Brink

[Art Blade]

If there's one thing I like about steam, or two if I include the voice chat ability, or three if I include the screenshot ability, it's how I always end up with an English language version even if the game doesn't support it at the start. Must have to do with my entire system and STEAM setup which is all in English. However, it took another 303MB to download.  :-()

And the narratives are all in nice  British English, so I have a big grin on my face now  :-D

The characters are all in American English, you can choose between various voices to customise your character.

You can customise your character until kingdom come, which I did when I decided to alt-tab out of the game so I could post a little here. It doesn't like alt-tabbing out.  :-\\

This pic here is half the way through customising my character.

[smg id=3320  type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 001"]

At the start of the game you have to make a choice: Defend the Arc or Escape from it, apparently it determines whether you are going to go IN to keeping 'em OUT or if you're going to get OUT while they're trying to keep you IN ;D No idea, really, but apparently it calls for at least two playthroughs.

:)

[mmosu]

Let us know Art, this one's getting mixed reviews out there  :-X

[Art Blade]

Indeed, so I decided to see for myself  :)

I haven't "played" it so yet, just only been playing around with customisation of my character and loadout. Man, there are a lot of weapons.. and customisable too (later in the game, though) hehe  :-()

Then I went through a load of tutorial vids and whatever vids to be found in the menu, both because they're so funny to watch and because I might learn a thing or three.

Looks a bit complicated, I have reason to believe that a player has to learn to play all four classes (engineer, medic, soldier and operative) because some goals can only be achieved by a specific class. I doubt that an AI mate of that class will achieve a goal for me. The presence of some sort of menu station where you can change your class during a mission also indicates that a player will have to use them just for that purpose, among others (reload weapons and so on).

The graphics so far look cool  :-()

[JRD]

For what I get about BRINK is that it`s meant to be a multiplayer experience but allow single players to have fun too by swapping characters during a mission.

The original Ghost Recon, one of my favorites shooters of all time, was a bit like that: you could assume the role of any member of your squad at any time. Actually, you HAD TO if you wanted to place the charges or fire the rockets for instance, AI wasn`t doing it for you. You had to place the other members in a position to protect you and do the objectives yourself.

Of course, at that time it was advertized that that was a game that puts the player into the action or whatever excuse they gave, but we all know it was weak AI scripts talking  ;)

[Art Blade]

I think you're right, the game is probably a blast for MP and not so much a blast for SP. During the tutorial vids there are indeed a lot of scenes that look exactly the way you described it: Protecting someone who hacks into a system or whatever job he's doing, and also stating that two or more characters of the same class dedicated to the same job (mission objective) will shorten the time needed for that job to be finished.

Still, it looks funny  :) It very much reminds me of the characters of Team Fortress.

[Art Blade]

Alright, the gameplay appears to be plainly chaotic if you jump in for the first time. You'll see a lot of team mates' names hover around and shine through walls as you're on a team of eight and start stumbling and prodding around wondering what the heck is going on and what you're supposed to do and if so, with what and by which means.. so you'd probably end up seeing this (incapacitated, waiting for a medic or to respawn)

[smg id=3321 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 002"]

I decided to play the same mission again to see if I can do any better and also chose to spawn as a different class (you can change your class during a mission, though) and it actually got better.

The AI isn't so stupid at all, medics came around and threw some stuff at me which allowed me to heal myself, soldiers replenished my ammo when they came past me, and the rest of my team actually took care of main and side mission goals. It does help, however, if you give them a little support and look how happy they are (I'm the leftmost guy) :-()

[smg id=3322 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 003"]

[JRD]

Hahahaha... you guys look like a punk rock band with assault rifles for guitars  >:D

Cool... keep it coming, mate... seems a funny game  :-X

[Art Blade]

OK. Hehe  :-()

I tried a "challenge" which is sort of a training camp with real enemies and your team hanging around, too, but you're the one who has to accomplish things. This requires you to change classes with each objective given and also to race against the clock (and enemies trying to stop you). The reason to do challenges is to get new weapons, abilities, outfits.. all kinds of stuff, and all those upgrades are only accessible after completing challenges successfully. Which obviously adds to the regular game  ;D

[smg id=3323 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 004"]

[smg id=3324 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 005"]

[smg id=3325 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 006"]

[Art Blade]

Oh, I wanted to tell you about that mysterious new movement system called SMART. It actually works  :-D You just keep running and whatever obstacles (crates, fences, not too high walls and so on) are in your way, you automatically will jump onto, climb over or slide underneath them. Unless you run up against a solid wall at the end of a hall, you will be moving on and around swiftly. Your team mates and your friendly enemies will also make use of that technique and it looks cool to see them do that with all their elegance and then, in one fell of a swoop, see 'em drop dead or incapacitated when stylishly gliding into your awaiting cooked-off hand grenade. :-()

[mmosu]

Nice  :-X
I didn't want to rush to judgement in the face of negative reviews because I had thought the game looked cool way back when.  Keep it coming Art, you have my attention!  8)

[Art Blade]

Alright  :-()

This game is starting to become addictive. I like it  :-D

Here is a scene where I've packed a big gun because those blokes in the back had been a little too mean for my taste, time for a good solid payback  >:D

[smg id=3326 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 007"]

This is one of the challenges, a parkour to be done with a light body type (the game lends it to you for that challenge) and that.. was fun.

[smg id=3327 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 008"]

I completed the two star parkour in 1:53 (max time allowed 2:00). Once you successfully complete a challenge, you cannot play it again on the same star level but will advance to the next level. Stars are difficulty levels, you can't choose them, the game will start with 1 star and upon completion you will advance until the highest difficulty which is 3 stars. If I'm not mistaken, the same principle applies to MP games.. as in you can't play with lower ranked players, but I'll have to check that out and validate it.

And after a successful challenge.. time for upgrades  :-()

[smg id=3328 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 009"]

[mmosu]

Now that's the part that interests me - I love customizing guns in games.  I guess you could say in real life too - I've never owned a paintball gun that I didn't modify in some way  8)

Art, how deep does the customization go, and how much of an effect does it actually have on performance in-game?

[Art Blade]

The customisation goes deep and it does have different effects, some minor, some major. Each weapon has four upgrade slots but they may have different meanings depending on the weapon or some just can't be used with some few weapons (with those you can only use three upgrades).

For example, you can't slap an under-barrel grenade launcher on a pistol or an SMG, you can only do that with an assault rifle. Or, you cannot use a high-capacity magazine with a rifle. But you can stick a silencer on every weapon (which reduces damage) or use different types of scopes on them which may change your overall sight when aiming down the barrel or through the scope as in no peripheral sight (sniper kind of scope) or zooming in a bit while losing some of the peripheral sight (red dot sights) or maintain full sight (adjusted ironsights). Adding heavy magazines will slow down toggling weapons (you have one primary and one secondary firearm), adding a grip to the barrel will increase stability but slows down weapon toggling while using a quick sling instead of a grip will speed up toggling..

You see, every advantage comes with a disadvantage. So there is no super duper maxed-out weapon, you'll have to find your preferred weapons first (out of a LOT of weapons) and then try to upgrade them in a way that suits your gaming style the most. Also, the body type of your character (light, medium, heavy) dictates which weapons you can or can't use. The light weight guy simply can't carry a gatling gun ;D The heavy guy can't run up a wall, though  :)

The upper pic shows the same weapon you already saw in the last post, only this time there is a different set of upgrades on it.
[smg id=3329 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 010"]
[smg id=3330 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 011"]

[Art Blade]

These are some of the "good" guys, while I'm currently playing one of the "bad" guys.

[smg id=3331 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 012"]

This game is massive. It has such a huge potential, I have played only two missions but those I played three or four times each.

Every time I tried a different thing like changing body types, using different weapon loadouts, different paths, classes or just the same character build to see if it can be done differently. As it turns out, no matter what you do, the same mission will almost certainly play differently because of the AI doing what you do: play it differently. Unpredictable the outcome, they assume different roles and try to achieve goals that you tried to achieve the last time and so forth. A well of fun and diversity. Of course the mission objectives are the same, but they are about as much fun and diverse as in FC2.

You can play the missions solo or with two, three or four players, apparently coop. That will add even more diversity. The two opposing teams consist of eight AI players each (minus you), so there is a lot of commotion and fighting going on, and they don't use the same loadouts all the time.

There are about say 10 missions for the good guys and another 10 for the bad guys. I don't know yet if they are the same missions just switching sides, but even if, that should be fun, too :)

I'm really starting to admire the entire concept of all this stuff  :-X

[PZ]

Graphics look nice  :-X

[Art Blade]

Today I wanted to see what the "other" missions were like, and I changed my outfit accordingly. You can use (and keep) your character with everything as it is being used for either the good or the bad guys missions, only the looks are different. If you take a close look at the top right corner you'll see a switch; there you can toggle your character's "side" and change the outfit. I opted for some stereotype bull of a cop  :-()
[smg id=3336 type=link align=center width=500]

This is in-game when you waltz off after mission start. In the lower right corner you can see the radar showing white dots in a line (my team) stretching around a corner.
[smg id=3337 type=link align=center width=500]

You may recognise the postures, I'm the leftmost guy, the finishing sequence of the first mission. So actually the missions for both bad and good guys are the same, only sides (and therefore objectives) are switched. That's why the game and achievements refer to attacker and defender roles.
[smg id=3338 type=link align=center width=500]

One example of funny details scattered all across the game: In the background on the wall you can see a huge picture of a hand grenade, "WAKE UP CALL" written all across it  ;D
[smg id=3339 type=link align=center width=500]

[Art Blade]

I love customising my gear.. weapons, looks.. hehehe  :-()

[smg id=3340 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 017"]
[smg id=3341 type=link align=center width=500 caption="BRINK SP 018"]

[mmosu]

Art, your ever-changing avatar keeps catching me by surprise!  If I don't keep logging in regularly I might miss something!  :-D

[Art Blade]

 ;D

[fragger]

Looks like a lot of fun all round :-X That character looks a bit like a happy version of Judge Dredd :-()

Forgive me if this is a redundant question, but does B.U.M.P. stand for anything?

[Art Blade]

Hehe, Judge Dredd!  ^+-+ :-X

Nope, BUMP and other funny words keep popping up everywhere.

[mmosu]

Big Ugly Multiplayer Party?

(;\

[Art Blade]

No idea, but one inscription on one of the T-shirts available reads "F that S"  ^+-+

I'm now about half through the first part (attackers) and played one mission of the defenders.

I play all missions a couple of times in a row, that's why I'm progressing slowly. I do that because there is always so much going on, several mission objectives being dealt with at the same time, followed by one or a few more in succession, that I never see the big picture. Playing those missions several times helps me get a better understanding of what's when where (but not why).  :-()

Nice is that even if you decide to quit playing right in the middle, you won't lose your XP points gained so far during that mission. You're being asked "are you sure? You'll only have <number> XP points." All other games would state something like "if you quit now, you'll lose everything." -- but not with BRINK.  :) :-X


By accident I found out you can form a fire team "alpha" by clicking on names of your team mates displayed on the ranking table (which is accessible after a mission). You can invite (add) and kick players (even AI). They'll display their names in a different colour during the game which makes it easy to see where they are. I'll take a look if they will be with me in the next game (AI mates that were scoring high and supportive). :)

[Art Blade]

Oh, I almost forgot:

Body types. Default is the medium type, later you get the heavy one and finally the light weight. The body is key to movement speed (and no, the heavy guy really isn't the fastest bloke :-() ) and weapon types (and yes, the heavy guy can kind of hide a pistol in his hand) as well as damage resistance (lead beans for breakfast? Heavy  :-D ) and ability to climb (ever seen a 500 lbs squirrel scale a tree at the speed of light?).

So despite the comparatively slow movement speed and inability to climb everywhere, I have grown fond of the heavy tank type. With a tuned MG you'd rather fit a battle ship with and a peaceful but steady step towards the enemy, I'm preferably using the engineer class which allows me to install turrets that take care of enemies on their own. Like that I'm some kind of a moving fortress  :-() My paperweight team mates keep buffing my supplies and health and throw ammo at me and so on, so we w@&k well together in a team :)

[Art Blade]

Alright, today I played my first MP game.

Two maps (missions), I chose "same rank" as opposed to "same or higher ranks" for human team players.

The game was somehow different. Everyone ran away and disappeared god knows where while I was still wondering which objective to care about.

Looks like human teams tend to stick together, that's why the maps appeared to be so empty.. the team players of both teams were all packed together and when killed, respawning just so they could run back to the pack.

Some of them actually buffed me (using their special class abilities to boost team mates) and I kept buffing whomever I had in easy reach. Only when it comes to medics and their ability to revive team mates.. that left something to desire. Most of the times I had to respawn because no one cared about me or anyone else lying on the floor, except twice when I got a syringe thrown at me so I could revive myself.

All in all, the "fake" MP experience (the SP or solo mode) is better because then your team mates both spread out to take care of various objectives and they care about their team mates. The AI was more supportive and decisive than the human teams I just witnessed.

Reminds me of fire teams. I think a game like this, 2 x 8 players, is difficult to handle if you want to be really good and economical/effective about it. Probably fire teams of two or three could take care of one mission goal at the time and then proceed. Probably three because one medic should be nice, protect him, he revives you, and the two remaining guys have to be one or both of the class needed for the current goal (can change the class at any time at a command post) or one of that class and a soldier for protection.

When I was playing MP, no one had been using a headset.. so I reckon that was just a random game of morons and inexperienced players, just like me, but I mean no one  used a headset...  ????