By Nathan Grayson on April 20th, 2012 at 11:00 pm.
What follows is a moment-by-moment recounting of my facial expressions while watching Spec Ops: The Line‘s multiplayer trailer – in ultra-vision. Exposition-y stuff: an expectant stare followed by an eye roll so hard it nearly detached my retinas at the phrase “This is their war.” Cover shooty runny ‘splodey stuff: a furrowed brow as if to say, “Is this all?” and “Why waste a slow-mo shot on a reload?” Class-based skills and rewards, etc: drooping eyelids, a hint of spittle dangling from the corner of my mouth. SAND AVALANCHE: Eyes wide-open, mouth creaking into a tentative smile, head cocked in much the same way as a dog saying, “Baroo?” Still though, it’s a bit worrisome that they actually had to spell out “Sand is a game-changer,” as though saying, “No, wait, don’t go! We’re sort of different, see?” And see you shall, if you opt to check out the trailer after the break.
Spec Ops is finally emerging from the not-so-quick sands of a somewhat tumultuous development cycle on June 29. I’m tentatively interested, though admittedly, I haven’t seen the game in person since E3 a couple years ago. Adam’s write-up, however, has me fairly hopeful, and even though Heart of Darkness is hardly a novel inspiration for games (please try not to see what I did there; you’ll respect me a whole lot more), it’s taken us on some pretty fascinating treks – for instance, Far Cry 2. We’ll know one way or another soon enough, and I’m sure facial expressions will be involved in some capacity. Unless I’ve lost my face.
20/04/2012 at 23:19 Scandalon says:
As an avid paintball player, I can confidently state those walls are at *least* 3 feet high.
20/04/2012 at 23:21 Tyrone Slothrop. says:
Too good for the metric system are you? Splitter!
21/04/2012 at 00:02 Scandalon says:
Nope, just cursed to be born in a society that thinks ignoring base-10 in favor of measurements based off the size of body parts of long-dead kings is a good idea.
(In fairness, the alt-text use feet. I’m sure if it had said metres I would have responded appropriately. :)
20/04/2012 at 23:24 TCM says:
Am I the only person who read that as “pinball player”?
21/04/2012 at 06:27 CaspianRoach says:
pintball
20/04/2012 at 23:27 marcusfell says:
I’m not sure if it’s dubstep or an industrial washing machine.
22/04/2012 at 22:31 TheIronSky says:
Aren’t they the same thing?
20/04/2012 at 23:33 Tei says:
Looks good, but the third person mode looks really force and make the shooting looks bland and very awkward.
20/04/2012 at 23:34 Bungle says:
Yikes, those animations need work.
21/04/2012 at 01:45 MeestaNob says:
Many of the falling/death animations looked terrible.
21/04/2012 at 00:52 Hoaxfish says:
When you join the army you get a free skull-bandana/facemask, for those regular intervals when society breaks down.
21/04/2012 at 01:35 Durkonkell says:
The standard USMC fire team now consists of: Fire team leader, Rifleman, Automatic Rifleman, Skull-Balaclava man.
21/04/2012 at 11:33 SuperNashwanPower says:
Find ‘em, Fix ‘em, Flank ‘em, POSEDOWN
21/04/2012 at 01:47 MeestaNob says:
That was a pretty terrible trailer. All of the supernatural style, FEAR-vibe that the previous videos had going for them has been replaced with CallofValourGunDudeBroShooter.
21/04/2012 at 02:05 bear912 says:
I thought they weren’t going to have multiplayer… I wonder whose decision it was to include it.
21/04/2012 at 08:24 Roshin says:
So, why would anyone tear themselves away from Battlefield: Call of Manshoot and play this? Because of sand?
21/04/2012 at 09:33 BrightCandle says:
That looks pretty bad. The graphics look pretty dated, the weapon mechanics and impact looks downright terrible and somehow in this game its ok to jump into oncoming automatic fire from 5 feet away because you have a shotgun! Don’t get me started on how awful that sandstorm effect looks, pixel shader effect with no depth to it is just wrong.
Well that was a waste of mankinds time.
21/04/2012 at 09:42 stahlwerk says:
I don’t think I’m interested, but if I Dubai it I’ll play it for the Qatar-sis.
21/04/2012 at 11:29 SuperNashwanPower says:
Arise, Sir Sean Punnery.
There can be only one.
21/04/2012 at 10:00 SuperNashwanPower says:
‘Eyes wide-open, mouth creaking into a tentative smile, head cocked in much the same way as a dog saying, “Baroo?” ‘
Today, Nathan Grayson, you are my favourite LOLDog.
21/04/2012 at 11:11 TheWhippetLord says:
As a qualified Bad Joke Umpire, I’m going to have to book you for that pun.
21/04/2012 at 14:49 Splotch says:
This looks unbelievably shithouse
21/04/2012 at 18:08 Shooop says:
So then, other than weaponized sand and a story very loosely based on Heart of Darkness what’s so interesting about this game?
It looks like every other 3rd person manshoot that has ever existed.