"Killzone is a first-person shooter, developed by Netherlands-based Guerrilla Games and released on November 24, 2004 in Europe. Killzone takes place in the middle of the 24th century and chronicles the war between two human factions; the Vektans, and the Helghan. The game is played from a first-person view and follows Jan Templar, a high-ranking officer within the Interplanetary Strategic Alliance, as he battles invading Helghan forces into Vekta."
- Wikipedia on Killzone.
What do I expect from the game?
This is my first experience playing any game from the Killzone franchise, and I'm entering into it without much of an idea of what to expect. I know that it is a first-person shooter set in a war-torn futuristic setting. I also know that it was a rather popular and high-profile release that spawned a number of sequels.
I am expecting the game to have a story-driven single player campaign, and possibly an arena mode with AI enemies. There was a multiplayer mode originally but the servers are long shut down. I expect the game's strong suit will be gameplay, which I think will consist of intense combat, as this is a staple of the FPS genre. I think that the dystopian future setting will be another strong suit. I expect that it will be a good game overall, as it was a big title at the time and was published by Sony.
First Impressions - What do I think of the game in its first few minutes?
Before I started playing Killzone, I had a quick flick through the game manual, which is stylised like a newspaper from one of the planets featured in the game. This was a pretty cool idea that makes the manual more interesting and helps make the game world easier to buy into. I believe that game manual design is sadly now an extinct art!
The game begins with a cinematic showing Scolar Visari, who is the emperor of the planet Helghan and the game's main antagonist, addressing his army and giving a speech about his intent to wage war on the planet Vekta. As Visari speaks, the cinematic shows scenes of the invasion and battles between the two planets. This dramatic opening cinematic effectively establishes the two polarised "good and evil" factions, introduces the main antagonist and also gives a good idea of the environments and graphics of the game.
The game's main menu is not terribly exciting. It takes a minimalistic approach to UI, with the 3 simple words "options", "game" and "extras". if it wasn't for the dramatic music and shots of characters in the background, the front end would be very plain. Left idle for a while, a game demo plays showing scenes and gameplay. This further helps to demonstrate the aesthetic of the game and the nature of the gameplay. The extras section allows you to view the trailer, rewatch the intro movie or watch "War Scenes" - which are randomly generated bot-on-bot matches. This is an interesting feature.
 |
| The game's front end. |
I started a new campaign and was prompted to create a profile name using a very odd system of selecting letters. You have to hold the d-pad or analog stick in one of 8 directions, then press one of the face buttons to select one of 4 letters. I wondered if this was would be a precursor to some sort of mini game later in the game (turns out it wasn't). Confused but undeterred, I created my profile and jumped into the first level - "Helghast Assault".
 |
| The weird profile name entering system! |
 |
| First view of the game world. |
The first level throws the player into the deep end with an action-packed firefight sequence in which the player has to defend and move between trenches while fighting enemies. Core mechanics such as movement and combat controls and health and stamina meters are introduced. I was instantly impressed by such things as the facial animations and voice acting in cutscenes, and the quality of the war-zone atmosphere. The level definitely looks authentic and it is clear that the developers looked to real conflicts for reference. Explosions, quality voice acting and SFX and a washed-out colour palette all add to the believability of this opening level. There is a bit of a lack of direction as your objectives do not pop up on screen as they are completed or updated, and you have to manually open a menu which takes a few seconds to load when you want to check your objectives. I also noticed that the textures are pretty low-resolution which detracts slightly from the atmosphere - but this is to be expected of a PS2 game.
 |
| Each level features friendly AI soldiers. |
I completed the first level in just over 10 minutes and picked up all mechanics needed to play the game in this time. I was also drawn in by the atmosphere and environment art. This tells me that it was an effective first level! On completion, I was presented with a few stats such as shots fired, kills, time taken and accuracy. Letting the player see information about their performance is absolutely vital as it helps them to invest more in the game, adds replay value and incentivises personal goal-setting and improvement.
 |
| The WW1 inspiration is plain to see in the first level. |
What do I like about the game?
Killzone's strongest features are its environment art, atmosphere, audio and the weapon and vehicle models. The game features some really good environments that include decent lighting and particle effects for the time at which the game was released. The environments have clearly been well thought-out and this makes for some atmospheric levels. The game claims to "draw inspiration from the best-known real war scenarios of our time", and I think that this is evident when playing it. It is clear to see the influence from World War 1 (in trench levels) and modern Urban wars (in the street and interior levels). Destructible objects in the environment also add to the realism of the environments.
Audio is another strong point of the game, specifically SFX. The sounds of gunfire, explosions and environmental noises all come together to form a convincing war zone soundscape. Again, this helps to create a strong atmosphere.
The game features a lot of different weapons and vehicles. The weapon and vehicle models are all high quality and realistic-looking. In terms of design, there isn't much that sets them apart from the weapons and vehicles of other sci-fi FPS games, but they still look quite good.
 |
| A friendly tank. |
What do I not like?
Though I liked the environments, audio and models in Killzone, I found more things that I didn't like than things that I liked - and some of them are quite glaring. Firstly, there is the controls. Though the button configuration is reasonable enough, the controls, including movement and combat, are clunky. This makes gameplay frustrating and rigid, and the game lacks the fluidity of movement that is so essential to the thorough enjoyment of an FPS game.
Another issue is the fact that the game doesn't do enough to get you hooked into the story in the early stages. Though the levels are fairly interesting and exciting, the objectives can be a bit banal and inconsequential. Also, as I mentioned previously, there is a real lack of direction in the game. Objectives don't appear on screen, so its easy to forget or not know what you are meant to be doing. There is no compass or mini-map at all either, so you often find yourself not knowing what you need to do or where you need to do it. The addition of a simple compass or map would alleviate this problem. It would also allow enemy positions to be displayed, which would also be beneficial.
Though the game does offer post-level stats, there is not really any sort of reward system, and the game doesn't do much to encourage replaying. The addition of challenges or things to unlock would add more depth and replayability to the game. Collectable items in each level would also be good, as this would also add more depth and encourage thorough exploration of the environments.
 |
| The environments effectively capture the chaos of war. |
Final Thoughts
While Killzone does have a few positive points, I would have to say that I didn't find it to be an incredibly enjoyable or engaging experience to play it. Of course, as is always the case when I play old games for Spontaneous Sunday, it could be just the game showing its age, but I was put off by the clunky controls, the lack of direction, and the lack of replayability and depth to the objectives and goals. The game must have done something right if the developer and publisher decided to create a franchise of it, but I can say that it didn't really resonate with me. It did have its good points, and I'm sure that later instalments in the franchise improve on it and iron out the issues, so I may look into playing another Killzone instalment in the future.
No comments:
Post a Comment