14 DAY TRIAL // I am rarely impressed when I hear about a game project from an unknown game developer, backed up by a publisher like Codemasters, which is not exactly a high scorer. But this time I am put under the spell of Damnation, the title that promises to revolutionize the shooter genre - the first game coming from Blue Omega. And if you think that the prototype of this game was a winner in the Make Something Unreal contest, hosted by Epic Games, you know that we might have a great game waiting to be launched.
However, it's not the game's story that makes it great (strange, since Blue Omega has 2 good films released already) - inspired by iconic elements of American history, the storyline evolves around a post-industrial conflict between humanity and hell-born weapon dealers willing to take over the world. It's the average FPS story and they just use it for the real great things this game has to offer.
First of all, the game calls itself "shooter gone vertical" and it seems it will actually be an evolution of the shooter genre: it's an exhilarating combination of fluid action and combat, daredevil acrobatics and high-octane vehicle-based stunts and a lot of vertical gameplay. But don't think of the already outdated airborne troops or something similar - think more Alien Vs. Predator with wall climbing, amazing jumps and so on. Or just check the screenshots, since they're worth more than 1000 words.
The second feat that makes this game wonderful is its open world: you will be able to choose your own path and complete the story exactly as you see fit, going anywhere and everywhere. Still, you will not be the only one able to perform these acrobatic "stunts" - the AI will be extremely... intelligent, too, and enemies will give chase and engage players in frantic gun fights and attacks that can come from any direction - in Damnation's world there's no safe place to hide.
And the last thing that would probably mean nothing to most of the people watching is very important, too: did you notice the drop dead gorgeous and really sexy girl that appears in all these screenshots? Of course you did and it's obvious that the devs know about her presence, too. Still, they said absolutely nothing about who that chick is, how many pixels her boobs have and stuff like that. This means that, unlike other games, Damnation is a FPS that doesn't need to put a girl's sensuality in the spotlight in order to sell. It has other things to march on with. And this, my friends, is something that deserves our praise.
However, we'll have to wait a little bit more until we get our hands on Damnation - it has a "TBA" release date, but we should expect it by the end of this year. For Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.
