show that some part of the wheel chassis has been affected. Whilst all this is a nice touch, I couldn’t help but feel that the overall fire effects that will engulf your car if it takes too much damage looked rather tame. I think a little more detail could have gone into creating a more realistic looking fire effect.

    Obviously being a first person shooter, many gamers will be here to take a look at the eye candy worth of firepower that the game has to offer, seeing as a lot of your time you will be wielding one of the games few weapon choices.

    First off I would like to point out that yes, the games choices in weaponry is rather limited, but it does do the job of supplying the player with all of the basics such as snipers, machine guns and even crossbows with more to boot.

    All of the weapons in the game have been given quite a lot of detail also, take for example the shotgun. Whilst it may not look like much to begin with if you take a closer look at the sides and at the top of the gun you will see markings along it, little grooves and areas that would normally get overlooked. Again this is another factor that id have spent some time and thought thinking through. They have sat down and realised that the guns will be on screen for the longest amount of time during the game, so obviously they need to look every bit as good as the rest of the game.

    Overall it really is hard to fault the new engine that id Software have created when it comes to id Tech 5, seeing as RAGE is really only the taster of what the engine can offer to future gaming. It will be interesting to see where id take the game engine In future games. With more tweaks and power placed within it, I think we could have the most powerful engine to ever grace gaming for some time to come. All other developers should take note and realise that with time and effort every game can really look as good as this. With no graphical slipups and very rare slow down, everything about this game looks great.

    Sound - 9/10

    If you remember back to our coverage of RAGE during our hands on play test where we got to play the game using Turtle Beach headsets, you may remember how we mentioned that the sound in the game was a massive factor, almost as massive as how amazing the game looked.

    Well after playing the game for a lot longer and witnessing so much of what the game has to offer in terms of sound quality you will be glad to know that the sound really is still a cut above the rest.

    Lets start by talking about the games score and the music that you will be experiencing whilst playing the game. When you're just wandering around you will get a very calm, almost ambient sound playing to you softly. Not only this though but you will also pick up on even the slightest things like walking, not only that but walking across each different terrain offers its own unique sound.

    I’m not talking about walking from concrete to metal either, I’m on about the difference between the sands/dirt you will walk across, be it hard or soft for some reason there is always a slight difference no matter what type of terrain it is that your walking.

    You have the sound of the wind that will also gently fly by, or even some kind of insects or something completely different making noises as you walk across the desolate wasteland. There are many more that could be mentioned but by now you probably get that, its nice to just sit back and be able to listen to the detail that has gone into the games sound design.

    When the action starts to pick up in the game, and you're met with having to fight off many enemies you will be glad to know that a heavier orchestral score will come into play. This will help keep you pumped up as you are about to go into a gun fight, one against many with the odds stacked greatly against you. It is probably also a good time to point out that the orchestral score does a very good job of telling you when an area is clear also and when things may start to pick up and be prepared for.

    The voice work in the game is rather decent, with many different voice actors on board it will be hard for you to notice the same voice actor playing two different characters or towns folk as you play through the game.

    Whilst there is a lot of dialogue in the game, much of it seems to be superbly done and none of the actors give off the impression that they was forced to say a line or act like they didn’t want to be there or care about what was being said, with each line delivered in the game you got the sense of feeling that the voice actors felt almost as passionate about the game as the developers did.

    The major flaw when it comes to the voice acting though stems directly from the enemies in the game, very much like the character modelling, the enemies often repeat the same lines over and over again, be it the mutants who will pretty much run at you whilst screaming or the human bandit enemies who will shout obscenities at you rather then wish you a good day. Everything here just seemed so lacklustre when compared to the rest of the games sound design.

    I feel like it wouldn’t of hurt for id to have wrote a few more lines for all of the enemy types so that when your playing through and trying to recover from taking a beating, you don’t have to hear the same old shouts/grunts or moans.

    Vehicles within the game often come with a nice roary and upbeat engine sound design, if we take the quad bike for example that you earn rather early into the game, whilst it may not be the fastest or the loudest sounding vehicle that you will come across, the grunt from the bike sounded pretty decent.

    Now when you compare this to some of the later vehicles you find, its still pretty much the same thing. But each vehicle has its own sense of sound, be it a racer buggy type vehicle or a normal off-road car that is capable of taking a beating they all sound very different.

    Now onto the bit though that everybody has probably been waiting to hear about, how do the guns sound? Well just like the appearance of the weaponry in the game, you will be hard to please if you don’t actually like how all of the different guns sound, whether it be reloading the gun or actually firing away. The sound design department have done an excellent job in creating different sounds for different weapons.

    Overall it really is apparent that the sound in the game was taken very seriously and built up to accommodate each different setting that the game has to offer. Whether you choose to sit in a local tavern or be out battling different foes you will never hear a silent moment in the game. Granted a few things could have been changed or altered around, possibly even taken out. But what is supplied is rather good and it kept me entertained whilst playing.

    Achievements - 7/10

    Most Xbox 360 players love achievements, and lets face it you wouldn’t be reading this section if you didn’t like achievements either! You are probably wondering, so how does RAGE’s achievement list stack up to the rest of the game?

    Well I can answer that by saying the achievement list that is features is a mixed bag, this isn’t a bad thing though it’s completely the opposite. The basic achievement list contains achievements for blasting away at the story, taking part in some of the online multiplayer aspects of the game. You even get rewarded for taking part in some of the random tasks that you may come across on your travels like taking part in meta games.

    There are achievements also based on racing and weapon related also, not to mention some other miscellaneous achievements that are featured. Whilst id have managed to pack 50 achievements into the game, it really does seem like they could of gone way over the limit and added even more fun stuff to do.

    But lets break it down though, as I said before you get a good selection of achievements for progressing through the story, whilst you may not get an amazing amount of points from these, its nice to know that your still being rewarded for completing a different and new section of the game.

    There really isn’t that many multiplayer achievements either packed into this game, this will no doubt come as a joy to some and an excuse not to play for others, the achievements that are on offer when it comes to the multiplayer though are rather easy and add a nice little touch to the game.

    There are a few cool achievements related to weapon kills which could also be associated with being misc related at the same time, you have simple ones for killing so many enemies with a certain weapon via headshots, whilst if your using the cross bow your also given an achievement for not only shooting enemies in the head with it, but also doing it stealthily without alerting them. There are a few others like kill a law officer quickly and efficiently whilst they are jet packing and before they land on the ground.

    With all of those other achievements though you would of thought id really would of started to run out of ideas by this stage, but that’s far from it because as I said at the start your given a few select achievements for discovering fun little things that you can find around the game world, be it finding the secret developer graffiti room or winning the max hand at a game of five finger fillet there is lots to do.

    Whilst some of the achievements are your run of the mill ones, there are some other decent and challenging achievements to boot which helps round out the achievement list quite nicely, nothing here will be too hard for your average gamer to get, but expect the full fifty achievements to take some time.

    Summery

    RAGE just proves that id Software have not just been sitting around for the last five years, it shows that the creators of this truly awe inspiring game have created something truly stunning and have took a lot of time care and attention in delivering something that they truly believe in.

    The single player may not be the longest but it still beats many other shooters currently on the market weighing in at a decent twelve hour campaign on average, but with all the other factor like side quests and racing you will easily knock up your play time.

    Add in the multiplayer that the game offers, and even though its not the best it still helps to add that extra value to the game, and it makes us all eager to find out where id Software will go next and what lessons they have learned from developing this game.

    This game really is a must for all shooter fans out there, I highly doubt anybody will be disappointed seeing as it has a decent difficulty system and will ultimately keep you coming back for more once the story is over with.

    Overall: 8.5/10 Great

    Review written for Xbox Resouce and slightly modified for True Achievements.

    I take my reviews seriously and go into as much depth and detail about everything that i can do to give you guys a full rundown of what to expect for your cash.

    If their is something you don't like or agree with or something you would like to see added then let me know and i shall add more information.

    If you feel the need to downvote me then please give me a reason.
    4.0
  • ryanlegend95ryanlegend95198,742
    18 Jul 2012 28 Jul 2012
    5 5 4
    Ok for starters this game is made by id Software so you just know that the game is going to be awesome considering that the company pretty much invented first person shooters.

    This game is a bit of a change for id Software because this is their first RPG game. This means that this is unfamiliar ground for them but I can tell you that the company pulled through and made a very unique game.

    The game is set in the future and the planet is a wasteland because an asteroid crashed into it. That's the main plot of the story but the story is a bit of a downer because it's too basic and uninteresting but id software isn't very good at making a storyline anyway so that's obviously their main weak point about creating a game. The strongest thing about them is their unique graphics. In almost every single game that they have made looks spectacular. They are called the kings of graphics for a reason you know.

    Now time for the king of reviews (lol)

    Graphics:
    The graphics are possibly the best that I have seen since Far Cry 2. Its astonishing how detailed every thing is e.g Scars and moles on characters faces that actually look convincing. Surprisingly the frame rate holds up very well. In fact it's probably the most smoothest frame rate that I have ever seen on a game. minimal glitches. fantastic character models with fantastic use of motion capture.
    External image

    The only bad thing about the graphics is that there are a lot of noticeable pop ins but it can be improved quite drastically by installing it to your hardrive but it takes up 22 GB of precious space.

    I give the graphics a perfect 10/10 for just looking too damn good.

    Sound:
    The sound is just as good as the graphics. Fantastic charming voice acting with great dialogue. Great sound effects. Great soundtrack and great ambient sounds. It's just nice to hear a buggy roar.

    I give the sound a 10/10. It's just perfect harmony.

    Gameplay:
    The gameplay is just as fantastic as the other categories. Extremely satisfying gunplay. Great objectives. Brilliant driving sections and fun minigames.
    External image

    The down side of the game is that it's short and maybe a bit too easy for some players but you're definitely going be playing it again and again. The multiplayer is a missed opportunity but the co-op is still great.

    I give the gameplay score a whopping 9.5/10.

    Storyline:
    This is definitely the worst thing about the game simply because it's basic and uninteresting but I do think that it had a great concept for it but just couldn't be delivered.

    I give the storyline score 5.5/10.

    Overall I think this is a great game with minor downfalls but you will be able to put those issues a side and just enjoy the game for what it has to offer.

    I give this game an outstanding 9/10.
    5.0
  • Removed Gamer
    Gamer has been removed
    10 12 4
    RAGE is an interesting game and a beautiful one at that - the urban landscapes, the dungeon inspired trudges through the city blocks, the mountainous ravines - all of them ooze detail and a gritty take on the world in an apocalyptic setting.
    Made by ID, of the revolutionary game developers and one of the first companies to introduce the concept of First Person Shooters its no surprise here that the game is very pretty. Despite its striking good looks RAGE feels as if it is missing something and that's not the game's fault. If you've played Fallout 3 and Borderlands you're going to feel a bit of slight nostalgia at first but that's not a bad thing necessarily, just a forewarning.
    RAGE is introduced in an amazing sequence of an asteroid bound for Earth. A female voice details the scene - Arks are being prepared to ensure mankind's continuation - and ends with a bone-chilling statement of 'may we see another day'. And then that's pretty much it. RAGE for the most part has a story that sees you shuffling from Point A to point B in your car, going for point A to point B in a dungeon crawling manner involving shooting and then rinsing and repeating. The story which had/has potential throws itself out of a window and disappears until about halway through the game and then makes a feeble resurrection at the end but at that point its too late, the feeling of a story is too long overdue and not welcomed. This is RAGE's biggest fault, if you're into a good story then RAGE is not for you. If however you're into shooting and driving then RAGE is for you because that's where its strengths shine.

    The dungeon-inspired shoot-outs are the best part of the game in my opinion. You start off with a pistol and then slowly find, build and are given better weapons. Each of them have different ammo types that help take on the bad guys. Speaking of the bad guys, they're all interestingly cool to take on. And they're smart.
    The Ghost Clan will jump off walls, flip through tight spaces and dash at you on open ground. They'll try and flank you, yell at you, balk you. The Authority will play tactical, the guys with shields will stand their ground in the open and fire while their friends fire from behind cover. They'll fire over their shoulders when running back when you've killed half of them. They communicate with each other. If you sit behind a wall and wait they'll come to you - they might even yell out it could be a trap - but they'll do it slowly. When you clear a room it feels satisfyingly great because you've outsmarted them.
    You can send in remote controlled cars and explode them, you can shoot a take over their minds and explode them, you can launch grenades, use bandages to heal yourself on the fly... the possibilties are quite near endless in what you can do just to clear a room and it makes the game all the more satisfying. Playing the game on Nightmare (the max setting) isn't hair-rippingly frustrating but fun simply because its a challenge - and you know there's a trick you just haven't tried.
    Beyond the combat in tight places with guns there's car racing to be had and cars to destroy out in the Wasteland. You can arm your car with rockets, turrets to fire for you, shields to repel incoming damage and miniguns. The controls for driving have a learning curve but all in good time, you drive a lot and it comes eventually after you drive to every point in the game.
    For however short the game is (and it is short at around 9 - 11 hours) its a fun romp through a classic scenario. The fights are satisfying, the car gameplay exciting and the minigames, people and places you visit are all amazingly charmed and detailed. One thing is missing - the decent storyline. It really felt as if the story could have been amazing and whole parts of the game rendered with gut-wrenching scenes of the world in decay as mankind comes to an end. It leads up to a sequel but in all honesty this could have been a stand-alone game with a longer story to it and thus a better, more solid game. It's a good game, solid in terms of gameplay, graphics and world creation, its just the story which could have been executed better. As a story-enthusiast and writer I saw potential in this one. Still, don't let that keep you from a great game - there's plenty of fun to be had.
  • xMysticWolfxxMysticWolfx10,686
    24 Oct 2011
    1 5 1
    Easy to learn gameplay with a few humorous parts and pretty graphics dont mask a faulty A.I. system. Enemies will charge you with a bat but run for cover with their shotguns. And to add insult to injury no-one can honestly say they beat nightmare difficulty with the aid of RC cars because all they do is give away your position and get shot before you can get close to your target. SPOILER - The end is about 30 seconds long, so dont hope for a awesome ending to tie-up the loose-strings.

    Multiplayer isn't too bad, with the obvious exception your placed in games with enemies WAY higher level then you and upgrades are level-based, not point-unlocks. To anyone going for the MVP achievement - wait for a rocket rally and totally ignore the enemies and shoot for the blue rays, 99% of the time the enemy is too wrapped-up in killing each-other to notice, i was able to achive this at lvl 1 so its possible with all vehicles

    Overall - Better then Duke Nukem Forever laugh
    4.0
  • GoGoAkimboGoGoAkimbo140,205
    15 Feb 2012
    2 12 0
    Well RAGE what can i say,

    Its not a bad game, But then again its not an amazing game either, However i am enjoying it, Purely because its not too difficult, Its actually quite linear,

    Ive spent the last 2 weeks playing Skyrim in all its complicatedness, so its quite refreshing to have a game where i dont really have to think too much to play it,

    It does have its faults, The story ending sucks a bit and the textures take a while to sort themselves out sometimes but that hasnt really impacted on my enjoyment,

    its all very simple, and thats the beauty of it, the environment is not so huge that it takes you hours to cross the map, everything that you will find important is laid out for you as quest rewards things like skematics and weapons and if they arent then they are easily found at vendors for you to purchase at your leisure, The enemies dont take too much killing, even on nightmare difficulty, its all fairly straight foreward.

    there isnt much else i want to say really, I dont hate it but i dont love it either,

    I havent played the multiplayer much so cant comment on that yet but i will endevour to update this when i do

    xxxxx
    3.0
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