|
|
 |
|
|
|
Timeshift Review (continued)
 |
Manufacturer: Sierra
Find all Sierra reviews
ESRB Rating: Mature
Platform(s): Windows XP, Windows 2000
Release Date: October 30, 2007
Average Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars
View Timeshift Details |
Retail Price: $19.99
Online Sale Price: $9.97
Save $10.02 Today!
* Price is subject to change.
|
More User Submitted Timeshift Reviews
Date: 2007-11-08
Runs Like A Dream At High Resolution, Amazing Shooter, Evergreen
What a wonderful First Person Shooter. I ran it at 2560 resolution with maximum texture resolution, Depth of Field, maximum anti-aliasing, and more... I've played it on both the 360 and the PC and the PC (with a moderately good PC makes the console version look like a console game. ;-). This thing is easy to get into--and an absolute and literal blast to play and replay.
First--the Single Player takes a solid 20 plus hours (indoors, outdoors, in the air, and on) to play with the use of Slow, Reverse, and Stop time and your ability to literally gib--and reverse, gib and reverse, and play with your enemies. The game is technically astonishing with a depth of dynamic shadows, incredibly detailed environs and a butt-kicking (no-slow-down) frame-rate. Then when you get great at it--you can play it again against AI that is better than first rate and makes great use of your ability to confuse them (temporarily) with the time powers.
The Multiplayer though?
It puts other games to shame. I have never seen more game types--faster play for up to sixteen, and had such fun with everything from Rocket Arena to Team Deathmatch. There are new modes like King of Time (get the player with the time powers and you become the target) and Meltdown Madness where you use your four time grenades (Multiplayer has weaponized time bubbles) to slow the coolant to your enemies reactors. This is more fun than Halo 3, Half-Life Orange Box, Gears of War, and Bioshock combined (and actually longer than the new content in the three of them if you include multiplayer. Highly recommended.
Date: 2007-11-06
Timeshift...an excellent FPS that with some improvements could have contended for 'Game of the Year' honors
This is an interesting FPS that allows you to use 'time' as one of your weapons in defeating the enemy; time can be slowed, stopped or even reversed. In fact, you won't get very far without using your one of your 3 'time' options to either defeat the enemy, avoid them or solve puzzles.
Some brief comments on the good and not so good...
The Pros:
1.)Smooth flowing graphics, great special effects (ambient lighting, smoke, dust etc.) and good audio.
2.)And to show off the graphics there are some stunning visuals once you get out of the urban area and into the country.
3.)A large selection of weapons (although you can only carry 3 at anyone time) that have a primary and a secondary firing option. You have, for instance, your standard pistol, automatic carbine and shotgun but you will also come across a guidable rocket launcher, a sniper rifle, an energy gun, an incendiary pellet gun and an extremely powerful crossbow.
4.)You have the ability to operate turret guns (both on the ground and on flying Zeppelins) and drive vehicles. Also, you can use 'time' when operating these units.
5.)Easy, anytime save/load with F5/F9 respectively, as well as game generated checkpoint saves.
6.)But the best (and most fun) feature of this game is the ability to alter time; however, the amount of 'time' you have to use is extremely limited, so using this asset wisely does require some thinking. Initially using 'time' was a huge advantage (especially against one or two enemy), but it soon became an absolute necessity as you proceed into some difficult combat situations (against larger, spread out groups) and also for some puzzles. There were areas that I had to 'inch' my way along (using frequent saves) to get through.
7.)I felt the game scenarios and challenges improved as the game progressed.
The Cons:
1.)Fairly narrow path to follow; very little area in which to 'roam' around or explore. (not unusual for most FPSs I guess)
2.)Limited replay value.
3.)About the only irritating thing about this game was the non-stop, repetitive propaganda dialogue, spewing from the loud speakers that were everywhere in the first couple segments and the finale.
4.)The game has fairly high hardware and video card requirements* (if you want to see it played as the developers intended).
5.)On 'Normal' game difficulty I felt there were 2 things that took away from the overall challenge of the game, these were:
a.)one weapon (crossbow) was a little too much of an advantage against the majority of the army-type personnel (it gives you the ability to easily pick off individual men from great distances).
b.) Ammo was too readily available. There was no need to conserve ammo, no need to be concerned about running low on 'bullets'; ammo seemed to be everywhere.
Conclusions:
I really liked this game...A game that uses 'time' manipulation to add a definite twist to this otherwise excellent FPS. If the game developers had not given the gamer such an omnipotent weapon (crossbow) with an overabundance of ammo, this game would have been extremely challenging to play and finish. But for this drawback, this game may have been in the running for single player 'Game of the Year' honors**. Nonetheless, an impressive and graphically beautiful game...4-4 1/2 Stars.
*System Specs...Played on Vista with an Intel Dual core processor, ASUS P5K motherboard, 2 GB RAM and Nvidia 8800 GTS video card
**other nominees (IMO) for single player, 'Game of the Year' would be 'Bioshock', 'Half-Life 2 episode 2', and 'Call of Duty 4', closely followed by 'STALKER-Chernobyl', with 'Crysis' a more distant, second tier contender.
Date: 2007-11-05
Underwelming
The game fells like a hastily finished effort that didn't come close to its potential. None of the characters introduced in the cut scenes is ever developed. The puzzles involving time control are really silly and contrived--no thinking required. And the ending...well there isn't one. The game just kind of stops and suddenly you're staring at a credits screen when you were expecting a huge end level or boss fight. This can't be how they planned it--someone just pronounced it "done" and pushed it out the door.
At some point the developers should have realized that the crossbow was way overpowered, and (at least) severely reduced it's inexhaustible ammo supply. Once you get that the game's difficulty drops by half and stays there, making the first quarter of the game the most difficult. The bolts have infinite range and explode like grenades. You can take down whole screens of baddies when they're millimeter specks in the distance by shooting them each once in the toe. Can you handle the suspense? The game could just as accurately be titled "Super Crossbow Man". Or maybe, "The Crossbow Of Uber Pwnage And The Guy Who Has It". "Crossbow" should be in there somewhere is all I'm saying.
The time shifting thing has been compared to Max Payne and Prince of Persia, but both of those games did it better. Max Payne's time distortion really felt like Bullet Time--Timeshift's feels more like a cheat code. And PoP's time reversal constantly saved you while in the very process of dying or even post death. But Timshift is VERY quick to kick you out to the load screen the micro second your life bar hits zero with no margin to rewind as you're hitting the floor.
The only thing going for Timeshift is some pretty nice level design. I never got tired of the really creative environments they kept coming up with. And if you resist using the Crossbow of Insta-Death and stick with lesser weaponry, you can have a lot of fun in the firefights.
Date: 2007-11-04
THE SUIT! MY KINGDOM FOR THE SUIT!
This game took the reaaaaally scenic route before, finally, finding its way home. Release dates were pushed back, again and again; publishers were changed (from ATARI to SIERRA), like horses while crossing a river: an equally bad idea. What finally reached the shore was nothing to brag about...
TIMESHIFT runs for about 10-15 hours, not short yet not long either by regular standards (I mean "regular", mind you, not HL2-Episodes which run shorter than demos). In all those hours the story never manages to engage you. Time travel has always been a mind bender to grasp - and this is especially true when the story is tissue-paper thin...True, most FPS games do not have thicker stories - yet all *Great* FPS games surely did.
In the original UNREAL you tried to escape an alien planet you crash-landed in a prison-ship. In HALF-LIFE you either fought in an alien-infested underground Black Mesa or were doing Mr Smith's biding in combine-controlled City 17. In FAR CRY you were thrown onto a tropical island with a wild bunch of mutant-creating mercenaries. In MAX PAYNE - oh, don't get me started on MAX PAYNE...
In TIMESHIFT you try to, well, get back a time-shifting suit from the evil doctor and then go back in time to amend the bad things he already did. Yeah, really exciting...
TIMESHIFT manages to stay afloat by improving on old idea. Remember MAX PAYNE's bullet-time? Well, in TIMESHIFT you can actually stop or even reverse time. This is not unlimited of course and it has rather slow recharge cycle but it provides with a number of interesting possibilities: dodge bullets, throw back the live grenade, disarm the opponents and then use their own weapons against them...(if you die though, you do stay dead).
AI? What AI? I don't know whether it is due to going back and forth in time, but your enemies never raise above flatlined braindead. Even without slowing time they will just walk in front of your mawing machine gun...
The one thing that DID improve by the long wait were the graphics. Compared to early-released demos, there seems that a lot of work has been put into all of textures, surfaces and shadows. Slow time and watch for the explosions: they are really impressive! Combine this with a collection of really imaginative and impressive weapons and you have TIMESHIFT's major success. Incendiary projectiles anyone? And I really liked the abundance of ammo! (some FPS are so stingy with their ammo crates, you would think they actually had to pay for them!)
Now, these high quality graphics do require the latest beta drivers (in fact the installation routine will direct you to the appropriate site for this reason), have pretty steep system requirements - and expect a number crashes. Ah well, that's what patches are for.
All in all, give it a try - but there are much better choices out there...
|
|
|
|
