We’ve kept a patient eye on Spec Ops: The Line. Debuting around this time last year at the 2009 VGAs, we were promised the sandy shooter would deploy in Q4 2010. Considering it’s made our Top 100 of 2011 list, you can work out how well that turned out. The delay is likely minimal, however, with Yager’s near-future tale of insertion into a sand-storm enveloped Dubai scheduled to make an appearance sometime over the coming months.
Mirroring Apocalypse Now in some regard, players control Captain Martin Walker, a highly trained Spec Ops soldier charged with dropping into the now entombed Dubai in search of missing Colonel, John Konrad. A founding member of the Spec Ops program, Konrad decided to stay behind – perhaps with ulterior motives – in the UAE’s largest city as a cataclysmic dust-storm buries the metropolis under a blanket of sand. A weak signal suggesting survivors somewhere beneath the endless wave results in the deployment of a military rescue mission.
It’s a third-person shooter with dynamic forces at play. The sand will shift and modify the environment in numerous ways. Windows can be shot out causing torrents of sand to pour out, changing paths and creating obstacles accordingly. Visually it looks striking, and though the cover mechanic has been done before, pretty much ad nauseam at this point, the inclusion of the sand factor will at least offer up a different element; something players must learn to both control and contend with.
Check out the following footage released during this year’s E3 event. If anything, you get to listen to some Alice In Chains, which is never a bad thing.
gazzagb
I think this will end up being like Fallout gameplay wise. While the sand does sound cool in that it adds variety to the game, I bet it either won’t have much of an impact (i.e you merely take a slightly longer route to get to your objective), or it will be pretty much pre-set to change your path regardless of what you do.
dude90
35 to go? God I lost count, I think 2011 is going to be good.
Kovacs
It starts getting realy crazy from here on in.
kjkg
I’d never heard of this until now. Looks cool. If my imagination of how the sand will react is actually realised in the game, then this could be unbelievable. But I’ve learnt that my imagination is much grander than reality far too many times now.
beeje13
was looking on the official website the other day, apart from that I haven’y seen it since E3. As a slight graphics whore i lick my lips at it! although it will take Crysis 2 and RAGE to get me frothing at the mouth, metaphorically, of course :)