Review: Rage

When you have a pedigree like id Software’s, it must be difficult to keep on one-upping yourself. The creators of Doom and Quake have now released Rage, and it has enraged many a PC gamer and generated mixed reviews.

Rage is a first-person shooter set on Earth, in a post-apocalyptic wasteland called, well, the Wasteland. Your nameless (but not quite faceless) character has been cryogenically frozen in an ark to keep him safe from a deadly asteroid that has pummelled the planet. Enough of these arks were placed to ensure the continued survival of mankind... except in the beginning of the game when you wake up, everyone else in your ark is dead.

id Software has never been stellar at character development – in fact, this is the first time the company has even made a real attempt. Unfortunately, even with legendary actor John Goodman voicing one of the characters, they all fall rather flat.

That said, Rage is not a bad game. It’s not a great game, either, but it ain’t bad. Gamers often say that id Software’s new games are really just demonstrations of their new game engines, and Rage’s id Tech 5 engine really is stellar. The graphics are fantastic – although there are very few options for adjusting graphics – and they really show off the elaborate environments and Borderlands-esque art style. There were a couple of minor bugs, like screen tearing on the title screen, but once I was in-game it was fine. There was a bit of texture pop-in, too (an effect where detail in the environment would render slowly, layer by layer) but it either stopped later in the game or I stopped noticing it.

As the game goes on, the novelty of a beautiful environment wears off, and enjoyment of the game all comes down to gameplay. The shooting mechanics do sound and feel great, and the variety of interesting weapons makes combat a lot of fun. Different enemies require different tactics, and I was definitely encouraged to use them all. Driving around the Wasteland is also an important element of Rage, and the mechanics are sound.

The quests, however, eventually get tired. All the main storyline missions are exactly the same – go to this place, kill a bunch of enemies, pick up an item, return to base. In between, there are a few fun side quests and a number of races to partake in, but there aren’t enough of them. Don’t be fooled into thinking this is an open-world game where you can uncover secret missions and play your own way. It’s very linear, and frequently turns back into a classic id Software corridor shooter.

Many PC gamers have had issues that have been well-documented on forums and message boards – screen tearing, texture pop-in – and for those with AMD/ATI graphics cards, the game has sometimes been unplayable.

I have Nvidia graphics, which leaves me something of a conundrum. Usually when I review a game, I rate it based on my own personal experience and ignore what others say, but part of me doesn’t feel I can rate a game highly if it doesn’t work on half of users’ PCs. In the end I chose to rate it on my own experience, so here’s the deal – don’t buy this game if you’re running an AMD/ATI system. Wait a few months, and hopefully the bugs will get fixed the way they did the last time gamers had issues like this, with Fallout: New Vegas. It'll be cheaper then, too. If you have Nvidia graphics or a console, a good game like Rage can be worth playing, but there have been a lot of great games out this year, and there are still more big titles to come.