Singularity: multiplayer mode is a bit like Natural Selection!
your_evil_twin
Join Date: 2004-02-24 Member: 26873Members
Join Date: 2004-02-24 Member: 26873Members
in Off-Topic
Want to know what made me excited about Natural Selection again? Singularity.
It's an entertaining first person shooter that rips off loads of other games, such as Bioshock, Half-Life, TimeSplitters, etc etc. I thoroughly enjoyed the singleplayer game, it felt like a better Bioshock 2 than the actual Bioshock 2. Plus I love anything to do with time travel and this game has lots of fun with messing with time.
The multiplayer has a team of humans versus a team of creatures, and while other people said it's a rip off of Left 4 Dead versus mode or AvP, to me it seemed more like a rip off of Natural Selection!
The real Natural Selection is a much deeper and more interesting game, but Singularity's multiplayer is good for a laugh. It's like "Natural Selection lite", like NS1's combat mode I suppose. It has "Extermination" mode in which the humans try to capture a series of beacons in order, and a plain deathmatch "Creatures versus Soldiers". The deathmatch isn't that good but the Extermination mode with the beacons is excellent fun.
I'm not sure if the developers were actually influenced by Natural Selection or not. It's quite common for sci-fi FPS games to feature both human enemies and monsters in singleplayer, but it is rare for the multiplayer to do humans versus monsters. Especially where the monsters are very different to humans. But the fact that as the soldiers capture each beacon in Extermination mode they get closer to the Hive and the walls are covered in organic material looked very Natural Selection-esque.
The creatures are great. My favourite is the Phase Tick, which reminds me of the Skulk in NS. It is all about surprising enemies. You can climb walls and ceilings, and you can do long aimed leaps. If you see a lone soldier on his own, then you can leap on him after a few seconds of depleting his health bar you possess his body, and turn his guns and abilities against his teammates! And if it is a group of enemies, then instead you can charge up for a few seconds and then explode the sack on the back of your body. Doesn't hurt you, hurts everyone around you like a grenade. Another favourite class of mine can puke all over the place, hurting enemies but healing allies. And there's a massive tank like monster too.
It's a game developed by Raven and published by Activision. For the past decade their games have all been sequels to other people's games (Quake 4, Wolfenstein, etc etc), it's the first new IP in ages. It was released with absolutely no advertising or marketing whatsoever, and the description and images on the back of the box are rubbish. I guess because Activision wants to turn Raven into a studio for making Call of Duty mappacks and so are perfectly happy for the game to flop. But it looks like it may be a sleeper hit as the most negative reviews (like the harsh Edge magazine) gave it 6, while most sites have given it 8 or even 9. <a href="http://www.destructoid.com/review-singularity-178727.phtml" target="_blank">http://www.destructoid.com/review-singularity-178727.phtml</a>
Don't buy it on Steam, though. The PC version has a texture streaming bug, and the unofficial patch that fixes it doesn't work with the Steam version. Also, doesn't make much difference whether you get it on console or PC, the PC has no extra graphic features or anything.
It's an entertaining first person shooter that rips off loads of other games, such as Bioshock, Half-Life, TimeSplitters, etc etc. I thoroughly enjoyed the singleplayer game, it felt like a better Bioshock 2 than the actual Bioshock 2. Plus I love anything to do with time travel and this game has lots of fun with messing with time.
The multiplayer has a team of humans versus a team of creatures, and while other people said it's a rip off of Left 4 Dead versus mode or AvP, to me it seemed more like a rip off of Natural Selection!
The real Natural Selection is a much deeper and more interesting game, but Singularity's multiplayer is good for a laugh. It's like "Natural Selection lite", like NS1's combat mode I suppose. It has "Extermination" mode in which the humans try to capture a series of beacons in order, and a plain deathmatch "Creatures versus Soldiers". The deathmatch isn't that good but the Extermination mode with the beacons is excellent fun.
I'm not sure if the developers were actually influenced by Natural Selection or not. It's quite common for sci-fi FPS games to feature both human enemies and monsters in singleplayer, but it is rare for the multiplayer to do humans versus monsters. Especially where the monsters are very different to humans. But the fact that as the soldiers capture each beacon in Extermination mode they get closer to the Hive and the walls are covered in organic material looked very Natural Selection-esque.
The creatures are great. My favourite is the Phase Tick, which reminds me of the Skulk in NS. It is all about surprising enemies. You can climb walls and ceilings, and you can do long aimed leaps. If you see a lone soldier on his own, then you can leap on him after a few seconds of depleting his health bar you possess his body, and turn his guns and abilities against his teammates! And if it is a group of enemies, then instead you can charge up for a few seconds and then explode the sack on the back of your body. Doesn't hurt you, hurts everyone around you like a grenade. Another favourite class of mine can puke all over the place, hurting enemies but healing allies. And there's a massive tank like monster too.
It's a game developed by Raven and published by Activision. For the past decade their games have all been sequels to other people's games (Quake 4, Wolfenstein, etc etc), it's the first new IP in ages. It was released with absolutely no advertising or marketing whatsoever, and the description and images on the back of the box are rubbish. I guess because Activision wants to turn Raven into a studio for making Call of Duty mappacks and so are perfectly happy for the game to flop. But it looks like it may be a sleeper hit as the most negative reviews (like the harsh Edge magazine) gave it 6, while most sites have given it 8 or even 9. <a href="http://www.destructoid.com/review-singularity-178727.phtml" target="_blank">http://www.destructoid.com/review-singularity-178727.phtml</a>
Don't buy it on Steam, though. The PC version has a texture streaming bug, and the unofficial patch that fixes it doesn't work with the Steam version. Also, doesn't make much difference whether you get it on console or PC, the PC has no extra graphic features or anything.