Spec Ops: The Line Multiplayer Early Preview

After taking a peek at a number of videos featuring Spec Ops: The Line and what its multiplayer will be bring to the table, I wasn’t as impressed as with its single player.

A successful game usually sells itself by replayability. A selling point that people use to justify spending their hard early cash. This can come in the form of a versatile single slayer or a relatively decent multiplayer. In The Line, it’s quite clear that a huge amount of effort has gone into its single player, with the player making game changing decisions that will have an effect on the rest of the story. Meaning any repeat plays allow the player to try out new tactics each time.

However the multiplayer is certainly shaping up to be a sorry consolation of a mode. What would have been revolutionary before Call of Duty 4 is now incorporated into a game of the year 2012. It has all been done before, and better, it has to be said. If I want class based options and perks with a couple of hap-dash environmental causes of death, that can be easily avoided after playing the game for a while, I’ll play COD. If I want to kill people without shooting them, I’ll destroy the building they’re holding up in, with Battlefield 3 as my platform; allowing for much more creative deaths that aren’t brought on by preset animations.

Multiplayer can add years onto a games lifespan when done right. Yet it must offer something very different. Right now Spec Ops: The Line is selling its multiplayer as a team based shooter. By team based, 2K games want you to know that you can run around with your team. Holy Crap. I don’t see this as team based gameplay.

Team based gameplay is what’s being revolutionised by Ghost Recon: Future Soldier. They’ve brought in completely original features such data hacking (stunning an enemy, then hacking into his data to reveal enemy positions. They’ve also incorporated an extremely advanced suppression system, along with well cut out cover mechanics to balance this.

What does Spec Ops offer? Rainbow Six Vegas with sandstorms. This comparison to RSV is a huge compliment. Rainbow Six is from another era of gaming – a golden era where developers went on their own initiative, striving for a brighter future.

Spec Ops: The Line will fail just like its predecessors if the ideas aren’t bucked up, fast.