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  1. 007: Night Fire – E3 Coverage

    By David Winter on 2002-05-23

    This year's E3 has seen some great upcoming games; Command & Conquer Generals, Age of Mythology and many more (well, them two are my most eagarly awaited games!).

    …oh, and not forgetting Nightfire – by Gearbox Software (creators of Half Life)!

    Top PC gaming sites, IGN and Gamespot have both given their impressions on the game featured at E3, so check them out:

    IGN: [link]
    Gamespot: [link]

    Here are some small tasters:

    IGN:

    There are tons of scripted events in the game, but the play is by no means linear. In fact, gamers can attack the same objective in several different ways. For example, in the first level, Bond must gain access to the castle in the background and sneak inside to attend a party, but he can't just walk through the front door as it's heavily guarded. Smart players will quickly notice that a nearby bridge enables their agent to jump down and onto a moving truck below — the vehicle will drive right into the enemy compound and Bond will be inside. However, there is another route: players can alternatively walk out into the woods and to the edge of the castle. From there, they can skirt around the structure, careful to avoid guards and enemy helicopters, until they come to a second-story ledge and a window that grants them access inside. Either way works — it's just a matter of player preference. Indeed, on some levels, Bond will need to be stealthy while in others he might find it beneficial to straight out attack the enemy.

    This gives me some great faith in the game. With all the other console games (other than GoldenEye), I felt that the gameplay was very linear. With GoldenEye, you was given a level area, and you had to work here completing the objectives – running back and forth. With The World Is Not Enough (as an example of the other four), you had a path, and that path had to be followed if you wanted to complete the missions, you couldn't make big choices on your actions.

    Gamespot:

    We're told that the game will have more than 20 missions, focusing on both single-player and multiplayer, and that the PC version of the game will have bonus content that the Xbox version won't.

    That's just a small snippet from the article on Gamespot, but points out one of the advantages to having the game on the PC, rather than a console version. Although it sounds as though this "bonus content" will come with the game, additional content, such as multiplayer levels will hopefully (depending on the mod capabilites) be available for download. Also a level editior, which will allow for fans of the game to create their own custom maps. Many other "extras" are available to PC versions of games over consoles, the main reason why I've refused to buy a console. However, this is my own speculation, but most game developers nowadays do include the option for mods. We'll just have to wait and see – fingers crossed.