Review: Rage
Over the past few years, the word “wasteland” has become one of Bethesda’s favorites as two of its most recently published games have taken place during a post-apocalyptic world where mutants and humans strive for survival. Taking these themes and combining them with its own seasoned experience in first person shooters, Id Software has developed a game that plays like a shooter but has plenty of secondary components that might have you expecting it to be so much more.
While Rage has some RPG elements, don’t expect to level up your character or assign him special abilities. The game might also seem like an open-world title, but the game has a subtle linearity that will keep you from truly exploring its world. While it may seem like Rage is suffering from an identity crisis, all of these different gameplay components come together to give you a great game that just works.
Id isn’t known for its groundbreaking plotlines, and Rage doesn’t break the mold. The game’s protagonist wakes up in a preservation vessel called an Ark over a hundred years after a massive asteroid has hit the earth and turned it into a barren wasteland. Without any memory of who he is or what he must do, the Ark survivor emerges from his underground “vault” to find that the world has two forces at war with each other. While the story may seem like something out of Fallout 3, it won’t win any screenplay awards, especially because it all rushes to an abrupt conclusion later on.
The game plays like a traditional shooter but also gives you side quests to do as you complete its main campaign mode. Most of your quests will involve helping the Resistance fulfill their plans to stop a hostile faction known as the Authority, but some will also involve dealing with some of the wasteland’s strange creatures and mutants. Despite being set in a massive world, most of your missions will take place in close quarters that truly show off the game’s great combat system.
One of the first things I noticed when playing the game is that you need to save often. In-game prompts even remind you of this, and because some checkpoints are so far in between each other, you might regret it if you don’t. The game offers a few difficulty levels, and you will find that the enemy AI is noticeably smart and tricky to take down at times. Mutants will not only leap at you or run at you in zigzags, but some enemies will even run away from you and hide. I also found myself getting shot at by enemies I thought were dead, but, in fact, were still alive and shooting at me from the ground.
You can pick up lots of junk during your quests that you can sell to merchants for money or for more ammo and weapons. I often found myself running out of ammo, so it’s good to invest some time at these shops before going on quests, especially since the game gives you lots of money to spend. Some junk can also be used as ingredients in recipes you can find that let you make items you normally couldn’t find anywhere else.
To make your commute across the vast wasteland a little bit easier, you also have access to a number of rides that you can upgrade and race with. Riding these vehicles to get to your next destination seems to be imperative, as you will always be attacked by enemy bandits that you can only destroy from your armed vehicle. Plus, there aren’t any special landmarks in between cities or worth checking out on foot anyway. Though I enjoyed the game’s rally racing feel, it didn’t provide me with enough of a thrill to keep coming back for more, and so while the story may introduce races, you don’t need to focus too much on them unless you really want to. You can also take the races online in various different modes that reward you with medals that unlock more vehicles and customization options.
If you were looking for a more traditional online multiplayer, you’re sadly out of luck. Aside from online racing modes, Rage has an online co-op that lets you play through various missions to reach a goal. It boggles my mind that the developers couldn’t spend a bit more time developing something as common as a traditional online FPS mode.
As you progress through the game, you will discover more about yourself and also meet some interesting characters along the way. While the game’s story is nothing special, Rage does a great job of incorporating you into its world thanks to its great voice acting and great soundtrack. Filling up three discs and being about ten hours long, the game itself is pretty big to begin with, but a lot of its size simple comes from the superior graphics output you will experience as you explore your world. Prompts recommend you install it to your console to avoid texture pop-ins and some lengthy load times, but even if you don’t, you will still get to explore an incredibly detailed world that looks amazing. There are some moments in the game that make it feel like a survival horror game, and then there other times that will make it feel like a science fiction-title. While I understand Rage is a shooter that lets you snipe people from far away, it doesn’t hurt that its ambiance will put you in the mood to keep shooting.
Whether you are racing across a desert, shooting enemies in tight quarters, or simply selling junk for cash, the game does a great job of changing things up as you play. Rage is a great shooter first and everything else second. While the main campaign mode is relatively short and multiplayer has some shortcomings, all the additional gameplay components simply help it come together to give you a complete gaming experience worth playing.
Score given: N/A
Published October 2011 | Fraggs.net
Giancarlo Saldana is a freelance writer and Gaming News Editor for Blast Magazine.