February 28, 2009

First Impressions: Killzone 2

In a word: awesome. In two words: ummm...super awesome?

There's certainly hasn't been a shortage of first person shooters since the holidays, but even if you are a little tired of the genre, Killzone 2 gets enough right to pull you in regardless. The most obvious thing is the game's graphics, which are nothing short of mind-blowing. It is easily the best-looking game on the system to date, and probably the best looking game ever released. That being said, graphics aren't everything, but the good news is the Killzone 2 has the gameplay to back them up.

The first thing you'll probably notice is it is a "slow" shooter. I mean a couple things by that, but most literally I mean that your character moves and controls very slowly. Your actions feel like they have some real weight to them, and it takes a little time to get used to, but in the end I think it's one of the things that really makes the game feel unique. In addition, the game features cover-based "stop-and-pop" gunplay over running and gunning. While your character can still take a beating, it's important to move intelligently from cover-to-cover, and never stay out in the open too long.

Having spent a little time with both the single-player and multiplayer offerings, I can say that they are both great, but I find myself really enjoying the multiplayer right now. Much like the single-player campaign, the multiplayer gameplay is very slow and strategic which is right where I want it to be some where between Call of Duty 4 and Gears of War in terms of bullet-to-death ratio. In addition, the list of potential unlocks for the game seems insane, and having put in a few hours now I feel like I have only scratched the surface of what the multiplayer gameplay truly is once more people (including myself) have access to different weapons and classes. Now that I've pulled myself away from the game long enough to write this, I think it's time to dive back in.

If you own a PS3 and don't completely abhor the FPS genre, you should do yourself a favor and pick this one up. Of course, if you fit into that category you probably already have, so I'll see you in the Warzone!

1 comment:

  1. I downloaded the demo the other day and played through it. I was underwhelmed. I looks decent, but it didn't jump out at me. (running on a 57" 1080p tv). I did notice that the detail of the weapon in the reload animations was really high, but that was all that really stood out to me.

    The gameplay also felt really strange. I suspect that is a product of being forced to play on the normal difficulty level and not having very interesting weapons to work with.

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