The Finals Review - An Explosive Game Show

I wasn't sold on The Finals after playing my first match. A single game obviously isn't enough time to come to any worthwhile conclusions, but still, after playing through its brief tutorial--which does a poor job of explaining the game's concepts--I initially felt lost and underwhelmed. Fortunately, this feeling didn't last, and after a few more games, The Finals had its hooks dug in deep. As a fan of the Battlefield series, this wasn't much of a surprise; The Finals is a team-based first-person-shooter with an emphasis on destruction and mayhem, developed by Embark Studios, which counts a number of Battlefield alumni among its ranks. The two games aren't at all similar in a broader sense, but Battlefield's DNA is present throughout, from its snappy shooting to its chaotic destruction.

One key difference between The Finals and most other competitive shooters is that it pits multiple teams of three players against each other, either in 3v3v3 or 3v3v3v3 matches. This multi-team setup leads to a consistent stream of dynamic firefights as each squad vies for control of The Finals' all-important cash. You end up fighting the defending team as they desperately try to hold on, while also scrapping with your fellow attackers, contributing to the game's palpable sense of outright bedlam. It's a vibrant and colorful shooter, too, augmenting its over-the-top action with a game-show-infused style, featuring a rambunctious crowd and excitable play-by-play announcers. Think 1987's The Running Man but with frantic gun battles. The controversial implementation of AI voicework is the only sore topic relating to the game's aesthetic. It's not particularly noticeable, but each line is fairly one-note so the AI doesn't have to extend itself, and either way, its use still feels gross.

There are currently two main modes to facilitate all of this chaos. Quick Cash sees three teams battling for possession of a vault filled with money, which must then be taken to a designated Cashout Station to be deposited. It's kind of like a mixture between Capture the Flag and King of the Hill, typically resulting in all three squads converging on one location for an all-out slaughter. Whoever inserts the vault into the Cashout Station starts a timer that'll bank all of the cash when it runs out, but any of the other teams can steal the deposit without resetting the countdown's progress. This quickly establishes a thrilling sense of forward momentum, primarily because it eliminates the possibility of a stalemate and ensures that the action maintains its rapid pace. There are few moments as satisfying as managing to steal the Cashout Point at the last possible second and banking all of the winnings for your team. The only thing that comes close is successfully fighting back the hordes and defending the point for a prolonged period of time as the world comes crashing down around you.

Continue Reading at GameSpot

source https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/the-finals-review-an-explosive-game-show/1900-6418164/?ftag=CAD-01-10abi2f

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Godfall Review

Godfall makes a good first impression. Even if you're playing on a moderately powerful PC, as I did, it's clear from the opening moments that developer Counterplay Games has endeavored to show off advancements in visual fidelity, no doubt in light of new hardware such as the PlayStation 5. From the way sparks fly to the myriad particles that coat every inch of its action and the reflectiveness of its gaudy gold and marble halls, Godfall wants you to know that next gen is here. Beyond the visual spectacle, however, lies a game that's immediately familiar and over-reliant on an amalgamation of loot-driven games from the past eight years or so. Godfall's mixture of loot progression and third-person melee combat has been described by Counterplay Games as a new type of genre: the looter-slasher. The name holds up insofar as you loot and slash things, but there's nothing about Godfall that feels intrinsically new. Diablo, Monster Hunter, and Warframe make up a portion o...
Read more

Days Gone Review - Farewell, Oregon

Image
Editor's Note: In May 2021, Sony ported Days Gone to PC. In addition to compiling two years' worth of updates since the 2019 game's initial launch, the Windows version offers opportunities for enhanced graphics and performance with more powerful gaming PCs. Mike Epstein delivers his impressions on the game's technical improvements and how they may change your experience playing the PC version of Days Gone. GameSpot's original review for Days Gone is below in full and the assessment for the PC version is integrated at the end. This review contains minor spoilers about mission structure and overall story direction. There are no spoilers for major narrative moments. Around 10 hours into Days Gone , you're thrown into a hunting tutorial apropos of nothing. The over-the-top libertarian character takes you out with a rifle and shows you how to track a deer, although you've already had a tracking tutorial. You're then tasked with getting more meat for you an...
Read more

Nioh 2 Review - Get Good And Die Trying

Nioh 2 is not to be trifled with. Building on the original's tough-as-nails reputation, Team Ninja's second samurai action-RPG brings back the original's penchant for punishing and highly nuanced combat. The sequel hones the original's distinctive take on the Souls-like without completely reinventing itself. The result is a long, tough slog that will push even the most challenge-hungry players to their breaking points as they fight for every inch of ground and become master samurai. Despite the title, Nioh 2 is a prequel, revealing the secret history of a decades-long period of war in medieval Japan. As the silent, customizable hero Hide, you fight to uncover the secret nature of "spirit stones," which grant supernatural power, and defeat hordes of Yokai across the country. The plot, which you mostly hear through cutscenes and exposition between missions, has an interesting historical bent, but it is really just glue to hold the levels together. Historically...
Read more