Time manipulation isn’t a new concept to the sci-fi genre, but Singularity manages to throw in a few clever twists to make it feel fresh and exciting. Sure, there’s a few predictable outcomes in the story, and the overall plot is like something ripped straight from the SyFy channel, but Singularity oozes with interesting time mechanics, awesome weapons, hordes of monsters, and one of the most atmospheric and fascinating locales I’ve seen since BioShock’s Rapture.
The game opens with a ludicrous, exposition heavy cutscene that tries its best to set up its world for you. Basically, the Russians discovered a rare element called E99, which has the ability to be harnessed to manipulate time. To study this element further, they set up a research center on a small deserted island called Katorga-12. However, a mysterious accident results in the mass disappearance of everyone on site. Now, more than 50 years later, you play as a U.S. Marine called in to recon the island and discover what led to its downfall.
As previously stated, Singularity reminded me of BioShock.
Katorga-12 is such a fascinating area to explore, and those who take the time to peruse the environment are bound to have a deeper experience. From finding notes and audio recordings left by the inhabitants, to turning on old projectors, and discovering mysterious messages scrawled on the wall, Singularity reeks of history. Katorga feels like a real place with a real purpose, and one of the greatest parts about my time with the game was simply walking through the halls, rooms, and exteriors of the facility. It reminded me of the sense of awe and wonder in exploring BioShock’s underwater utopia, Rapture. There’s very little known about the area you find yourself in, and by perusing the items left behind by the inhabitants, you’ll slowly start to piece together the events leading up to their demise.
However, the events that took place on this island have resulted in scores of mutated monsters roaming the environments. While it’s worth checking every little nook and cranny of the facility (and I insist you do), it’s rarely a safe or calm practice. Monsters slink out from the shadows, descend down walls, and even pop out of the very ground you walk on, ensuring that you’re never truly safe. Due to the decent variety of species, Singularity never starts to feel repetitive. Some of them faze in and out of reality, rush you with a suicidal explosion, or simply slash at you with elongated arms and sharp claws. There’s human soldiers sprinkled throughout the game as well, but there’s nothing particularly different about them. They run and shoot. That’s about it. Regardless of if you’re fighting monsters or humans, I guarantee you that you’ll be having fun.
Singularity is first and foremost a first-person shooter, and (similar to Doom, Wolfenstein, etc.) it loves to give you big meaty weapons to blow crap up with. You have your standard FPS weapons, such as the revolver, shotgun, and assault rifle, but the real strength in gunplay comes from Singularity’s E99 infused special weapons. There’s a sniper rifle that can slow down time, giving you the opportunity to set up headshots; a spike cannon that shoots out high-speed balls of death; and (my personal favorite) a remote controlled grenade launcher that lets you roll explosives around the field like a madman. However, there’s one weapon that’s even more valuable than any of the guns.
The TMD, or, “time manipulation device” is a small gauntlet styled weapon you discover early on that lets you control time. While a majority of video games with similar powers focus on rewinding or freezing time, Singularity gets a little more clever with it. You can rapidly age pieces of the environment to deteriorate them, or revert them back to a previous, more sturdy state. This feature is most commonly utilized for a few light puzzles, and platforming segments, but it also has some pretty awesome combat capabilities as well. You can create pockets of stasis (which slow/halt enemies), send out concentrated blasts of time waves that tear people to shreds (don’t question it), or you can do one of the coolest video game abilities of all time and age enemies into dust. Not only are the time powers fun to play with, they add another level to the gameplay, guaranteeing that everything stays fresh and exciting the whole way through.
Taking things further, there’s upgrade cases and containers of E99 (which acts as currency) that you can find to upgrade your weapons and abilities. You can increase your health and defense against certain attacks, or upgrade clip sizes and damage dealt with different weapons. There’s also upgrades to the TMD, which boost its abilities and length/size of attacks. There’s a large amount of E99 to discover, but you’ll have to thoroughly scour the environment if you want to find the upgrade cases. Unfortunately, after two playthroughs, I don’t think there’s enough E99 available to get every upgrade and ability boost in one go. Singularity is only around 6-8 hours long (depending on how thoroughly you look for upgrades and notes/audio recordings), so it’s short enough to warrant a second playthrough if you want to go back and try upgrading different parts of your arsenal.
While the majority of my time spent with Singularity was positive, I have a few complaints. I know it’s a minor feature to most people, but the lack of subtitles bothered me. I like being able to know exactly what people are saying, how locations/names are spelled, and other nerdy things like that. There were also a few times where the audio cut out, textures didn’t load, and the game even froze on me twice. There weren’t any issues with framerate, which was nice, but the other hiccups were definitely noticeable. However, my biggest complaint (which is actually my own fault) is the multiplayer. Singularity is an older game, so it’s not too surprising that its multiplayer is dead. I thought the weapons and time abilities would be fun to play with against other players, and when I learned that there’s a mode where you can even play as the monsters, I got excited. Unfortunately, I was too late to the party, and nobody is playing the game anymore. I wasn’t able to get into a single round of the multiplayer. Total bummer.
FINAL VERDICT
Minus a few shortcomings, Singularity is a terrific game, and the epitome of a hidden gem. The story is a little bit weird, but the world it pulls you into, the enemies it has you face, and the tools it gives you to destroy them all equate into a package of pure awesomeness. If you enjoy exploring and uncovering secrets, killing monsters, and manipulating time, than Singularity is worth checking out.
– Zack Burrows