Ion Fury

Great Game, I hope they bring Duke back to GOG..

Ion Fury is great fun, and will appeal to anyone who loved BUILD games of old. Yet while the game is competent in every aspect, it never tries to get creative and try anything truly new and different. Positives: + Really fun gunplay. Every gun feels great, and you really need to think carefully about what weapon to use in which situation. Headshots are a nice tweak and feel satisfying. + Complex, non-linear, old school level design + A few moments that really stand stand out (tank, piano, darts, etc.) + Occasional simple puzzles to break up the pace + The centipede is a brilliant and unique enemy + Quite long but mixes things up just enough to feel fresh throughout Negatives: - The enemy design is for the most part very dull. Most enemies you will encounter will be "guys with guns". Besides the aforementioned centipede, there wasn't much creativity put into the enemy design, which is a shame since that was one of the strong points of the Build games. - Very few bosses for the length of the game, and most are not done very well. - Most levels are just generic underground bases or empty streets. There needed to be more creativity in crafting a diverse set of environments. - No story beyond a few hastily-written sentences on the help screen. In old build games story didn't matter much, but at least there was a compelling reason for the action. Here it's not really too clear why you are fighting. - Music is just okay besides a few amazing tracks. Sound is also somewhat lacking, particularly enemy sounds could have been improved. - Too much of the game is by the book. If the game had come out in the late 90s it would have been panned as just another Doom-clone with little new to offer. If you look at games from back then, almost all of them had some really unique stuff to offer. For instance: vehicles in Shadow Warrior, atmosphere in Blood and Powerslave, outer space in Duke, hand-to-hand combat in Witchaven. There's not much like this in Ion Fury.

For my money, Blood remains the undisputed king of Build Engine FPS games. Ion Fury has some strong points but has too many mediocre (or worse) qualities to really rise to meet the new wave of retro FPS games. Ion Fury has pretty good level design. I'm rarely lost looking for a key or switch and most of the levels do the Romero thing of looping you back to the main path and putting new enemies in your way when you need to backtrack. While the level layouts are generally well done, you do spend a lot of time in industrial tunnels/sewers/cramped spaces that get a bit repetitive. The outdoor and city areas are the most fun to play in and they disappear from the game about 1/2 way through save for a smaller outdoor section of the mansion level. The music is solid as well but I don't think, after 10 or so hours of play, I'd be able to hum a melody or correctly identify any of the tracks removed from the game. The weapons are mostly serviceable. None of them are terrible to use but none of them jump out as a favorite. If I were to be charitable, I'd say they're evenly balanced. More critically: none of them are all that fun. I really wish the game had at least one big over-the-top kill-everything weapon. Compounding my problem with the weapons is that none of the enemies are all that interesting to kill. The AI pathfinding is very poor with enemies regularly getting stuck on walls and doors. I have no clue how intelligent the enemies in Blood were because they were brutally unfair and you wanted them dead as soon as possible and had the arsenal to make that happen. The game also has two annoying enemies that really feel like they're put in to waste your time and ammo--a small spider-head that gnaws at your shins and a small flying head that does shoot at you, but is just a nuisance. Overall the game is fine but doesn't stack up against history or anything new like Project Warlock 2, Dusk, or Amid Evil.

Two things to start: This is a Build Engine game, meant for people who also enjoy build games. If you didn't like or never played Duke3d, Shadow Warrior, Blood, etc, then ignore the 5 stars as this game may not be for you. Second, if you're worried about censorship, check the forums (spoiler: not gettting censored). With that out of the way: I'm a couple hours in at this point, and in love. The levels are well designed, with plenty of secrets. The soundtrack is so far perfect, capturing a 90s sort of sci-fi feel perfect for the game. Weapon variety is somewhat lacking, but what is there is satisfying to use (the starter pistol does not become obsolete as soon as you get another weapon). Shelly's one liners are sufficiently (but not dangerously) cheesy. I can easily see this being the sort of game that I'll beat, then keep coming back to for secret hunting, mods, and higher difficulties.

This is all around very fun FPS game. Gunplay feels very satisfying and levels are very well designed. Music is great as well! It's a first game after a long time that I replayed immediately on higher difficulty after my first playthrough. Definitely recommended.