Title: Rogue Warrior Release Date: December 2, 2009
Genre: First-Person Shooter
Rating: M for Mature
Platform: XBox 360
Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
Developer: Rebellion
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Let's face it – if you want a game to be counted among the good titles in a genre, you have to make it stand out in some good way. Whether it's the potential for hours of enjoyment, a new idea that nobody's seen before or something else, there's got to be something there to hook people.
Rogue Warrior, unfortunately, offers nothing to hook gamers in or differentiate itself from the many better first-person shooter titles around, resulting in a lackluster game that can safely be avoided by FPS fans.
In Rogue Warrior, you play the role of Richard Marcinko, a real-life soldier – according to Wikipedia, the guy founded both SEAL Team Six (a counter-terrorist unit) and Red Cell (a unit designed to test the United States' Navy's security against terrorist actions). At the beginning of the game (which takes place in the 1980s near the tail end of the Cold War), Marcinko and a small team of commandos land in North Korea in an effort to gather intelligence on ballistic missile launchers. An ambush leaves the rest of Marcinko's team dead, however, and Marcinko eventually finds evidence that there's a lot more to the ballistic missile plot than originally thought – so much so that it could bring the world to the brink of nuclear disaster if it's not stopped.
Let me get right to the point with my major gripe about the game: there is absolutely nothing new to be found. Everything you see in Rogue Warrior, from the first-person shooting action to the “kill moves” (which allow you to instantly kill enemies in inventive and brutal ways) has been done better elsewhere. The weapons are pretty standard Cold War-era stuff, with not much in the way of variation between them other than basic capabilities (machine guns and assault rifles have fully automatic fire, sniper rifles have targeting scopes, etc). The action, while it has its moments, never quite gets revved up to the heights found in Halo 3 or even the first Killzone on the Playstation 2. Even the online multiplayer portion of the game isn’t much fun.
A second flaw in Rogue Warrior, in my opinion, is the ridiculous overuse of cursing. Before anyone accuses me of being some tightwad about this, let me assure you that I'm far from a prude when it comes to coarse language – there are times when I make the stereotypical foul-mouthed sailor look gentlemanly by comparison. But the protagonist in this game overuses profanity in such a way that he comes off like an immature high school freshman trying to sound cool or “hardcore,” failing miserably in the process and making the game even more of a joke than it already is.
No first-person shooter fan should feel compelled to bother playing Rogue Warrior. There's nothing interesting or new to be seen, and too much fun missing from the action to make it worthwhile.
Overall Rating: ** out of 5
Christopher Mastey-Muzikreviews.com Video Game Reviewer
December 31, 2009
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