Hard Reset Redux

If you just want a great collection of weapons, enemies, and bosses, you'll love the redux. Controls are perfect. Sword is a blast. Story is unnecessary but present. Buy on sale.

Stunning cyberpunk world and solid guneplay make Hard Reset a worthwhile FPS experience.

Hard Reset is run-of-the-mill FPS, but it does it well. Nothing revolutionary here: it's the standard scripted shooter action, with tons of FPS loot (ammo and health), and a very, very linear game. The story is incoherent, but it's told through some cool graphic art. Why play this game? Because you love FPS and you're looking for something that has few surprises but does FPS really well. The secrets are easy, the ambushes straight out of the Doom textbook, but ... everything blows up and the carnage is quite fun. Plus, the game looks great. The whole Blade Runner feel of it is very strong. So get it for when you run out of your favorite FPS and you need something to tide you over.

I never played the original but this is a straight-out shooter with no other skills needed such as hacking etc. but you do need to plan your way through the battles a bit I did enjoy it and if you like that kind of thing it keeps you absorbed, with a good set of weapons (although some kind of bug meant i couldn't use alternate fire which was frustrating) It's so straightforward it doesn't even have a crouch function which at times is annoying but not a huge issue. Having played a lot of FPS games I was able to beat it on 'Insane' level, although switched down the difficulty level (something you can mercifully do at any time) for most of the boss fights as they're a big step up and not much fun for me. I really liked the look and feel of the environment with the earliar parts in particular not just channeling buy copying Blade Runner to a large extent. It made me wish there was maybe just a bit more to the game though - not just the length but maybe having some hacking from time to time - there's a little bit fo problem-solving but only on a certain level. What is good is the amount of stuff you can blow up to help combat enemies - you quickly learn to scout an area out to see where those pionts are and you can even move exposive barrels around to be better positioned for when those enemies come at you - later on there is some industrial machinery into which you can lead them and then watch them get crushed. There could perhaps have been one or two more enemy types although the game mixes them up a fair deal. Through the game you get to power up weapons and armour and at the end it allows you to play the whole campaign through again with everything you've accumulated, which is a nice way of adding some replayability.

Very good graphics, very good controls and feel (replica of Shadow Warrior 2). Nonsense story, but you play this kind of a game for the action. The weapons and modification system are a bit novel and take a bit of getting used to. I would give it 4 stars, but the price is really good, so it is a great value.