First Person Shooters : What does that even mean, really? Part 4 - The Seven Year Itch

Part 1 - The Roots    Part 2 - The Shift    Part 3 - The War and Horror Interlude 

For this part, we will attempt to cover the 2003-2009 span. Considering just how many great first-person shooters came out in those seven years, this might be a tall order. Considering we will be excluding games that were covered in the War and Horror post, we might just be ok.

Not only did those seven years see some of the most iconic games of the genre come out, we saw some of the most iconic franchises of the genre get started or reinvented. As you may have noticed, so far once we get started on a franchise, we expand on it a little, and don't really revisit it in detail later on. There are going to be exceptions to this pattern in this entry.

Super Metroid

But first, let's start with cheating, and going back a year to mention Metroid Prime, which came out for the Gamecube in 2002. The Metroid series needs little introduction (it's been around since 1986 and is one of Nintendo's most famous IPs, right up there with Mario and Zelda, for crying out loud). However, due to the limitation in release platform (only came out for Gamecube and Wii), it's possible many of you haven't actually played it.

And you're missing out.

Metroid Prime

Metroid has long been a franchise ahead of its time. Not necessarily in terms of gameplay -the first games were basic platformers, after all- but for focusing instead on polished gameplay and probably the most badass female character of all gaming: Samus Aran. Metroid Prime, the first-person offshoot - now main branch of the franchise, ostensibly- has garnered several laurels, critical acclaim and fan favours over the years. Continued with Metroid Prime 2: Echoes in 2004 (released on both the Gamecube and Wii) and, eventually, with the full-blown transition to Wii with Metroid Prime 3: Corruption in 2007  and the third-person Metroid Prime: Other M in 2010. Metroid Prime 4 is in development, with a release date to be announced.

Metroid Prime 3: Corruption 

Metroid Prime wasn't a superficial shooter though: it always combined the shooting part with Samus' abilities, puzzles, 3D platforming and a great story. When the Wii came into the picture with Metroid Prime 2, it also added a new dimension via the use of its control scheme, years ahead of Kinect and VR controllers. If you aim to try it nowadays, you're better off hunting down the Metroid Prime Trilogy (2009), re-released (and optimised) for Wii.

And that brings us in earnest into 2003, and one of the three major new shooters of the year: Star Wars: Republic Commando.

Republic Commando

Republic Commando is infamous among the gaming community. One of the main reasons for it, is that it's one of the only few truly good games based on the prequel Star Wars trilogy. Actually, coming to think of it, it's the best game based on the prequels. Republic Commando follows the events of Delta Squad, an elite clone commando squad, beginning during the events of the 2nd film's Geonosis invasion and culminating on Kashyyyk, fighting against General Grievous' elite bodyguards, on a cliffhanger that has yet to be resolved.

Republic Commando

The tone of the game varies depending on the level, with open(ish) battles, tactical squad action, stealthy infiltration setpieces and a short interlude of horror-esque exploration onboard the Prosecutor starship. The gunplay is good, and the HUD is genious (actually watching through your character's helmet). The story and overall tone are pretty interesting, too (and the Clone Wars cartoons are a good example of it, especially the 2010 episode "Clone Cadets"). But the other reason the game is often remembered with nostalgia and a sequel is often dreamed about is the team you're leading. Delta Squad's Scorch, Fixer and Sev are some of the best AI squadmates you'll ever have. Beautifully written and scripted, with their own outlooks and personalities, each with a different speciality. But the best part? They follow your orders. Each has a degree of decision-making ability when left alone, but your role is not to only shoot, but to lead. Republic Commando introduced a visual and satisfactory way to give specific, if simple, orders that could make or break any given situation.

We're still waiting for a sequel, Disney. Get on it.

TRON 2.0

2003 also saw the release of the criminally underrated and largely forgotten TRON 2.0. Which is a damn shame, because TRON 2.0 was, no joke, one of the very best games released on that side of the decade.

Based on the Tron (1982) film, TRON 2.0 was the sequel to the story we knew from the cult film (and was, unfortunately, discarded as canon with the release of Tron Legacy in 2010). While it didn't follow the adventures of Flynn (instead, we played as Jet, Alan Bradley's son), TRON 2.0 was a genuinely interesting story and plot, with pretty cool characters. Not only is the game in love with the source material, it genuinely feels like the developers were fans and had a ton of fun making a game based on it.

That, however, doesn't necessarily make a game good. Luckily, TRON 2.0 had other things going for it apart from being based on a cult film from the early 80es and an interesting plot. 

TRON 2.0

TRON 2.0 used the source material's quirkiness to its absolute advantage not only in terms of visual and level design, but also in weapon design (4 different weapons including the iconic Tron disc, which could be upgraded/modified to your liking and situation at hand) and most importantly in game design: you are a program within a digital computer world, and you can acquire and implement subroutines in your own code at will: these in essence work like skills or artifacts that empower your character, but the memory limitation system meant you could only implement specific combinations of specific subroutines at any given time. I'm telling you, TRON 2.0 was -and is- brilliant. 

Speaking of brilliant art and game design, we'll be rounding off 2003 with XIII.

XIII

XIII was a brilliant little game that unfortunately didn't do that well in sales, more like an experiment that worked, but didn't seem to cause a big enough splash to be repeated. Developed and released by Ubisoft, it was based (loosely) on the 1984 Belgian comic book of the same name by Jean Van Hamme and William Vance, Ubisoft took the comic book aesthetic and ran wild with it. It's based on the Unreal engine, but you wouldn't be able to tell by looking: the art style of the game is utterly cel-shaded (might actually be the first mainstream game to pull that off, owing this in part to Outlaws paving the way for non-realistic graphics on the genre a few years back). This of course was later on repeated on several different games (most notably on Borderlands and Telltale's Walking Dead episodic adventure game series), but it's important to remember that XIII not only paved the way, but did it with gusto.

XIII

Not only are the graphics cel-shaded, the whole game seems to be ripped from the pages of a comic book. Onomatopoetic visual representations of sounds (which, apart from comic books, owe a debt of gratitude to the 1960s Batman TV show) help accentuate all aspects of the gameplay, and the focusing of specific actions or details in additional panels/inserts on screen (something we saw before, albeit poorly, on Sin and others) only hammer the aesthetic home. Combine that with with a spy story, and you had an amazing game that unfortunately was overshadowed when it mattered most.

Warhammer 40K:
Fire Warrior

Honorable mention goes out to Warhammer 40K: Fire Warrior (2003) for being the first Warhammer 40K first-person shooter, even if it asked you to play through the eyes of a Tau instead of a Space Marine (which is what everyone wanted). 

Warhammer 40K:
Space Hulk - Deathwing

We wouldn't get that chance till the disappointingly mediocre Warhammer 40K: Space Hulk - Deathwing in 2016, remastered thanks to a PS4 re-release in 2018, a game that was a boon to 40K fans but spent more energy in doing fanservice that concentrating on good mechanics and gameplay. As such, Deathwing missed its shot at greatness, and along with its lack of decent single-player it failed to compete with games such as Warhammer: Vermintide for a spot in gamers' co-op rotation. But I digress.

2004 was a pretty huge year.

Killzone

We saw the launch of the Killzone franchise on Playstation 2, in a bid to give Playstation its own Halo. Despite an interesting story, hype, positive reviews and its adoration by fans (who, let's face it, were largely from a gamerbase that didn't really have much to compare it to), it never really comes up when discussing the great first-person shooters of all time. The story was a little meh, the gameplay was a little meh, all in all the game was a little meh. It was robust, it was well-made, but Halo it was not. It got two sequels, in Killzone 2 in 2009 and Killzone 3 in 2011, both for the Playstation 3, as well as some offshoots and portable game versions of the franchise. The last blip on the radar was Killzone: Shadow Fall in 2013, and it's presumed dead now.

Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay

At the same year, we saw the surprisingly excellent Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay by the developer Starbreeze. It's very rare for games based on movies to turn out good, and this one surprised us all so much with its quality that, honestly, when we're talking about games based on film we almost always forget to include it. Extremely reminiscent of Doom 3 in terms of visuals -it used a different, proprietary graphics engine that nevertheless produced similar results-, Riddick (as we'll now be calling it, because just look at the full title) came out of nowhere. Backed by Vin Diesel resprising the titular character, with a plot that wasn't chained down to the canon of the film Pitch Black or its sequel Chronicles of Riddick (rather, it was a prequel), Riddick mashed several different things together and beat them into working. It was a shooter, it was a stealth game, it was a first-person melee game and it was an action adventure, all into one. It was followed by the equally good but no longer surprising Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena in 2009 (which also included a visually updated and remastered version of the original game).

If you know your gaming history and you are paying attention to the year we're talking about, you know what's coming. I promise you we're getting there. But first, Painkiller.

Painkiller is very much a game influenced by previous shooters like Serious Sam and Blood. In Painkiller, you are a man trapped in Purgatory (after causing an accident that kills you and your wife), until you are tasked by an angel to kill a number of Lucifer's general to prevent all-out war between Heaven and Hell. What's in it for you? Doing so will purify your soul and send you to Heaven, where your wife is. 

Painkiller

Painkiller combined the pseudo-goth aesthetic of Blood with the large number of enemies and action of Serious Sam, and layered it over a core of the Havok 2.0 physics engine. This made weapons such as the Stake Gun that could pin enemies to walls not only possible, but immense fun as well. It also followed the episodic campaign style of Blood (sort of), and pitted you against a variety of hordes of enemies, brandishing weapons both fantastic and mundane, in a fun -if eventually forgettable- experience. Painkiller aimed to revive the gameplay of shooters past in a genre that was quickly moving past that gameplay, and it did that adequately, but not well enough to stop the advance. It received five (!) standalone expansions over the years, each by a different developer, up until 2012 with Painkiller: Recurring Evil. No word from it since then, but it's probably a matter of time till someone bets on the nostalgia factor to resurrect it.

Now, to the main event of the year...the very much hyped to hell, visually stunning, ground-breaking...Far Cry. No, wait, I mean Half-Life 2.

Ok then, Far Cry first.

In this blog, I've talked a little bit on the past history of the Far Cry series here and there. But I've never actually gone into details on the very first game.

Far Cry

Far Cry was hyped to hell before it came out. It was supposed to be the next huge thing. And while it delivered in many of its promises, somehow it fell short. It was absolutely beautiful for its time. Hell, it still looks pretty good. Far Cry - for the most part - took the action away from corridors and urban environments and took it to a tropical island. While visually it succeeded, it didn't much matter in terms of gameplay. Despite having different angles in approaching most situations and the enemy AI to match, it still felt like a very linear, non-dynamic experience.

Far Cry

The story was B-movie stuff: initially promising, but eventually a let-down. Gamers at the time were wowed by the visuals of it (it was the first game to use the proprietary Cryengine), but the release of Doom 3 and Half Life 2 in the same year cast a shadow that Far Cry just didn't have the gravitas to get out of. It was a good game, but not as good as it was promised, and the final levels of it forego almost all innovation introduced during the earlier levels. All in all, Far Cry was a disappointment, something that was addressed and fixed in latter iterations, twice (both in Far Cry 2 and Crysis).

Now, Half-Life 2...well...I've gushed about it in the past.

Half-Life 2

It had a lot to prove: it had to live up to the original Half-Life. It had to move the genre forward in the same way that the original did. It had to be fun. It had to be great, in fact. It wasn't only the franchise riding on it: it's unlikely that Valve would have become what it is had Half-Life 2 been a disappointment.

But it wasn't. It was anything but a disappointment. It was on-rails, yes, but directed and designed in a way that made you forget about that more often than not. This was also largely helped by the fact you had physics and the gravity gun to play around with, which provided the illusion of chaos. 

Half-Life 2

But what Half-Life 2 had more than anything else, was polish. Polish in its level, game and sound design, art style, graphics, music, its story. It really deserves several paragraphs here, but I simply can't afford the space. So...click the link above for more. To summarise: "It was probably one of the most on-rails, linear shooters of the last decade, but, by god, it was also the best."

So, let's push on to 2005. We won't spend much time in it, though. We'll only briefly discuss two games on this year: Quake 4 and Call of Juarez.

Quake 4

I suppose the easiest way to describe Quake 4 would be: Quake 2 with Doom 3 graphics. It was a direct continuation of that story (humans vs Strogg) but with better graphics, and little other innovation. The one thing that stands out is the Robocop-esque twist around the middle of the game, where your character is captured and is physically turned into a Strogg cyborg, but is saved at the last minute and retains free will, giving you different abilities and possibilities (like being able to interact with Strogg consoles). It was, unfortunately, rather forgettable, even for its time. Seeing as all the previous Quake games were ground-breaking, that speaks volumes.

Call of Juarez

Call of Juarez, on the other hand, wasn't as cookie-cutter shooter fare. For one thing, it was set in the non-saturated gaming-wise wild west. There weren't too many wild west games out at the time: major ones were Outlaws several years back, the underrated, GTA-like GUN in the same year, the Commandos-like Desperados a few years back, and Red Dead Revolver the year before, none of which made the kind of splash Red Dead Redemption would make five years later, so the setting still felt fresh. With 2 different, alternating protagonists with all the refreshing, different tropes that came with the setting: the false quest for revenge, the gruff gunslinger, the man longing for peace taking up weapons again (3 in 1, with Ray), the quest to clear up one's name, duels, quickdrawing, hell, even quoting Bible passages on command that may or may not affect enemies. 

Call of Juarez: Gunslinger

It didn't sell too well, but it sold well enough to warrant a prequel in 2009's Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood, a fast-forward "sequel" set in modern times in 2011's Call of Juarez: The Cartel and finally the plot-wise unrelated Call of Juarez: Gunslinger in 2013.

Red Steel

Next up, and kicking off 2006, we have a rather ambitious but ultimately failed experiment, in Ubisoft's Red Steel for the Nintendo Wii. Red Steel was a rather formulaic shooter, that was banking on the uniqueness of the Wii's controllers to bring an extra dimension of immersion to the floor. The Wiimote served as the traditional movement and gun controls, while the Nunchuck served as the melee sword weapon as well as the environment interaction and the reload function. The game had a rather...Japanese Yakuza feel to it, but despite how good it sounded in theory, it just wasn't a must-play game. The Wii's graphics capabilities being rather restricted definitely didn't help sell it. It was followed by the stand-alone Red Steel 2 in 2010, that polished the mechanics but had a completely different story.

Resistance: Fall of Man

Remember when we mentioned Killzone as a potential Halo-buster for the Playstation, and how it failed?

Well, Resistance: Fall of Man in 2006 also failed to be that thing. But it didn't fail quite as much.

Resistance 3

Resistance had a better story, better gameplay, better graphics and was overall better than Killzone. But Resistance didn't manage to stand out enough, being a weird blend of Halo, Call of Duty and Gears of War. It's a great and interesting game, that wowed both fans and critics, but ultimately was proven not to have been a game worth buying a console for (arguably, neither was Halo 3, when all is said and done). It was, however, good enough to get two sequels, in 2008's Resistance 2, 2011's Resistance 3 and two portable offshoots in PSP's Resistance: Retribution in 2009 and the aggressively mediocre Resistance: Burning Skies for the Vita in 2012.

But the real gem, the sleeper MVP of the year was Prey.

No no, don't confuse it with 2017's Prey. They have the same name, yes. Why? Search me. They are nothing alike, in any way.

Prey

The original was a very novel shooter, that made extensive use of what I like to call MFMs. You played a modern Native American, out of touch with his roots, during an apocalyptic alien invasion/mass abduction of gigantic proportions. As you were trying to navigate the alien ship, you communed with your dead grandfather's ghost (because of course you did), slowly coming to accept your heritage and unlocking powers such as projecting an astral form of yourself to go where your physical body couldn't, looking for a way to stop the aliens and to also look for the also abducted woman you love. So far, so good.

Prey

But then the game also threw at you numerous things there's no way you were prepared for: impromptu scale alterations (suddenly you're tiny and fighting tiny aliens on the surface of a model planet you were just perusing), gravity switches, dimensional rifts, and so on. It all lead to a bonkers finale that left us wanting more. This "more" never came because, as said above, 2017's Prey is entirely unrelated to the original in story, tone and mechanics.

Oh, and by the way, MFMs stands for Mind Fuck Moments.

But, alas, 2007 was just around the corner, and would alter the shooter scene in as significant a way as Half-Life did, courtesy of two games: Crysis, and Bioshock.

But first, Timeshift.

Not that Timeshift wasn't good. Well, it wasn't, but that's besides the point.

Timeshift

It had some really, really good ideas, mainly the time hopping/rewinding mechanic that let you visit areas in past and future, and use the passage of time to your advantage, the durability of constructs in relations to time passed and so on to pass through areas inaccessible in one era but accessible in the other. It was a cool mechanic, but it was realised poorly until Titanfall 2 used it (for one glorious and brilliant level) in 2016. Sadly, Timeshift didn't have much else going for it, and was passed by.

Then you had the big two: Crysis and Bioshock. On the surface, these two games couldn't be more different.

In Crysis, you play an elite future super soldier, Nomad, part of the nanosuit-outfitted Raptor Team, sent to the Lingshan islands to locate and rescue a team of scientists captured by the Korean paramilitary KPA. But it turns out, there's something far deadlier than Korean troops or nanosuit soldiers on this island, something that had been slumbering for a long time and now has been awakened.

I've talked about the franchise as a whole before during my Crysis 3 review back in the day, and the first Crysis in particular during a mini blog. But still, somehow, I haven't done it justice.

Crysis

Crysis was a revelation. Apart from the intriguing (though not particularly novel) story, apart from the open(ish) world that allowed you to approach situations as you saw fit, apart from its attention to detail, apart from the nanosuit's varied and distinct modes and extensive weapon customisation allowing you to play the game as you wanted and adapt to any given scenario, apart from all of these, Crysis was nothing short of a technological visual wonder. To this day, the joke "But can it run Crysis?" persists when talking about a good PC rig: it was a demanding game to run on high graphics, but was beautiful on all graphics settings really. 12 years after its initial release (Christ, it feels like only yesterday) it is still a beautiful game, both in terms of visuals and gameplay.

It was followed by the expansion Crysis: Warhead in 2008, and Crysis 2 and Crysis 3 in 2011 and 2013 respectively, games that were similar, but at the same time very different.

Bioshock, on the other hand, was the outsider, the game that came out of left field and kicked us all square in the nuts.

Bioshock

You're playing as Jack. You're on a plane that quickly ends up crash-landing on the Atlantic, and you're left exploring, seemingly by accident, the underwater city of Rapture, a city perpetually in an art deco style of a belle epoque that never quite waned. But Rapture is also a city in ruins, its infrastructure all but destroyed, its freedom from the laws of man, ethical and otherwise, seemingly its downfall. Piece by piece, you will find out just what Rapture was, who its founder Andrew Ryan was, who Frank Fontaine, the voice in your radio is, who (and what) the Little Sisters and Big Daddies roaming its halls are, and who you are. I won't ruin the plot here, it's more than worth playing through.

Bioshock bet all not only in its atmospheric and unique game and level design (would you kindly look at that screenshot, for example?), not only in its excellent story, but also its gameplay. Part shooter, part horror, Bioshock took elements that worked from games such as System Shock and Clive Barker's Undying (the plasmids of Bioshock are strongly reminiscent of the Gel'ziabar Stone of Undying, only better), and combined them in a shooter that proved, beyond measure of a doubt, that shooters were a genre that could appeal to a more thoughtful, adult gamer. It was followed by the comparatively inferior Bioshock 2 in 2010 (which we won't discuss further) and the different, but equally amazing Bioshock Infinite in 2013 (which we will).

Like I said above, Crysis and Bioshock couldn't be more different if you look at the surface. But at their core, both games toyed with the futility of player agency, seemingly giving you choices that eventually turned out to be nothing more than clever design: in Crysis, this was by giving you the illusion of approach choice in a linear campaign, in Bioshock by pulling back the curtain and showing you the strings that control you. Both these games wrestled with the importance of player choice and if it even mattered, overtly and covertly.

But 2008's Far Cry 2, for the first time, really gave players control.

Far Cry 2

Far Cry 2 dumped players into a sandbox of 50 square kilometers of a fictional African country torn by civil war, infected you with malaria, and tasked you with killing the arms dealer arming both sides and profiting from the country's implosion, the Jackal. It had a few milestones along the way to achieving the end goal that had to happen, such as the tutorial missions, for example. But apart from that Far Cry 2 gave you the toys, the rules and the playground and let you loose. The ways you got there, the buddies you picked up along the way, the weapons you used, was all up to you.

It wasn't without flaws. For example, the weapon decay system which overcompensated and instead of giving the game extra depth it just ended up being a drag. Or the very bad voice acting. Or the pseudo noir, wannabe charismatic monologues of the Jackal. Even the total immersion and conviction of the game to the game's character (which you chose) with graphic self-administered first-aid and having to view minimaps in the game's time with the character's eyes (not viewing them on a game-pausing menu), ended up ultimately working against the player experience at times.

But still, the open-ended environment and dynamic adaptability of the player, the enemies and the environment itself creating a seemingly random, chaos theory-loving sandbox shooter amalgam that is fondly remembered to this day.

The following year, Borderlands (2009) did something similar, but smarter.

Borderlands

Gearbox's Borderlands applied a positively MMO/Diablo approach to its mission structure, but mainly in its approach to loot: weaponry and gear was plentiful and randomised, which made luck play a large part in your enjoyment vis-a-vis your sense of reward in the game, but also gave you the incentive to keep exploring and hunting down loot. It added a lovely touch of chaos that never really let the game grow too stale.

This, combined with an interesting world and lore (that was thought up to suit the core gameplay mechanics rather than the other way around), the co-op capabilities, a variety of characters to choose from (each with different abilities) and a cel-shaded cartoony art style (that was decided almost last minute, due to a genious stroke of inspiration and lead to the crest-fallen initial art director of the game to quit the company) that has not aged one bit a decade later, has made sure that Borderlands became an instant success. It was followed by the unanimously superior Borderlands 2 in 2012, and the not-quite-so-amazing Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel in 2014, set between the two main games. A third installment is not yet announced, but almost positively a sure bet, eventually. (29/3 Edit: Literally just announced a few hours ago) Also note the game's world and art-style spawned the Telltale adventure offshoot Tales From The Borderlands, also in 2014.

Phew!

That concludes the main games of these seven, formative years.

Up next, this current decade. Stay tuned.