UNREAL 2: THE AWAKENING (PC)


We came, we saw, we exploded...

By MARTIN KINGSLEY

In 1997, Epic Megagames produced Unreal, a Quake-killer and rather excellent game in its own right.

With relatively high-poly models, OpenGL support, cool character design, volumetric fog, and some funky water textures, it single-handedly opened up a world beyond anything we had ever seen before, a world that did not feature zombies, lightning guns or Trent Renzor and his Nine Inch Nails.

This world was alive. Gigantic dragonflies tried to rend you asunder, 7-foot tall 6-armed green men wandered around and got blasted into chunky kibbles.

Piranha swam around in the virulent blue water, just waiting for an unsuspecting gamer to take a jump off the opening level's cliff and find that "THERE'S SOMETHING IN HERE!".

In short, the game world was alive, but everything in there was designed with a singular purpose in mind: To make sure that you weren't.

Nevertheless, Unreal had atmosphere down to a fine art. You could wander through the Vortex Rikers prison ship, lights down, sound up, with nothing but a rather weak flashlight and your natural ingenuity to guide you. Scary stuff. And I ain't even going to talk about the first time you see a Titan.

It's like: oh, alright, killed a couple of monsters, feeling pretty good about myself, strolling along…What the FLUNK is that ?! Yahhh-Garglegarglesplat!"

Sort of getting the idea? Since that fateful day in 1997, we've been granted more Unreal goodness, in the forms of Unreal Tournament, Unreal Tournament 2003 (Unreal Championship to all of you out in console land) and an extremely inconspicuous Unreal expansion pack that disappeared off the shelves in mysterious circumstances that are likely to remain mysterious for an indefinite period of time.

Unreal 2 has been in development for a long time, no doubt about it.

However, it was never given the same kind of reputation of Daikatana ("snailware") and Duke Nukem Forever ("foreverware"), as it treaded that sort of thin line between being hyped up and hushed up, with decent amounts of screenshots being unloaded upon the gaming public at measured intervals.

It's been a fact of some controversy that Unreal 2 was not actually developed by Epic Megagames per se, and instead has been coded and created by those lovely if somewhat scarce people at Legend Entertainment, best known for their Unreal-powered game Wheel of Time, based on the books of the same name by Raymond E. Feist, who in turn is best known for the Betrayal in Krondor/Antara books, which were also both turned into excellent if slightly frustrating RPGs.

Some suspicious individuals took this to mean that Unreal 2 would automatically turn out to be crud. Now Unreal 2 is here and, happily, I can say without any kind of subtlety that it's worth every penny you'll be spending to get it into your hot little hands.

The story picks up some years after the original Unreal. You are a Colonial Space Marshall, assigned to protect the outer territories of space and solve any little disputes that may arise in your tiny corner of the galaxy.

Unfortunately, spending your time "up the asshole of the universe" is not the way you wish to spend your life and you have been consistently requesting transfer to the Marines, a request that is consistently denied.

You are captain of a "rusty bucket of bolts", crewed by a strange and motley assortment of beings, consisting of a quite amusing Hex-Core pilot (imagine 20 kilos of glowing radioactive goo seated inside 300 kilos of space suit crammed with electronics and you're halfway there), Aida (your lovely and totally cynical assistant), and Isaak, (your drunkard, chain-smoking armourer).

The first time you see these guys, you become instantly endeared to them, simply because they feel so real. The way they refer to each other, talk, move and screw around is something that has to be seen to be believed. Just take a second to study Isaak quite calmly going through cigarette after cigarette after cigarette and you'll know what I mean.

Getting back to the storyline, this quiet corner of the universe is about to heat up, almost to the point of an intergalactic war. Remember the good ole' Skaarj from the original Unreal? Well, in the words of one generic horror movie villain, "THEY'RE BAAAACKKKK!" And they aren't the only ones.

To reveal anymore of the storyline would be just cruel, so I'll let you figure the rest out yourself.

The most vaunted and impressive thing about Unreal 2 has to be the engine. A slightly updated version of the UT2003 engine, this is the bee's knees of graphical beauty. Crisp textures, Inverse Kinematics, excellent lip-synch, huge poly-counts, volumetric lighting and truly impressive fog are only the tip of the iceberg.

As with the original, Legend have managed to recapture the feeling of atmosphere I talked about in relation to the original Unreal.

From your dank and somewhat rickety bucket of bolts to the planetary complex of Eden to the far reaches of deepest space, everything is beautifully designed and set up. From watching a workman clawing at the slick metal floor as he is dragged underneath a blast-proof door to staring over the railing at the Eden tower, watching the landscape so tiny beneath you.

I have no hesitation in naming Unreal 2 as one of the prettiest things I have seen in a long, long time. Of course, there is a downside to that fact (monstrous system requirements, if you hadn't guessed already).

Anyone without the help of Geforce4 and at least 1.4Ghz behind the processor is going to struggle, but those of you who have stayed on the leading bleeding edge of gaming technology will benefit greatly from all that disposable income being disposed of.

As a Colonial Marshall you, of course, have the advantage of a better damn arsenal than the poor convict from the first Unreal outing. Before I begin on the customary weapons load-out, I think it's worth mentioning the animations, some of which are quite cool.

I first noted the animations when I grabbed the Dispersion Pistol, whose secondary fire-mode is a charged-up round, which you increase in power by holding down the alternate fire button.

On-screen, you watch your Marshall's hands start to shake as the pistol starts to charge. This progresses to full body shaking, your view starting to jitter about on screen, and, finally, full power, where your arms are starting to fly all about the place and you are forced to hold the gun in place lest it fall from your grip.

This is just one example of the thought that has gone into designing The Awakening, and a good example it is too. It shows that Unreal 2 is more than just a game. It is a product of love, of caring. Someone actually cared enough to handcraft each of these animations to the point of perfection and then some. There are maybe a handful of companies in the world who would go that far, and Legend is one.

But enough with the praise, let's take a look at them there machineguns, shall we? Apart from the trusty sidearm mentioned above, you've got the standard Assault Rifle (always good in a firefight) and the Grenade Launcher, which can carry around 6 different types of ammo at once.

This is what you get to start with, but you rapidly find yourself in deep water and the armoury starts to change accordingly. Prying weapons from the cold dead tentacles of your enemies starts to become second nature after a while, and you find that you feel a certain sense of glee upon grabbing another alien weapon that looks cool but, more importantly, gives no indication as to what the hell it does, therefore necessitating that you taketh this shiny new toy and wreak havoc upon thine enemies, raining down fiery judgment from on high. Or something like that.

In an interesting twist, Legend has given you the ability to strike up conversations with different NPCs scattered through the universe, and you can then choose different conversation options.

For instance, in the combat training session cleverly disguised as a holo chamber, you can ask your virtually-there instructor "Why am I talking to a hologram?" To which he replies, "Who knows? My mother talks to her cat, so…"

Now, much has been made of the Unreal 2 AI and how it interacts with the player and the game world in general. I have to say that, in general, the AI has to be the most intimidating piece of binary brilliance since Half-Life, and that's saying something.

While the reptilian-style creatures you'll face for the first half hour of the game are not the smartest pieces of crocodile meat to ever star in a video game, they are quite capable of flanking you. It's the humanoid intelligence that really steals the show, though. They provide covering fire, work in groups, use pincer movements and give orders to each other. It's really quite something to see in action, let me tell you.

As with all good First Person Shooters, a lot of people are concerned about the multiplayer functions. Well, I say to you: never fear, as you can expect more of the same multiplayer goodness you saw in UT2003, only with the advantage of slightly better looking maps.

Bots and such are in attendance, but you really need to go online to experience online warfare as it was originally intended. On a decent Australian server, ping is really quite acceptable, despite all the things that would make you think otherwise (systemrequirementscough).

Unreal 2: The Awakening has lived up to the hype. Legend and Epic Megagames have delivered once more, and we can all once more look forward to more sweaty, sleepless nights spent sitting in front of a flickering monitor in a pitch-black room, subwoofer pumping out bass and speakers blaring. This is as good as it gets, my friends, as good as it gets…

ORIGINALITY 90%
SOUND/GRAPHICS 100%
PLAYABILITY 95%
ADDICTION 95%
ENJOYMENT 95%