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Syndicate
Miles Kilo is an agent for Eurocorp and his sole purpose in life is to protect the interests of the Syndicate. Kilo is so devoted to his cause that he agreed to be fitted with the prototype Dart-6 chip, despite the risk of brain cancer. The chip enables Kilo to connect to the dataverse and take down enemies as well as electronics at a distance. The constant power struggle between syndicates to stay at the cutting edge of chip development means that there are plenty of assignments for a loyal employee such as Kilo.
The original Syndicate was released in the early nineties and placed you in control of your own syndicate. By using brainwashing and augmented soldiers, the aim was to conquer territories while researching new weaponry. The overhead viewpoint enabled you to control squads of operatives in missions where the collateral and civilian casualties almost always outnumbered that of the enemies (well in my games at least.) The game was well received and after an expansion as well as sequel things went quiet. When it was announced that a new reboot of the series would be released where the action has been switched to a first person view, reactions were understandably mixed. Personally, I thought it would be interesting to see the world of Syndicate from the view of an operative and the "breaching" feature where you can literally hack into the brains of the opposition sounded promising. Unfortunately, once I got my hands on the game, the experience was not quite what I had hoped for. The first hurdle was the low field of view, which coupled with the dark environments, left me nauseous after only a short amount of playtime. With no way to adjust this I was forced to endure it but it definitely had a negative impact on my overall enjoyment of the game. Since the original game was set outdoors in a large city environment, I was surprised that this game funneled me through generic corridors and warehouses filled with locked doors. This is really a wasted opportunity and at times I had to make sure that I didn't accidently boot up F.E.A.R instead of Syndicate. In what I can only assume was some sort of effort to mask the generic environments, the game features ridiculous amounts of bloom effects. Literally every light source in the game is blinding which becomes old very fast. I've heard the expression "The future is so bright that you gotta wear shades" but apparently Kilo did not receive the memo and left his at home. Either that or his augmentation is having a series impact on his vision. The much touted "breaching" feature also turned out to be a bit of a letdown. It basically boils down to pressing your "E" key when an enemy is in sight in order to make them commit suicide, fight on your side or experience their own weapon backfiring. The results are mostly the same and the abilities require recharging to prevent you from abusing them. You can also activate an overlay which slows down time and enables you to see enemies through walls. It sounds very exciting but once again it's nothing that we haven't seen before. The game loves to throw boss battles at you and these are quite a bit harder than the standard grunt encounters. For one, your breaching techniques don't work on these guys and secondly, they usually have some special skill that requires you to figure out their weaknesses instead of just holding down the fire button. I quite enjoyed these encounters but some people might not appreciate the sudden spike in difficulty. The plot is disappointingly predictable and there is no prize for guessing how it will all play out. To make up for the rather thin story, there are mountains of background information that can be found and read at your own leisure. Some of these offer some very interesting so it's a shame that it wasn't incorporated better into the storyline. The game has a rather limited cast of characters but uses big name talents like Rosario Dawson and Brian Cox to voice them. Kilo himself remains mute the entire game despite his fellow operative Merit being very chatty. The sound effects were not too bad although the music is largely forgettable. Despite the exotic weaponry and breaching abilities, combat is fairly generic. The weapons felt way too floaty for my taste and bar a few exceptions seem to lack punch. Playing on "Normal" difficulty or above results in enemies turning into bullet sponges that really soak up the damage before going down. The game also features the usual console trappings such as checkpoint saves and a two weapon carry limit. If you have never played the original game before you will find this reboot to be a solid but unremarkable shooter. Fans of the original will unfortunately know how much potential this title had and how much of it was squandered. Apart from the rather short single player campaign, the game also features a co-operative mode. While I could unfortunately not find other players to join me in testing this mode it is from what I have heard a decent addition. Starbreeze Studios have created some great games in the past but unfortunately Syndicate is not one of them. While it is true that hardcore fans of the original might have hated the reboot purely because of the viewpoint, it is hard to deny that the license deserved better than this. At times it feels like the name of a beloved classic franchise was just tacked on to a generic shooter instead of what could have been possible with a better plot and environments. In the end it just another overhyped game you will be hard pressed to remember in a few year time.
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System Requirements
TAGS: Syndicate, EuroCorp, Kilo, Dart 6, Breach,
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Copyright © 2010 GAMERamble. All rights reserved