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Got my first two hours under my belt last night and my overall impressions of the game were pretty positive despite a game breaking glitch I encountered early on which wouldn't let me connect to any servers. It happened, I think, because a server I tried joining shutdown/disconnected just as I was connecting to it which somehow glitched my ability to connect to other servers. I had to re-log Steam entirely but after that my server connections were really quick and I had no issues with it. On that note though, the server and friend system is all built upon Steamworks so if you are anything like I am with a vast network of online FPS buddies then getting into games with your friends conveniently with the Steam friend system will be a very nice asset.

Teamwork is encouraged a lot. Medics and Engineers can buff health and gun damage by running up to teammates and performing an action on them. I was kept really busy with all the people getting rocked as a medic. I would say it is faster paced than W:ET or ET:QW ever was.

The maps so far have felt a bit small and at times claustrophobic to me in a few odd places. Maybe my parkouring is just not up to par yet and I am not exploring by thinking out of the box.

I think anyone who was a fan of W:ET or ET:QWs could jump on board with this and be into it instantly.

Maybe I would buy it, if PSN wasn't still down.

Kanluwen wrote:I didn't know you were starting to hallucinate.

You wish - I rock your odd balls!

I'll be able to review it for you by the time you finish at work, hopefully. UPS says it's on truck for delivery.

Look on the brightside. At least you won't be cajoled into joining me for the Gears 3 Beta again?

Yeah, now I remember why I never played the other ones in multiplayer. Bloody shotguns! I don't really feel the time it would take to get used to the gameplay would be rewarded by the actual multiplayer experience. Though I do like the Reach-esque "ribbons".

SilverMK2 wrote:

Kanluwen wrote:I didn't know you were starting to hallucinate.

You wish - I rock your odd balls!

And this is why inside jokes don't work in public!

I'll be able to review it for you by the time you finish at work, hopefully. UPS says it's on truck for delivery.

Look on the brightside. At least you won't be cajoled into joining me for the Gears 3 Beta again?

Yeah, now I remember why I never played the other ones in multiplayer. Bloody shotguns! I don't really feel the time it would take to get used to the gameplay would be rewarded by the actual multiplayer experience. Though I do like the Reach-esque "ribbons".

Thankfully: we'll have campaign and Hordes, am I right?

Already pre-ordered it.
Game says it is being shipped today.
I have high hopes that it will rock something hard.

Wheres the demo on XBL?

Would have liked to try it out.

Is there one?
Haven't been able to go on my Xbox recently so i wouldn't know.

There's not a demo as far as I've seen.

Red Faction: Armageddon just got one though.

Curse you broken tv...
I want to play that demo so badly...

Those of you with potential interest in the game, but who haven't bought it yet, might be interested in this (and those who have bought it may be interested as well):

http://www.gamespot.com/features/6312552/index.html?tag=gameguide%3Btitle%3B1

It is a primer that includes a list of all of the abilities for each class, all of the weapons and weapon attatchments, a rundown of each map, the quickest way to win challenges, and a list of achievements for the game.

I'll give my full review as soon as I feel that I am able to. My initial impressions are that the learning curve is fairly steep for an FPS. There are a few tutorials here and there, but most of them are fairly advanced; there's a reason they're called challenges. Learning the game in itself is rewarding, though. When I first picked it up, I never thought I'd be able to utilize the multi-faceted HUD in any effective way. After a few hours with it, I'm amazed how all of it works together in tandem and how I'm able to process all of this information with such efficiency (due to it's briliiant design).

After I got over the learning hump, I found that Brink is the most incredibly satisfying first-person shooter I've ever played. The game is balanced perfectly. You can withstand enough damage that a firefight becomes entirely tactical instead of based on twitch reaction, and is often based on your strategy and mobility more than your aim. The game still rewards good aim more than spraying and praying, but you will never suffer a single-shot kill for any reason. If you keep on the move and keep your wits about you (and your teammates close), you'll survive.

The game requires team cooperation much more than any other shooter I've played, but it does such a good job of feeding you incremental bonuses for you efforts that you actually find yourself wanting to support your team as much as possible, instead of feeling forced into it. Streaks are much more satisfying to me than in a lone-wolf twitch shooter, as they are based on your team's support as much as your reflexes. You actually feel proud of your entire team when you're able to score numerous kills in a row, every single time.

The abilities all seem to be significant enough that there aren't any that won't be used by someone in some sort of build. You have the capability of playing any way you want to, but the game still has an incredible sense of balance. Though the list of abilities may not seem very expansive, they are incredibly well-thought-out and won't give anyone a ridiculous advantage, or cause any FOTM builds (as far as I know). Most of your choices will be based on your intuition and playstyle instead of desired overall power. It's like an extended perk system that meshes together incredibly well without anything feeling so overpowered that you can't handle it. The classes all play very differently from one another, and play off of each other very well.

Though there are only 8 maps, they are incredibly well-designed for balance and to take advantage of the ridiculously fluid and intuitive SMART system without making it seem too powerful in any given situation. The maps are also two to three times bigger than your average FPS map, and they have four times as many objectives at any given time (There may be a defense mission going on in the middle of a capture the flag mission). This gives the game a sort of sandbox FPS feel (that goes well with the character customization aspect) while remaining concise and retaining the great design aspects of a small-scale FPS. It is impossible to spawn camp the opposing team's main respawn point, and the maps constantly change hands based on capturable control points that can also provide small bonuses to your team. Though you never feel overwhelmed because of these bonuses, they still serve as incentive to capture them.

Brink does a great job of rewarding you. You strive for every achievement not for some pointless score, but because you always get something awesome and tangible for achieving any goal. The XP system is constantly feeding you points for even the smallest little thing (though it is scaled well and entirely dependant on how much of an impact your actions have), which serves to always guide you to be helpful in some manner without feeling forceful. It is perfectly possible to level up without firing a bullet as a medic, for example (though you probably won't do that, just saying).

The art design is wonderful without being invasive. I've never played a shooter that has looked or felt quite like Brink, which will serve as a good thing to most people (the FPS genre is pretty artistically stagnant, drowning in 'grey and brown marines' these days). The world is surprisingly colorful without losing the feel of a world that is slowly reaching it's impending doom. The menus are all very clean, and the included music is amazing (and changes depending on your faction). The sound effects are all very well done; each weapon sounds perfectly appropriate, despite the fact that they're all fictional with basis in reality, and the game gives subtle and organic audio clues depending on the situation. The storyline is amazing without interrupting the gameplay (this is a multiplayer-centric game, after all). You get little bits and pieces at a time, but they are incredibly effective for how short each scene is. There is lots of room for more, but the way the story is told makes it possible for it to run out of order.

The only thing I'm remotely disappointed by so far is the lack of appearance options. Though there are enough, there are not as many as I thought there would be. At the very least, it is practically impossible to make a bad-looking avatar. Everything 'fits' together in a way, so no matter what you do, you're pretty much always going to look badass. There are plenty of coordinating color schemes to pick from, which is a nice touch.

These are just my initial impressions, though. Time may tell a different story, but at this point, I can only see myself loving the game more the more I play it. It seems almost impossible to have the same experience twice with Brink.

Splash Damage, I salute you.

EDIT: I forgot to add that this game is incredibly well-optimized for the PC (which is surprising, seeing as how they used id's engine to develop it). It runs better than most games do on my PC, but it looks better than most of the games that I own. I experience a bit of screen tearing here and there (and there aren't many complex options for optimization), but it runs at a solid 30 FPS and looks absolutely amazing.

I hope to get Brink... it looks bloody awesome.

Chrysaor686 wrote:There may be a certain time of day when the game will actually become 'active'. Usually, preloads do not work directly at midnight (though they should, in theory). It is possible that they don't want to give an unfair advantage to people who bought it directly from Steam instead of pre-ordering it at a retailer.

If Steam is letting you play it, but it crashes when you boot the game up, you may want to try reinstalling it.

Did that, still the same gak. I told Steam about this issue, but they haven't gotten back to me.

Aaaand...the reviewers have let the hammer fall hard, damning this game to obscurity.

What a shame. It's the most fun I've ever had with a first person shooter, and I have experienced none of the glitches or problems that are described in the majority of reviews within my 12 straight hours of playtime (the game has run flawlessly; I've only encountered a single glitch this entire time, and everything else has been delivered exactly as advertised). This must mean a shoddy console port; cut your losses and go with the PC version if you can.

The best I can hope for is cult-classic status at this point. Hopefully, positive player reviews far outweigh the ridiculously negative professional reviews that this game has received.

Every game has problems just after release...
Some games have more problems than others.

Chrysaor686 wrote:Aaaand...the reviewers have let the hammer fall hard, damning this game to obscurity.

What a shame. It's the most fun I've ever had with a first person shooter, and I have experienced none of the glitches or problems that are described in the majority of reviews within my 12 straight hours of playtime (the game has run flawlessly; I've only encountered a single glitch this entire time, and everything else has been delivered exactly as advertised). This must mean a shoddy console port; cut your losses and go with the PC version if you can.

The best I can hope for is cult-classic status at this point. Hopefully, positive player reviews far outweigh the ridiculously negative professional reviews that this game has received.

I didn't wanna hear that. It can't be THAT bad. I mean Mass Effect is probably the shining example of how terribly buggy a pc game can be compared to it's console counter parts. Like textures on a planet filled with lava valleys suddenly disappearing, driving the Mako across an infinite sea of non-existent textures! Or Garrus's face losing texture on the stats screen which now looks like he was a terrible burn victim.

Yea, reviews haven't been kind. This is why I wanted a demo!

I've seen just as many points brought of on strange design decisions within the game as complaints about bugs. Like the single player that's really just multiplayer matches, that's like Quake 3: Arena right there!

does it support eyefinity?

Highly interested in maybe picking it up

Chrysaor686 wrote:Aaaand...the reviewers have let the hammer fall hard, damning this game to obscurity.

What a shame. It's the most fun I've ever had with a first person shooter, and I have experienced none of the glitches or problems that are described in the majority of reviews within my 12 straight hours of playtime (the game has run flawlessly; I've only encountered a single glitch this entire time, and everything else has been delivered exactly as advertised). This must mean a shoddy console port; cut your losses and go with the PC version if you can.

The best I can hope for is cult-classic status at this point. Hopefully, positive player reviews far outweigh the ridiculously negative professional reviews that this game has received.

To be fair it seems as if the independent critics and user reviews are scoring the came significantly higher than the major game sites. For example Gamespot rates it 6/10, while both the critics and user reviews put it at 7.3/4.

Indeed, a summation can be found here: http://uk.gamespot.com/xbox360/action/brink/review.html?mode=web

(BRINK PC GAMERS)
Has anyone else run into the same problem as I have? I re-installed Brink and it still crashes as soon as the game loads up. I have downloaded new drivers for my video card and checked to see if it was doing the same for other games, but all my other games run just fine. WHAT THE HELL, STEAM?!

DickBandit wrote:(BRINK PC GAMERS)
Has anyone else run into the same problem as I have? I re-installed Brink and it still crashes as soon as the game loads up. I have downloaded new drivers for my video card and checked to see if it was doing the same for other games, but all my other games run just fine. WHAT THE HELL, STEAM?!

you probably are having a config issue and have steam cloud enabled so it is copying the settings causing the issues on startup/reinstall.

Got it today...
Seemed fine, the SMART system will take some getting used too but apart from that no problems...

purplefood wrote:Got it today...
Seemed fine, the SMART system will take some getting used too but apart from that no problems...

Really? I found SMART to be incredibly smooth and intuitive. I still have to work on my efficiency a bit (jumping before I vault over an object, sliding when I hit the ground, etc.), but SMART does exactly what I want it to 95% of the time with hardly any effort from me whatsoever.

At any rate, it's nowhere near as difficult as Mirror's Edge's movment system (which had an entire controller dedicated to every function), but SMART is almost as effective while only using two buttons total.

You'll probably get the hang of it in a couple hours. Just wait until you hit level 7 and unlock the Light Body Type. That's when SMART really shines.

Chrysaor686 wrote:

purplefood wrote:Got it today...
Seemed fine, the SMART system will take some getting used too but apart from that no problems...

Really? I found SMART to be incredibly smooth and intuitive. I still have to work on my efficiency a bit (jumping before I vault over an object, sliding when I hit the ground, etc.), but SMART does exactly what I want it to 95% of the time with hardly any effort from me whatsoever.

At any rate, it's nowhere near as difficult as Mirror's Edge's movment system (which had an entire controller dedicated to every function), but SMART is almost as effective while only using two buttons total.

You'll probably get the hang of it in a couple hours. Just wait until you hit level 7 and unlock the Light Body Type. That's when SMART really shines.

No as in getting used to using it...
It's fine when i'm using it but i keep forgetting to make use of it...

If I did get it, it would be on my PS3, so thats obviously out as of right now lol

Im itching with excitement right now, going to the store tommorow to pick up a copy... I want SMART and teamwork... Screw the reviews, often times they compare games which they shouldn't, I.E. CoD to Brink, they are TWO DIFFERENT GAMES, yes, you can compare sound, but they function completly different from one another.

Picked it up today. I must admit, I am impressed, after reading some of the reviews on the net, I wasn't expecting much.

The offline, single-player campaign is pretty mediocore, the gameplay REALLY doesn't suit bot teammates, and is a little drab (no characters, poor story and unimaginative campaign mission layout. Note: same layout works great in MP and co-op) . The online is where it's at.

Played a few 'free play' games with 3 friends and myself, which was really fun. The teamwork is great, and objectives are always open to all classes and team members, the gameplay never stops and is always free-flowing.

The single player challenges are good fun, when completed they unlock better guns and attachments for all weapons. They can also be done in up to 4 player co-op but minus the weapons and attachment rewards.

The ONE thing that lets the game down is the connection in ANY online match. It is terrible, we got lag spikes every minute or so, no matter the host (hosting in other games was fine). I REALLY hope they sort this out, as it is very enjoyable in co-op online!

Definitely worth the rent!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
The review that IGN gave, was it a 6.something? Single player is deserving of that, but co-op and online is far better - a solid 7/8 (sans lag).

KingCracker wrote:If I did get it, it would be on my PS3, so thats obviously out as of right now lol

Same for me. How are the graphics? The advert I saw on TV made the graphics look quite bad and unrealistic...

Lord Rogukiel wrote:

KingCracker wrote:If I did get it, it would be on my PS3, so thats obviously out as of right now lol

Same for me. How are the graphics? The advert I saw on TV made the graphics look quite bad and unrealistic...

They are highly stylised if that is what you mean.

Got it, and it is AWESOME!
Almost endlessly customizable and really fun online.
I got it for xbox as I can't play PC games for ****, no coordination at all. If you are considering getting it, stop and get it NOW!
'fanboy rant over'

Aquaterry

I sincerely hate all of you. I'm the only one who still has problems. I haven't even been able to look at the freakin' title screen. I've verified the file cache 10,000 times. Re-re-re-re-re-re-re-redownloaded it. Updated Steam every two seconds. Install new video card drivers. Like what more can I do? I told Steam about it and they basically said "Sucks for you, THIS GAME IS GRRRRRRRRRREAT!!" So I then went straight to Bethesda and sent them a freakin message last week. STILL NO RESPONSE!! I'm gonna crucify every Bethesda staff member.