SiN:Steam-A must play for new SiN games to make any sense Though old; the sheer gore & memories make me smile upo
The above is for those worried about SiN's age and dont want to play through pain in order actualy enjoy Emergance... You must have played at least one or the other, SiN is best probably overall since it's steam release is stable and other than no mouse on the menu which isnt an issue at all the way it's set up.
Now onto SiN. SiN to me is a game that cannot be summed up with a single catagory for classification, I found surprisingly good is what most people will feel about it considering how old it is. Guilty Pleasure comes to mind depending on one's opinions and zelosy about games that do something above and beyond it's own time with gore. Other's that come to mind are old-school, imersive after one or two hours of play and over all a fun and surprisingly fluid lesson in what life was before Half-Life took standards and made them so high you would have to play ball. It realy blows the mind when you go back and see it for real.
Thats not to say SiN dosent have it's share of one-ups to even Half-Life, coming out at the same time it seemed I am sure thinking of one thing valve didnt pwn expecialy since valve is lazy about one thing in hl, and that was sinper rifles, not only does the body massivly bleed as with the crossbow from HL (only far more) but its a faster sharper shot, and depending on where you hit them you can sever limbs, pop off heads, split a guy in two... and it's intergrated silencer (unrealistic as it is) lets you play lawn mower with lots of guys all close to each other without having them shoot back when cover can be found. Whats cooler is the animation of it that has it automaticaly fold into a convieniant travel case to take with you to all the fancy um... ok its a f*cking oil rig, but you do get to tour an estate on a tropical Island, where, a party could have indefeinatly be held at.*
I just felt that should be mentioned up front in the intrests of goodness first, and I must have opened it and closed it for five minutes the next spare moment I had in sheer amaizment. Other than that I dont realy see anything that would be a "SiN's own" factor in its gameplay; though SiN's intergration of so many factors all in one and the unique style about the game make it far from just another re-hash shooter.
The plot is well, solid at best. There is something to be said for plots and shooters back then... expecialy shooters about cops, who do just about every thing but shoot in bank robbery situations, much less mow down each and every participant and then hunting them down through the surrounding crack houses, allys, sewers, and who could forget the abandoned, condemned, and allways so smashingly creepy in the dark, the one, the only... subway system! One of the first things you learn is that in the future thier are cops, and there is HARDCORPS. Hard Corps is the organization used when the police feel wierd or something about a crime; for instance how many armed robbery's involve RPG teams accross the roof to shoot down media and police choppers, as well as the ocasional pigeon.** So you are sent into set things straight... just remember they cant sue the force if you cant ID the body. When the bank is cleared you and the police fade into the slums of Freeport.
I would also like to point out that very little is done with friendly NPC's in the game leaving you lone with your geek guy who fills you in on layout and methodology to many of the locations and objectives. This makes the game's levels in darkness boarderline creepy. You are not given the courtesy of a flashlight which though can be frustrating after some time just finding like a med kit or something. Though they never keep you completely in the dark it can be difficult to tell some things.Thats not to say they never have lights out darkness at all and a fire fight in blackness interupted by flashes weaving in and out of boxes illuminating a target for you it is truly a phenominal sight. I have seen this in other games and even today this was the best display since.
So after the chase into the surrounding area draws you further from the bank, you noticed some creatures, some dead, some far from it. The tests on the corpses of the beasts turn out to be robbers from the bank. All with a substance warping their DNA. The manufacture of the g4 compound takes place at one Biochemistry and pharmicudical reaserch corperation. The name: SiNtek, the presidential CEO and majority share holder: Elexis Sinclaire. You are sent to recon the facility and if possible steal a sample of the substance in order to connect SiNtek to the robbery, but more importantly, the mutated corpses from the subway.
It sounds pretty cool when you wright it out but any serious tone is cut by cleche's strategicaly placed as a satire of the genere. The majority of the dialogue is that on your com with J.C. but as what I am convinced must be Jack Carver's long lost half-black brother. You can tell the different parents as your name in this is Blade. When I say similer I refer to the Doyle/Jack conversations during the first demo when Doyle was much younger and Jack was still a wise cracking baddass. Though what would often sound just bad in FarCry's voice overs, Blade passes it off well, or better. Same loud, inconsiderate maleness that DukeNukem pioneered.
As far as gameplay goes, there are moments of stealth where you crouch, use fists and a silenced pistol/assult rifle. To stay behind or in the dark of oncoming threats. Once a threat recognizes you, Imediatly shoot him innocent or not., or the alarm will make those numbers worse. Just make sure you plan movments around windows and have a as many clear shots as is possible between anyone and the alarm. There are some jump puzzles as well, and a couple find keys and codes and then enter them all in some way.
The rest is pure shoot them first and faster just with some of the coolest most inspiring gore I have seen in an older shooter. You could riddle the corpses with bullets, a predefined decal for that region would produce a gaping mangled wound and burned or torn cloathing around it. which when you get good the only shots you tend to make are head shots which often leaves bodies lined up or strewn about a shooter marble sized hole in the back of the skull spilling blood all over the often shaved head of the ex-liviing guy. You can take your time or rush the game out, the only difference is you, and rushing uses up lots of ammo. Even in 1998 graphics seeing the shells spit out of the rifle and I riddled some poor bastard taking him arpart as each shot hit him and from CC with a shot gun people often disovle into gore, if not jut become halfs or fourths.
One last thing worth noting is all about its style. One of the key selling points of it seems the marketing of SiN: Episodes was a promise of sensuality. This is the first time I assure you they were taking it seriously, but SiN... well even the first one with scripted deaths and all had some sort of physics on the breasts of the female characters. I guess part of Elexis's thing is she is turned on by every thing. It's more of a joke than anything else, but please understand, the selling of this game using Sinclaire seems to be for that purpose only. The game is not overtly sexualy explicit though every thing about Sinclaire is an inuendo, kids may not get it, but its cirtiantly not worth the call from the principle's to find out why.
Thought I dont see any issue with adolecents playing this or the other two SiN universe titles. And the point I am trying to make with this is that the game's name SiN, It dosent refer to sin as in a lets make a game to piss off christians. I dont know if this were ever an issue but for some reason they tend to take it personaly when you call a game like sin, sin - which has to do with the corperate sydicate of coruption and the horrors that forgo stories of our arrogance and narcessism as humans desparetly and dangerously mess with that which seemed better left alone.
Remember the Jewish prisoners who were used as experiment subjects by Nazi doctors, often testing surguries, poisons, amputation and re-attachment, one that was noted at the musame was a guy who was put in a compression chamber to be um-poped? to death, I think they were testing boots as well the effects of that kind of death for german pilots. They also had counter photo's of a subjects being crushed to death. If this dosent set the scene for you than I cant think of a better example, which mabey that german heritige is what inspiered Crytek to use a very similer plot line in FarCry.
Of course Kreiger had delusions of evolution of the race. Sinclaire's character, and you will find out soon enough... Though once finished with SiN go directly to Emergance and things just get damned cool. Over all SiN delivers as much as any fan of graphic violence could want, It had fair AI, It looked acceptable for its age, but most importantly is that once you get into the gist of the game they try very hard to keep the back-then-super effects happening so, that incombo with the blood and things like cups, computers and chairs less but similer to half-life's touches of everyday realism.
OVERALL: 89%
PROS:
A great, very viceral, oldschool shooter wich makes up for graphics and age with memories of older times to before Half-Life was the game ending up making us its b*tch.
A must play for those who want to get into the incredible but very follow upish SiN: Emergance. One cannot truly enjoy the game without priorly at least rushing through it to catch the major plot points.
CONS:
1998 is still a long time ago, It was a game that caught quake IIs's accention to the gods. Even main characters seem not focused much on.
Opening sequince as well as all the cutcenes involving lots of movment are lacking even back then, simplicity would have made a better more badass agent kind of point but would have looked smoother.
**(I now get where the DayHard guys got that, nice omage guys)
*After all valve has to keep up the impression that it was because the source code had been stolen that they needed another convenient six months, oh wait, just another three, oh you know, common just another three then I promise... TADA!! the game you all have been waiting for... and guess WHAT! We didnt just work on security, thats right boys and girls we also took out A WHOLE THIRD OF THE GAME!! And not just any third, no valve wouldent just cut out any third you know that, because now not only is every real boss monster is removed, but we took out all of the guns and levels that resembled something slightly unpathetic and took out several combat componets to make way for nusencey and agrivating yet insainly simple and pointless puzzles involving distracting you and insulting your intelect at the same time.