Embrace the First Person Shooter Renaissance

Since about 2007, if you ask me, something's been very wrong about the whole direction of the first person shooter. Sure, FPS is a genre that arguably evolves throughout the generations, but this generation, I feel, the fun has been removed from a lot of first person shooters.
My personal blame for all this is the intertwining of genres, although some great games such as Bioshock have come out of this and the fact a first person shooter has mostly just become an online game competing against each other for a short time span until the next best thing comes along. I'm not saying that I haven't enjoyed a FPS in the last 4 years or so, I've enjoyed Infinity Ward's Modern Warfare campaigns a lot and enjoyed Killzone 2 and the Resistance series to date and I'm a fairly big fan of the Halo universe. I'm just saying I think the genre is getting to the point of stagnation with all of the 'modern' based FPS after we all got virtually sick with the old silent 'space marine' cliche last generation, which nobody EVER came near to Halo. it's time to move on. It's time to escape from the confines of the real world and the wars within it. It's time to be a hero with one liners and a crapload of guns and shoot stuff in block sized arenas or struggle shooting enemies in cramped corridors.

With Bulletstorm, Duke Nukem Forever and Rage coming out this year, it looks like developers are beginning to pay attention that first person shooters are wholly meant to be fun and concentrating on the single player side of the game and have gotten fed up of people buying the game to 'go online'.
When I like a FPS, I prefer a FPS to feel 'chunky'. I can only describe a 'chunky FPS' as a FPS where your gun takes up most of the bottom of the screen, keycards, labyrinth levels, powerups, pick ups, health packs and a basic sci-fi inspired story. Examples, Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Quake 1&2, Rise of the Triad, Duke Nukem 3D, Shadow Warrior, Serious Sam, Nitro Family, Painkiller, Will Rock, Doom 3, Quake 4, quite recently, the shamefully badly marketed but great Singularity. The kind of gameplay in these games were the blueprints for what we play now.
IF you think you think those games are 'linear'. I challenge you to actually go back and play your Call of Duty game, play a level of the campaign and hopefully it'll sink in that the level design and freedom in first person shooters has actually gone backwards, the level design in Doom is more complicated than Call of Duty.
To date, I must say the last 'chunky FPS' released that I played was 2K Games Prey released in 2006. I loved Prey because of the odd, scary, physics breaking world it injected you into and the creative, but basic FPS weapons it supplied you with. The lead character, however, spoke, which is a rarity in chunky FPS. Not since Duke had I heard someone speak so clearly and not be afraid of showing the lead character at the beginning of the game. Prey also had (static) portal mechanics, before Portal, so I do find it a little annoying that Prey gets forgotten so often because to me, it had so many achievements as a game and had real character and concept. Bethesdea now have the rights for the franchise, so hopefully Prey 2 will be under Id tech 5.

Back to the games releasing this year, Bulletstorm arguably, looks like People Can Fly are applying everything they learned making Painkiller and just upping the scale. Combos in FPS aren't a new thing though, shooting combos can be found in the Xbox port of Serious Sam and a little known game made with the Serious Engine for PC named 'Nitro Family' (Go check it out, insane game), I believe the last point award system with multipliers was ironically, CoD4's Arcade Mode. But Bulletstorm looks to put the 'shooting' back into FPS and to be a whole lot of fun. But is actually a continuation of the early 2000's budget shooter that got kickstarted on PC again by Serious Sam which arguably picked up popularity because the FPS genre was getting stale because of getting too 'serious' ingrained in reality, sound familiar?

Duke Nukem Forever, goes without saying. Most people think that DNF will be a grand end for one big joke. I think that it'll be a revitalisation for the first person shooter. For a first person shooter, you really don't need a big story. A first person shooter is the equivalent of an 80's action film and Duke 3D reveled in that. Looking at Duke Nukem Forever, it looks to be giving a swift kick in the balls of what a first person shooter should be, plus, still following 3D Realms trademark as in Duke 3D and Prey, there's going to be a lot of doors to open, buttons to press and general interactivity, maybe even a pool table again.

Rage is Id Software's new baby. John Carmack, what can I say. Id software basically vanished from the development scene after 2004's Doom3, although Doom3 wasn't the macho hell cheese fest everyone expected it had it's moments. For those who did want that kind of crazy action, try the expansion pack 'Resurrection of Evil'. In the past, Id was always the developer to set the ball rolling with how to evolve the FPS. Doom, then Quake, Quake 2 and then hit the online world with Quake 3 Arena and then, arguably. Epic took over with anything with Unreal stamped on it being quality, barring Unreal 2. Meanwhile Id licensed their engines to numerous games and even allowed other developers to follow through with their IP. Rage is Id's IP and unfortunately, Id Software need to keep up with the rest of the gaming world this time. It may just look like another Fallout 3 or Borderlands, but this is Id we're talking about. Id start trends, they don't follow. So I expect a lot out of this.

I hope you agree with my stance of the first person shooter and how personally, they were more fun when they didn't actually take their selves too seriously, connect to real world events or have realistic damage that couldn't be repaired by a box on the ground by a man carrying 10 guns on his back. The chunky FPS returns and I'm all for it.

2011 is the First Person Shooter Renaissance.

[UnSelf]

i kno im in the minority here but i dont like when a FPS (or any game for that matter) has a serious overtone but has unrealistic attributes.

Take the weapon wheel in R:FOM. obviously, the devs want us to take the story seriously, yet we can carry 10 huge weapons. i think u kind of shoot urself in the foot that way. be silly or be serious, dont straddle the line.

[Lyr1c]

I personally never noticed that, but now that I'm aware of it...I'm sure it will be bothering me as much as it's bothered you. -____-

[GodofSackboy]

Oh well, Insomniac do that in all their games, it's damn fun being able to carry all the weapons you want, brings me back to the old Ratchet and Clank days *sob*

Talking of that, do a HD Ratchet and Clank collection. I would pay any amount of money for that.

[Neckbear]

But eh, you're forgetting something VERY important, my friend. The answer to what may seem odd for you.

THEY'RE VIDEOGAMES! TO HELL WITH "REALISM", SERIOUSNESS AND LOGIC!

[UnSelf]

hmmmmm what exactly do u mean by that? just cuz of the medium of the storytelling, does that mean im not supposed to take it as serious?

not 1 movie is real, yet we cry, laugh, get angry and debate over the things that are portrayed in films, can the same not be said for games?

[ZombieNinjaPanda]

The weapon wheel in resistance is perfect. Go play R2 right now, and you'll see that only being able to carry two weapons at once severely hurt the gameplay.

[DelbertGrady]

It worked quite well in Halo: Reach, although that's in a different league.

[Pandamobile]

There are so damn many FPS's coming (as an FPS fan, that's hardly a complaint) this year.

I'm really liking that a lot of the FPS games this year actually have some originality to them.

The last truly original FPS's we've had were probably Portal and Mirror's Edge. But now we've got games like Bulletstorm and Brink which both look really awesome in their own ways.

2011 will be an awesome year.
That and there's a ton of awesome blockbuster games which I've been looking forward to for 3-6 years now that are finally coming into fruition like Portal 2, Crysis 2 and Battlefield 3.

[Sarcasm]

As much as I'd like originality in FPS games like other people, there's no denying that a solid military based shooter (soon BF3) is what I want.

It only gets repetitive and boring when you look at something like Homefront and automatically think "COD."

Developers need to understand that simple changes of skin and gimmicks aren't going to win any awards. (MOH)

[The-Tentacle]

Killzone 3 is the shooter to own in 2011.

[hennessey86]

halo 4 comes out

[El_Colombiano]

lawl

[hennessey86]

it was a joke lolz halo wont be out till 2012 atleast

[Kon]

No, but Crysis 2 will

[PhoenixDevil]

Cant wait for the demo of bulletstorm on the 25th going to be really interesting to see how good it is, the dev trailers are just so funny
http://www.youtube.com/watc...

Its really gotten me interested as it has such a great care free feel, because sometimes after a long day you do just want to go home n really let it out on some mutants with some big ass guns. If they make that feel rewarding without it being over easy then its going to be such a good game

[lex-1020]

My biggest problem with bulletstorm, and i'm sure this is just the person playing is that, in all of the videos i see a repetition of one thing. The guy pulls an enemy, kicks hi, than shoots him. The player seems to repeat this action obsessively. Again I know it's just the person playing but it gives off the impression that the game is going to be exceptionally repetitive.

[PhoenixDevil]

yh agreed on what your saying, I think thats the idea behind the 'skillshot' system, in order to get more points (for leaderboards or wepon unlocks upgrades or rankings however there going to impliment it) will require you to do different things

while pulling someone in with the whip kicking them into there floaty state n then shooting them may be very effective (and a little on the easy side) it may get you only 100 points, where as shooting a guy in the leg then pulling out the shotgun sliding towards him to blast him up in the air n then grab them with the whip to crash them back down could be awarded 500 points, they may also have a feature where if you do the same move a few times in a row you only get half the points

Bulletstorm is made around this system and with the right implimentations it wont be repetitive, im just hoping its not too easy

[Captain Tuttle]

I love me some FPS's

[Statix]

This blog is complete fail for not having any mention whatsoever of Deus Ex 3.

[LunaticBrandon]

I am. I just need to figure out what to buy. Brink, Rage, Crysis 2, Portal 2, Battlefield 3, Deus Ex 3, Duke Nukem Forever, Bulletstorm. Then there is Dead Space 2 Postal 3 and Mass Effect 3 that aren't FPS but still shooters. I'll probably just get Brink, Rage, Portal, Battlefield, Duke Nukem and Deus Ex. The rest will be bought during sales.

[s45gr32]

well, personally I really want a new genre. But, to bring this chunky fps games yeah labirynth levels, secret areas, mutants to kill, etc. to me is great nostalgia but a new genre is the best way to go

[soundslike]

I love FPS but i think the renaissance is coming to a close with 2011. Yea there will always be amazing FPS games, but the innovations coming with games like Brink, will likely set a standard unmatched for years, much like COD4 unmatched by even its own expansion packs (yea I went there. wut WUT.) since 2007.

Games are branching out again, DCUO, LBP2, Kinect, Move, Twisted Metal,Minecraft. what do these things have in common? The interest to get away from the standard FPS mindset and control scheme.

[shadow2797]

Portal is probably my favorite FPS of all time (though not technically a "shooter"), and I'm pumped for Portal 2.

That said, I absolutely hate (HATE!) gimicky FPS games. Ex. I hated the fire, etc. superpowers in Bioshock. And everything I've seen of Bulletstorm rubs me the wrong way.

I'd rather have awesome, innovative weapons (Resistance), or interesting levels (KZ2's train or Nuke Beach), or new, awesome modes (Halo always has a ton), or interesting, challenging enemies (Dead Space). My point is: there are other ways to innovate. Personally, I don't think there's going to be huge sweeping changes to the genre, but I do think there will be small changes that will be adopted over time. For instance, the sprint button. Not a huge change, but it's now a mainstay of FPS games.

[Enigma_2099]

I can sum up my problem with FPS games with one question...

... why do we have so d*** many at one time?