New Syndicate game - My thoughts before playing

[kopite]

Hey all,

I`ve read a few reviews and watched a few videos of this and to me it looks like a total rip off of deus ex human revolution even down to the storyline and locations.

None of the reviews I`ve read have mentioned this so i`m wondering if I`m alone in this thinking?

As I`ve said I havent played the new syndicate yet(Loved the original on amiga ) but
Both games are based around augments although in syndicate they are called Biochips.
Both games seem to be based at the beginning of the tech coming into use.
Both have lame boss battles,
Noth are set in near future worlds with big tower blocks and neon night clubs
Both have big companies battling it out for control.

I know a lot of games have similarities but I sat watching the video review on Gametrailers and couldnt help thinking that starbreeze have just taken every idea of Deus ex and re-used it with only minor tweaks.

The only major difference I can see if the Squad based structure of syndicate. I know fps games are the daddy nowadays and have been for a while Hut surely doing it closer to the original game style would have sold well instead of just using the name to sell a deus ex clone?

[Ferral]

The Eurogamer review mentions DXHR towards the end if my mind serves me right.

Agree with what you are saying, it does look like DX in so many ways. Main difference I think is the fact the DX goes into 3rd person when doing stealth.

Syndicate does have a full co op campaign which looks like that could be interesting as it was 4 man teams on the origional.

I think I will be picking it up at somepoint, I loved DXHR from start to finish, just couldnt put it down. If this turns out to be similar in the way it plays and is engaging enough it should be half decent. Starbreeze are a pretty good developer usually which puts the ball right where they want it. People will buy this not only because its Syndicate but also because of the developer.

[Pob255]

I'm not sure but it looks like they are not using cover based shooting, it's old style, ie stand behind something not put a button to glue your back to that chest high wall, which I like.

It looks a lot more FPS with some upgrade options than the slightly more rpg style of DX

To this

Both are set in near future worlds with big tower blocks and neon night clubs
Both have big companies battling it out for control.

Ummm they are both cyberpunk games, the originals both of them where probably the two biggest classic cyberpunk games.
And those two lines basically describe cyberpunk without forgetting Cybernetic enhancements of course.

I do hope there's a bit more variation in environments, to include the more run down areas of the sprawl and some industrial areas. Arcologies would be a nice touch.
Show the full contrast of the have and have not nature of the corporate state environment.

I also hope they don't try to do a goody/bady type story line, an agent's sole role is basically black op's and wet work so don't try to put a nice spin on it, yes the corporation's public relations department will do that for the public image, but your an agent doing wet work.
If they have a story where part way though you suddenly discover the corporation isn't doing this for the good of humanity and all the little fluffy bunnies and then have to fight against the evil corporation, I will be MASSIVELY disappointed.

[OilSheikh]

Yup, agree with you. Its a DEUSEX copy but at least everything's not golden in colour

[Pob255]

Saying it's a copy is not quite right, because of development times, no way has this been made since the release of DX, it's more that two games developed by different companies around the same time are going to be very similar.
If this had come out first would we be saying DX is a copy?

DX does have a big advantage in that the original game was a similar format where as the original syndicate was a very different game.

It's a big shame they've not gone a step more like 2k has with x-com and produce a 2nd game at the same time that's a revamp of the original.

[Blademrk]

From the reviews I've read, single player was meh, although co-op was a bit more fun and opened up a few more tactics.

[RichieLee]

I loved the original on Amiga, I'm pretty interested to see what this one is like.

[kopite]

You are right Pob255 that both being cyberpunk doesnt give much scope for change and also that they would have both been in production at the same time so its more than likely coincidence.

I think my main gripe is that the original syndicate and syndicate wars where so good because imo they wherent Just copying what was the popular game format at the time. IIRC the original came out when Platformers where the norm and Syndicate wars was FPS.

This just seems to me like a cyber punk FPS that they tagged on the Syndicate name in the hope of selling more copies.

[obliviondoll]

The original Deus Ex came later than the original Syndicate.

When making Deus Ex, the developers specifically referred to Syndicate as one of their inspirations.

I think taking some measure of inspiration from HR is legitimate, and it's a VERY different game experience.

Deus Ex is first and foremost a stealth-RPG that happens to mostly be played from first person (with some third person cover-based gameplay. Syndicate is at its core a First Person Shooter. There is an upgrade system built into your chip, and there are hacking actions which LOOK similar on the surface, but the gameplay of the two games is about as vastly different as it can be between two first person games.

And most the art style came from Syndicate before it came from Deus Ex, so you can't really say it's ripping that off.

[Pob255]

Syndicate wars was a squad based RTS like the original syndicate, back before C&C, warcraft & starcraft had made RTS really popular.

As I said before it's a really big shame they are not doing the same as 2k games
2k is making a new x-com game but are making an FPS, there was a big fan out cry over that (and I think there made well of been some internal outcry too) so they handed it over to Firaxis, who they own, and basically said do a remake of the original to keep the fans happy while we get on with this FPS.

I doubt the remake will out sell the fps, lets face it the publicity is going behind the fps but I would of loved it if they did the same with syndicate, but then again this is EA we're talking about here.

[obliviondoll]

Dune II (ACTUALLY what first popularised RTS games): 1992
Warcraft: 1994
Command and Conquer: 1995
Syndicate Wars: 1996

Pretty sure your dates are off.

And it was actually a point-and-click shooter, the term RTS would NEVER have been used for Syndicate or Syndicate Wars when they came out. It's only modern convention of thinking any top down point and click game = RTS that gets people saying that. It's about small-scale TACTICS, and it's about SHOOTING. It's NOT about STRATEGY. The strategy layer is distinctly separate from core gameplay.

It's more Cannon Fodder than Warcraft or Dune.

I still think a "proper" remake of the original would be nice, but this is actually pretty true to the source material - although FAR moreso in co-op...

[Pob255]

Dune II (ACTUALLY what first popularised RTS games): 1992
Warcraft: 1994
Command and Conquer: 1995
Syndicate Wars: 1996

dune2 never popularised RTS, it did set the mold for what would become the RTS genre. It was C&C that did popularise RTS granted it was a year before syndicate wars, but the original syndicate was 93 and predates it, but it really wasn't until the mid 90's that RTS came to mean something that followed the structure laid down by westwood in 92 with Dune2

RTS, or Real Time Strategy, was just any top down game, where you gave orders to units in real time as apposed to turn based.
Syndicate wars was more shooter than strategy, but to say " It's about small-scale TACTICS, and it's about SHOOTING." is non-sense, because at the same time you'd really have to question games like C&C esp on the commando missions, but still the amount of micro management needed and short term mission structure makes these more tactical than strategy.
Yes syndicate give you more control and therefore micromanagement of your units and there's no building stuff in the missions but building stuff doesn't make a game strategic and it the later levels of syndicate you had to rely on the AI
I don't think I've yet seen a really strategic RTS and in many way the whole genre should be renamed RTT

However back to the original topic, I do agree with you on the difference between syndicate (2012) and dues ex (2011), the new syndicate is far more of an FPS.

I'm still debating over getting it, I saw the zeropunctuation review/rant http://www.escapistmagazine.com/vide...5478-Syndicate I never take them at face value and I think he would hate it it you based you computer game buying based on his ramblings, however I do find he's got the habbit of exposing the key weaknesses of a game.
So I decided to check out a lets play and after finding a slightly less annoying one that didn't have me shouting at the monitor over the levels of idiocy displayed, I started watching.
Now the big reason for spoiling a game for my self this way was the sentence "but the rebels don't seem to have a plan beyond smashing up the towers where the big meany heads live." That was a massive FLAG to me and goes back to what I've been saying since I first heard about this fps remake.

One of the key things for me is that in the original you were the evil corporation oppressing and exploiting the masses.

What I was worried about was a stereotypical, Ooo I've been shooting so many nameless guards that I never realised how evil the corporation I was working for was.
Now I must bring them down because they are evil and exploiting people.

Guess which way they went with the story? it rather sickens me, because the game looks fun and the sort I would like, ok minus the stupidly high bloom levels, quicktime events and regenerating health.
Bloom should be reduce-able in the options, there don't seem to be too many QT's (but why do you have to mash a button to open a door instead of hold it down) but the regening health is something I really hate in games for me the 2 biggest tumorous growths on fps are health regen and cover based mechanics, well at least syndicate doesn't have cover based mechanics and I like the look of the way the "poke your gun round the corner" works which they've used instead.

[shaithis]

Meh, populous was the RTS that I remember being first - 1989!

[Pob255]

Meh, populous was the RTS that I remember being first - 1989!

excellent example of a non-dune2 mechanic RTS, and part of my point that it was the later games that cemented the "RTS genre" to one type of game and why I would call the original syndicate an RTS game.

[obliviondoll]

Dune 2 started RTS games becoming popular. Its success was why Blizzard made Warcraft in the first place. Warcraft and Command and Conquer were BOTH building off the popularity of Dune 2.

And for the record, the Commando missions in C&C were actually described as "shooter missions" by several reviews in different PC gaming magazines I read before buying the game. And the "Covert Ops" expansion was described as "a shooter in RTS clothing" by some of them as well. Another shooter with the same style of gameplay is Cannon Fodder, though that had even less player control and micromanagement than the C&C Commando missions.

So yes, making the new game a shooter IS still sticking to the mold of the original, like I said.

I won't argue much in support of the single player, and I particularly won't try to defend the story, except to say that the story in Co-Op is better told by virtue of forcing less personality on the corporations and NPCs. But seriously, the Co-Op, if you have even a vaguely competent team, feels VERY much like you're playing the old Syndicate games at ground level. It's different, but it feels like the same type of gameplay in a lot of ways.

I'm not arguing that all RTS games have to have base building. Endwar is a base-free RTS game, and it's still part of the genre. Populous, while good (it was already old when I played it, but I still played it. And the sequel), never got the kind of attention that Dune 2 managed to pick up, but they're also still good examples of RTS gameplay. But Syndicate was about action, and was more of a shooter.

[Pob255]

No Dune2 was popular but did not create the wide spread popularity that c&c did, and it was the popularity of c&c after dune2 (both from westwood) that formed the structure of the "RTS genre" that blizzard copied for warcraft
And that's the point, these games defined the genre, before them the was no "RTS genre" heck dune2 was originally refereed to as a "god game" by some, slotting it in with populous, sim city and such, or just as a strategy game.
Because one game is not a genre it's when other games come out using the same basic mechanics and structure that a genre is formed.

For the first couple of missions you could say it's a shooter, but it's all the stuff outside outside of the missions that start to separate it, the research, the unit management, the region management and the non-linear mission selection
Combined with the later harder missions where you could not play it as a shooter, if you didn't let the AI control the shooting and take more of a micro management role than a direct control role on a mission like the oil rig, then you'd last less than a minute.

Yes syndicate is more shootery than most RTS and RTT is probably a better genre for it, but I think dune2 and c&c would also be better called RTT, but the term RTT didn't come about until later.

In the same way you could say that cannon fodder is not a shooter, because it lacks a key part of shooters namely direct control of the player unit.

Genres are not hard and fast and most games actually blur the boundaries, but Genres are a non-quantitative division made of opinion.
You could call syndicate a cyberpunk corporate sim, that's probably the most accurate genre for it.

We're getting at cross points here anyway, I have no objection to a the new syndicate being an fsp, what I don't like it the lazy storytelling which could could of been so much more than the tired, uninspired predictable rubbish it was.