Hard Reset Review
When a game goes out of its way to try and revitalise a style of game that has seemingly gone out of fashion, I am immediately inclined to nod approvingly while politely applauding. Hard Reset is one of those. While it may appear to be a classic shooter at face value, it does break a few rules of the genre. Unfortunately, this turns out to be a slight degradation on top of the old formula, rather than the refreshing quip of innovation that it so clearly wants to be.
At face value, Hard Reset appears to be everything you want it to be. It has futuristic guns, lots of explosions and gorgeous graphics. Accompanying this is a cyberpunk setting and plot that looks fit to incite dreams about electric sheep. You play as CLN-16, an operative for the all-powerful Corporation. A breach at the Sanctuary has him pulled away from his whiskey, and into the clutches of the angry robots that are attempting to steal the AI that will allow them to evolve beyond human control. As is often the case, things are not all what they seem and CLN-16 soon starts to realise the hidden truth behind the Corporation and the potential of meddling with the AI he has been sent to defend. Following the trend of most cyberpunk narratives, Hard Reset’s story is hard to follow and consequently not that engaging. It is told through hand-drawn comic book cutscenes though, and is good to look at it if not to absorb. Oddly, the narrative does not seem to mesh with the gameplay very well, with it often feeling like the two are not directly connected. Events that happen in the comic book world seemingly do not blend into the one that you are playing in, and so you cannot be blamed for not paying attention to its intricacies.
Fortunately, the meat of the game bucks the trend by being both very good to look at and fun to play…most of the time. Aspiring to be a classic shooter means that Hard Reset mostly consists of shootouts in enclosed areas. It feels like a corridor shooter but most of its paths are quite wide and do allow enough room for you and a horde of enemies to waltz in. Plenty of back-pedalling and circling is vital as the smaller robots scurry towards you with buzzsaws and the larger ones charge at you relying on their bulky steel structure to knock you flying. Some frustration will be had when you are trapped in a corner or keep knocking into objects behind you, and the sprinting limitations seem a little unfair against the speed of the robots at times. Just shooting enemies is never enough to defeat your powerful foe. Shooting the numerous explosives scattered around the environment is an essential practice. But even doing this is still not enough. Hard Reset requires its players to plan out the most effective way to use the environment. Shooting explosive barrels and electrical conduits at the right time will slow down the bigger enemies and destroy large groups of smaller ones.
Trust me, you would be causing the electrical storms and fireworks if it was not vital for survival anyway, because it is pure eye candy. The lighting effects in Flying Wild Hog’s brand new engine are some of the best I have ever seen. Better yet, the game never drops a single frame no matter how many explosions you cause, and there is usually a lot of other activity going on in the screen as well. The levels may be enclosed but they are fleshed out with busy backgrounds full of flying cars, zeppelins and impressive structures off in the distance. There are plenty of moments when the visuals will drop your jaw, and if you are craving your next fix then most of the time you can just look up to see flying cars and towering buildings. This really is an engine that can only be truly realised on PC at the moment.
Complimenting the impressive HD visuals is Hard Reset’s clean interface. The simple but colourful HUD provides all you need to know – health, shield and ammo count. Speaking of which, the game has health pickups and a regenerating shield combo that works as well as it did in Halo: Combat Evolved. In most parts the game is very user friendly, with bright distinctive colours easily telling the player if that is health or ammo lying on the floor, and a very handy hint system available to help prevent any possible confusion. This easy-to-use interface is contradicted in one area, and it just so happens to be the most vital one for a shooter. You would think that having a gun that can literally transform between 6 different types would be the pinnacle of a user-friendly weapon management system. Well, Hard Reset provides its players with two of these bad boys. The CLN fires bullets and rockets, and the N.R.G. harnesses the power of plasma energy. That is essentially twelve different guns packed into just two devices. To my knowledge this has not been seen in a game before, and it appears that there are reasons for this.
As you gradually upgrade your weapons and gain the shotgun, the rail gun, the grenade launcher and the rest of this powerful arsenal; you will notice that the guns all look the same. Yes the guns transform a little, but when you are in the heat of an intense firefight you will struggle to recognise what gun you have equipped as each of them look the same, because they are! Switching between the two models is also a problem as it is slow, taking up crucial seconds of your time. Combine these two issues together and you find yourself having to decide what type of gun you want to use before each battle. Otherwise your inevitable fumbling as you attempt to switch it up during battle will more than likely lead to an unnecessary death.
As corrupt a design as that is, a glance at the HUD in the bottom left corner will alleviate this problem to a point, and after a while you will find yourself being able to identify the weapons by their unique reticules. So essentially it is only a small gripe, and nothing game breaking. There is one overarching problem with the game as a whole though, and it is this that stops it from being a much better shooter – it is missing a sense of satisfaction. It took me a while to figure out what the cause of this absence was. At first I thought the guns were to blame. I have already mentioned that there are only two gun models, but all twelve of the available gun types feel powerful and the results of pulling the trigger are usually spectacular and very different with each gun. Especially the Shock Blaster with its mini-electrical storm frying enemies that get too close. I then decided that the environments did not change up enough, as the look of the city is pulled straight out of Bladerunner and the interiors mostly consist of dark, faceless corridors. As familiar as the setting may be it is still fantastic to look at, and provides a lot of the game’s dark atmosphere.
Having eliminated those two options I then nailed it. The only enemies are robots! Aside from the fact that there are essentially only three different models of enemy, robots are just not as fun to shoot as flesh and bone. Despite the neat animations and cute scuttling of the smaller types, the robots lack personality (apart from the cement mixer with legs). The usual recurring problem with shooting robots also pops up; they do not react to the damage you are dishing out. Part of the fun of shooting flesh is seeing the victim react to being shot in the leg as opposed to the torso. It is also not hard to see how much more fun it would be to cause these explosions with fleshy opponents around, rather than an army of robots that basically die in the same way every time. The simple truth is, shooting metal is just not satisfying.
Hard Reset features some unwise and questionable decisions. The most odd being the inability to crouch which seems to only be in place so that you cannot get through holes designed for the small robots to run through. But these design choices do not retract from its fun gameplay too much. After all, it is still a classic shooter and will appeal to anyone looking for that kind of experience. It even features a couple of epic-sized, memorable boss fights and will provide a challenge for those moaning at the apparent easy games of today. Being a budget title a single playthrough will take about 4-5 hours of gameplay, and anyone who has replayed Doom a thousand times will enjoy coming back to find all of the secrets, pickups and get through each level in the quickest time. Players who need something a little more modern as an excuse to replay the game will be chasing achievements, and that will include going through on the Insane difficulty. Luckily, once the game has been completed an EX Mode is unlocked which allows all of the upgrades you have purchased to be carried through to a new game, thus making the seemingly impossible harder modes that little bit easier.
This is not just a game that you will enjoy replaying to complete to 100% though, as the incredible engine it is built on is something you are going to want to play with a little more after it has all come to an end. Which reminds me, the game ends in a way that makes it feel like this is only episode one, to be honest it ends when it seems that it is just about to get going. Another downer for that satisfaction you will be desperately searching for by this time. If a sequel is on the way, let’s hope we see some fleshy enemies to shoot, as the experience and capabilities of the engine would certainly benefit from this.
Review summary Pros:
Stunning visuals, great fun especially when causing environmental damage, plenty of reason to replay, classic shooter formula, challenging
Cons:
Lacks feeling of satisfaction due to robot-only enemies, gun differentiation is not clear enough
Rating: 70%
