Hard Reset is an action-packed, single-player shooter. Set in a beautifully realized cyberpunk city, it emphasizes over-the-top destruction and gives you a large variety of weapons to dispatch hordes of enemies. Featuring a cyberpunk plot that drawis inspiration from William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, and Philip K. Dick, especially Blade Runner and Screamers. The world as we know it ceased to exist. Humanity is at the verge of extinction, living in the last closed city of Bezoar. Mankind wages war against the machines controlling vast areas of what became the 'Barrens'. Machines want to control and assimilate 'The Sanctuary' a network that holds billions of digitalized human minds. Our hero, Maj. Fletcher, is a soldier of CLN - a corporation combat unit, established to protect the city. Machines are constantly assaulting the walls of Bezoar. Fletcher moves in when Bezoar's protective barrier is breached.
You know I hate when studios think that Old School means cramming as much enemies as possible in one square room and then after finishing they let you go to a next corridor to do the exact same thing again.
This is fine for old games like Smash TV but once you get to FPS games like Doom you start seeing something else. Enemies are placed in a specific and deliberate way. The levels weren't corridors but were instead free to explore for keys, secrets and other things like that. You had many things to do instead of just going to the exit.
Hexen took this to a new level for FPS games by connecting open levels into one giant hub.
For a PC exclusive this game has one of the worst loading times I have ever seen in my life. Painkiller Overdose doesn't load as slow as this and that game was criticized for slow loading.
What also irritates me in this game is that you lack an ability to side-step quickly. Something that makes fast paced old school shooters is missing here and is instead replaced with slow walking and a sprint ability that lasts for short time and works only in one direction which is forward. Hell a game that came afer this: Shadow Warrior 2013 handled this much better, and that one still wasn't old school.
Now you're probably wondering, after such harsh criticism do I think this game is good? Well yes. I do actually. It is a breath of fresh air, for start the story is absolute rubbish but you can't skip any of it because the load times are so terrible. Trust me you won't understand any of it.
The weapon upgrade system is really fun, you have just two weapons but you can upgrade them to do many things. Like rocket launchers, shotguns, etc.
Also this game is a real looker, sure the textures are low res since the game is old but the style is just jaw dropping. It's packed with detail, but the sacrifice comes in linearity. This game is stupidly linear, plus it's really short.
The bosses are as stupid as in Shadow Warrior 2013. I'm not really fond of these kind of boss fights where their weak spots are glowing so hard you could get blind.
So is it a good game? Yeah! You should give it a shot, but it's not old school. It's just a breath of fresh air in sea of blunt AAA titles.
The gothic futuristic type scenery is well thought out, the enemies you face are terrifyingly fast at times and can be a real edge of the seat nail biting moment or two when trying think of the best way to combat them which makes it alot better than most linear shooters.
The cutscene cartoon style while not my cup of tea fits in well with the theme of this game, i think its good the devs didnt spend thousands of hours rendering cutscene movies and instead put the quality into the monsters and other objects etc in the game for an indy company on a much smaller budget than a AAA dev or ublisher they have exceeded my expectations.
Game play wise it is a linear fast paced shooter with a few puzzles along the way and you decide also what items / armor or weapons you will upgrade. The only thing i wish was in this was a Co Op mode perhaps, but given the price and the fun i have ahd in single player i am not complaining ratehr i just enjoyed it so much i would loved to have had an option for co op.
Worth the price, and i give it 8/10
awesome graphics, although there lacks a good story.
It's just completing levels and playing through the game, instead of getting in to the storyline.
Maybe this is because the graphics from the game is awesome an realistic, but the cutscenes are cartoonish.
feels like bioshock 2, but not as well executed
thanks best game..
Great game
✓
Lovely graphics and lots of explosions detract from the awful save system. Small areas though and not much scope for exploration. That won't stop you from coming back to it though because it's satisfyingly difficult.
3 words.
Best
Gameplay
Ever!
I think this is the direction games should go into. Fast paced with a variety of weapon combos to reduce enemies into pieces.
Not to mention the graphics are breath taking in some instances, but we all know thats not what this baby is about.
But to be honest its not nearly as good as Painkiller, there just to finicky stuff here. While it takes the horrid shared ammunition of Deus Ex IW, your always finding ammo so it never becomes a problem really. You get to upgrade yourself and your weapons but mostly its used to unlock the rest of the weapons. Theres nothing special here upgrades wise so it kind of feels a bit generic.
The main issue for me is the lack of enemies, the game just becomes boring quickly fighting the same enemies. Also there are 10 weapons but they are all represented by the 2 guns that shape shift slightly into the next gun... which seems very cookie cutter IMO.
Guns and Enemies is supposed to be the advantage of this kind of game, beside providing tons of action. So I can't really give it any higher than 8 for the lack of content.
There is a addon released that adds 6 new enemies, but you have to wade through the main game first before you get to fight them. So I'm not sure whether its worth or not.
The Story just provides you the moral right to kick ***.
Good oldschool game.