Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Titanfall: Doing It Right

I have always enjoyed games from the Call of Duty series.  I think they are a fun, brainless way to pass time, laugh with friends, or vent frustrations.  With the last couple releases, the Call of Duty online experience has become so intense that there is little value for the casual player.  Having releases every year causes the learning curve to approach so fast and so steep that it can be impossible to keep up.

Titanfall provides the action and fun of the online multiplayer experience, without all the baggage.  Of course, there are some players that magically become pros the instant the game loads up.  But for the most part, everyone is wading through these foreign waters together.  

There has always been a presence on the Internet that would like multiplayer and solo campaign games to be separate.  In the case of CoD, even the zombie levels should probably consist of their own title.  Instead of cramming all this into one, Titanfall poured all their attention into the multiplayer game.  With no focus being given to a single player story, the end result of Titanfall is near perfection.

The only decision I don't quite understand about Titanfall is why there is a multiplayer campaign.  The story is almost non-existent.  I played through and I don't remember any part of it; I was too busy messing with my loadouts.  The campaign consists of lobbies that play exactly like the regular, multiplayer game.  Developers really could have just left the game as Red Team vs Blue Team; we don't need a backstory.

While I have never enjoyed achievements that are based on online play, I think the goals they set are manageable.  For those of you who were raised in the Call of Duty era, give Titanfall a try for something a bit more fresh.

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