By Alec Meer on November 1st, 2011.
A reasonable number of folk around these parts are, I think it’s safe to sweepingly generalise, a little nonplussed that Starbreeze’s Syndicate remake is going down the mostly linear manshooter path. All along, though, we’ve been told the game’s four-player co-op mode would entail a more direct nod to the strategicish Bullfrog original. Is that, could that be, true? Time to find out.
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Eliminate the hooligans
By John Walker on October 24th, 2011.
As everyone knows, Syndicate is back. And as everyone also knows, it’s a first-person shooter, which perhaps isn’t the direction everyone was expecting it to head in. I’ve sat down and played a small section of the game, and below you can read my thoughts.
By Alec Meer on October 18th, 2011.
This is one for the young people, perhaps – as part of another trailer for the upcoming Syndicate enshooterising, we get a potted history of Bullfrog’s original game. “A cyberpunk wonderland,” apparently. Then it segues into a pic’n'mix of previous and new Syndishoot footage, and I guess we’re supposed to think “gosh, the reticule-based adventures of MILES KILO sure are highly thematically similar to an isometric tactical game.” Still, it’s nice to see the original Syndicate (“quite a unique experience”, claims robo-lady in the video) given a proper nod – never thought we’d see that as part of a bombastic, noisy trailer like this.
By John Walker on October 13th, 2011.
Crikey, from being an unknown (and yet somehow inevitably always an FPS) project of rumour and vapour, there’s already footage of Syndicate to coo at/smash up your house in rage because of. Ten minutes of it! Which you can watch below.
By Jim Rossignol on September 29th, 2011.
Okay, here it is: the first Syndicate trailer. Heavy on the dubstep and men in trenchcoats. Gosh, this makes me realise that the original Syndicate came out in the era before there were generally trailers for games.
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By Jim Rossignol on September 28th, 2011.
I’ll tell you: according to Gamasutra, it’s coming out in February of 2012. The 21st in the North America and the 24th in Europlace. That’s relatively soon! Yes it is. Also, there’s now a website for the game over here. It’s not much of a website, but it does say this: “AT THE FRONT LINE OF THIS WAR ARE THE AGENTS, THE SYNDICATE’S BIO-ENGINEERED AND CHIP-AUGMENTED ENFORCERS. THEY CAN BREACH ANYTHING IN THE WIRED DATAVERSE INCLUDING THEIR ENEMIES, THEIR WEAPONS AND THE ENVIRONMENT THAT SURROUNDS THEM, MAKING THEM THE MOST EFFICIENT AND DEADLY TECHNOLOGICAL WEAPONS IN THE WORLD. TAKE ON THE ROLE OF MILES KILO, EUROCORP’S LATEST PROTOTYPE AGENT, AND EMBARK ON A BRUTAL ACTION ADVENTURE OF CORRUPTION AND REVENGE.”
Miles Kilo. That’s his name. That’s your name. You are him.
Alec fires up the angrytank
By Alec Meer on September 13th, 2011.
This isn’t going to help. More likely quite the opposite, in fact. But, for the record, here’s Starbreeze’s claimed explanation for why they’ve so controversially made revered RTS/RTT/whatevs Syndicate into an adrenalised FPS.
Convinced? Me, not so much.
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By John Walker on September 12th, 2011.
After the rumours spilled out, EA and Starbreeze’s well known secret is finally official. Syndicate (the official site isn’t yet working, but should be there) has been announced, and yes, it’s an FPS. And yes, it offers four-player co-op. And it’s only called “Syndicate” so far. Surprisingly, it’s due out early next year. They’re describing it as a “revival”. Because when you think Syndicate, you think “a unique and brutal sci-fi first-person shooter experience”. Right?
By Jim Rossignol on September 11th, 2011.
Syndicate will reportedly be a 4-player co-op FPS, developed by Starbreeze. This thread on NeoGAF has some images and info which are apparently leaked from the Swedish edition of Game Reactor which is out next week. This what we know: “Chip Enhanced Gameplay: Slow down time, see through walls, and breach your enemy and everything digital in the world with Dart vision – A neural DART6 chip implant that allows you to interface directly with the Dataverse,” “4-Player Online Co-op: Assemble your Syndicate for global domination. A 4-player, online co-op experience like no other, with chip enhanced gameplay and 9 missions re-imagined from the original Syndicate,” “Visceral FPS Experience: Utilize an upgradable arsenal of futuristic weapons, armor and gear to annihilate your enemies and harvest their chip technology for personal advancement and sinister corporate greed,” “Sci-Fi Fiction: Immerse yourself in the world of Syndicate 2069, with a world-class sci-fi story experience, written by bestselling author Richard Morgan.”
Men will get shot from a first-person perspective. Yep.
By Jim Rossignol on June 3rd, 2011.
Speaking of games that are back from the dead in FPS form, here’s the latest on Syndicate. It would seem improbably in the extreme that Starbreeze, the guys behind the Riddick games and The Darkness, would do anything other than a shooter, but this “Inside Starbreeze” piece at 1up seems to confirm it. This quote attributed to “a source” seems to say that the game – which is Codenamed “Project Redlime” until EA choose to reveal it – sits firmly within Starbreeze’s shooter evolution heritage. There’s more from Starbreeze’s Johan Kristiansson following it.
“RedLime was meant to be the step up from Darkness, where we sort of took all the mistakes we did with Darkness and do them right.”
That could only mean one thing.
By Alec Meer on May 26th, 2011.
The alleged Syndicate alleged reboot allegedly being allegedly made by Riddick developers Starbreeze remains only alleged, but more and more alleged signs point to its alleged development. Latest of these is a chuck of script which has found its way to Siliconera. If this is real, Eurocorp returns – but the plot will concern a resistance movement against it, perhaps a la the original game’s expansion, American Revolt.
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