Intense, powerful and explosive.
The atmosphere created by the intense audio experience and cacophony of sounds that resound out of your speakers brings war crashing into your living room through a series of thunderous explosions and deafening gun-fire, whilst the rousing soundtrack, that flows alongside the gameplay and rises in tempo when fighting reaches its peak, helps to create tension and get that blood pumping around your veins when the going gets really tough.Visually, the graphics and special effects, plus the sheer attention to detail is outstanding and consistent from the outset right up until the final battle in the palace of Visari. From the huge dense clouds of smoke that fill the air following a missile strike and the red skies that buzz with Helghast drop-ships, to the floating debris which is carried around by the strong winds that ravish the planet and the dust and sparks that appear whenever a bullet hits a hard surface, there’s plenty of eye-catching visuals to enjoy.
Grenades explode vigorously, projecting shrapnel and tossing casualties in the air and its effect can be seen on objects around it, ripping cover to shreds or punching dents in metal. Character models also animate impressively and are exquisitely detailed. The way that a Helghast trooper staggers when you shoot him and his blood stain then trickles down the wall behind him, or the way they fall over balconies and slide down stairwells, or clumsily stumble around hand on head screaming when you set them ablaze with a flamethrower, are all impressive sights. Despite killing in excess of 500 Helghast on my journey, there's been so much variety in the way that the Helghast behave and die that there's never been a dull moment.
Credit has to be given the way that AI has been handled. Your own ISA team have a whole range of complex movements and move realistically, reacting to the action around them and indeed the way that you play the game. They take cover when under pressure, press forward up the battlefield when you do and throughout the game you always feel like they've got your back and are working together as team. The Helghast, however, do provide a formidable opposition and will flank you, hang back behind cover when under suppression and move forward when you're at your most vulnerable. The resulting battles are extremely well balanced and high in ferocity and intensity.
Looking at it from a negative angle, however, the AI is sometimes a bit too good, artificially so. The Helghast have an uncanny knack of being able to throw a grenade right at your feet, even when you have yet to step out into the open or show your face. Particularly later on in the game, when you'll come up against hordes of Helghast at any one time and it can be extremely tough when you've constantly got enemy firing at your position. Nevertheless, the steep challenge is always an exciting one and whenever you reach the end of a level there's a real sense of satisfaction knowing that you've just participating in one hell of a fight and had to use skill and courage to get through it.
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