If anyone manages to find a place to download it from besides Poland, and at speeds higher than a turtle in winter, please let me know :)

--- Alan

Me too; apparently every Univac in Warsaw is being used to actually host this thing.

Looks like I may get some movement soon on it, will let everyone know.

--- Alan

Try:

ftp://ftp.barrysworld.com/pub/games/othergames/demos/redfactiondemo.exe

I'd put it up on Playnet.com but given what's happened so far we'd probably kill the whole site in about 5 minutes ;)

--- Alan

www.3dgamers.com
www.3dfiles.com

-Monkeybutt

It's still hard to download. I'm getting terrible speeds when I try the different download sites.

I got it d/l'ed from Alan's location. I played it for a while, and it was fun, but my ears and my eyes got in an argument as to how fast I was travelling. Needless to say, I turned all green and had to stop playing. Its a shame because the game appears fun (I like the submarine action).

I finally got. I've only gone through the training and played a bit of the one level, but the weapons don't have much oomph to them so far. I also hope that a lot of the levels aren't in the mines, because the mine is really boring.

The destructible terrain is neat, but so far hasn't been of any real consequence.

"The destructible terrain is neat, but so far hasn't been of any real consequence."

I'm about at the same point in the game, and I'm pretty unimpressed. Graphically, seems about like the Half-life engine. Also, in the training level I used the rocket launcher to destroy the walls supporting the unbreakable glass, and the glass panel remained hovering in the air. I'm still unclear on why the concrete was vaporized, but not the reinforced glass.

Having just finished Max Payne, I gotta admit that this demo fills me with ho-hum. Swithching back to a Quake based engine makes you realize just how good that MAX FX engine looks. I'm afraid I have been spoiled, from now on, for better or worse.

Plus, the tunnels are too long, you gotta click 6 times to fire 6 pistol shots, the 'weapons don't have much oomph to them'...

DeanCo--

I too was fairly unimpressed. Destructible terrain is neat and all, but so far I don't see how it helps gameplay very much, except to discover another way of getting someplace. Weapons are unremarkable -- enemy AI seems to actually work rather nicely though.

--- Alan

Yeah, I was disappointed when there was an enemy on a platform and I used the rocket launcher to destroy a support and collapse the platform and the enemy just hopped off and continued firing. I really expected to kill him by destroying the platform, but it didn't work.

Dean, yeah, after Max the graphics are a letdown.

The weapons feel too wimpy.

The enemy AI is decent, I agree. They don't blindly charge, they'll take cover, they'll move and shoot, etc.

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Quote:

Swithching back to a Quake based engine

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Quote:

Geo-Mod� Engine: The only game with real-time, arbitrary geometry modification allowing for complete environmental destruction.

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Hard to tell with the demo. I'm assuming in later parts of the game there's more stuff you can blow up for different tactical effects. I just wonder how much of the game takes place in the mines? You might as well be running around in sewers.

>Swithching back to a Quake based engine makes you realize just how good that MAX FX engine looks

As Dave indicated, Red Faction uses a proprietary engine developed internally by Volition, not any of the Quake engines.

Good AI and a good gimmick with destructible terrain are two assets that most shooters don't have.

Stefan

Yeah, those are assets. The demo is rather bland, though, and wimpy weapons are really a problem for shooters.

Assuming the PC version is the same as the PS2 version, there's actually less use of the Geo-Mod destructibility as the game wears on. It made for a pretty solid experience as a console shooter, but I imagine it will seem a little lacking and bland for PC gamers who get FPSs all the time. At the very least, the end of the game should be a lot less frustrating on the PC - the PS2 version just seemed to lose sight of the limitations of pad control in an FPS about 2/3rds of the way through, with its crazy-accurate rail-driver toting enemies. I beat it out of sheer determination, the fun was pretty much gone.

-Matthew

Yeah, my mistake guys. I just based my statement it on what it looked like, which is a Half-Life/Quake clone.

It's still boring, anyway you look at it. Heck, they even paint crosses on the walls to show you where you're 'supposed to' blow up the terrain. A previous comment about 'it may as well be doors and keys' is pretty much on the mark. Of course, it IS just a demo...

DeanCo--

>wimpy weapons are really a problem for shooters

Yeah, that was one of the criticisms of the original Unreal, as I recall. I'm actually just playing that game now and can understand why (the criticism, not my rationale for playing).

That's too bad about Red Faction - I thought it looked promising, and I like Volition's work.

Stefan

I played through the demo this morning--without sound, because unbeknownst to me my speaker cable had come undone, and I just figured my system was acting up again--in about, what, fifteen minutes or so? It was pretty fun. Graphically, who can tell--it's in a freakin' mine, and all these damn mines in shooters look alike. The animations are goofy. The gameplay is pretty decent. The potential for a story and some intereseting context is there. Geo-Mod works, but in the demo at least isn't that compelling, largely because they have to hand hold you with big x's on the spots you can/should blow up.

Overall it's encouraging, I think, but I'll have to see the full game to get really excited (if I do). One potential issue with stuff like destructible terrain is how do you guide the player? If there are no indications that a particular area is destructible, then will players go around blowing everything up to find the destructible bits? If you mark every spot, won't that be about the same as putting a door there?

I agree. The X's were really just doors waiting to be opened. One thing that surprised me is that there seems to be no debris. A typical action movie tactic would be to blow up something above the bad guys and have it all fall on them. It looks like Geomod is mostly for creating new entrances, at least in the demo. It doesn't seem to produce collateral damage.

I really just wish the weapon effects were better, the graphics were better, and it didn't take place in a mine. Volition may have time to work on the weapon effects, but the animation is a bit goofy as you say. There's very little feedback from the small weapons. I'm not sure they have time to fix that.

I've played my way through all the levels in a beta version, and I can assure you that there is a lot more variety to the levels than just mine shafts. And the weapons do get better as you go along although you're right Mark, the effects are wimpy.

I haven't played the demo yet (it's just the first level, right?), but it seems like it would have been a better idea to include one of the vehicle-driving levels to show us what the game's got to offer. The submarine stuff really is pretty cool.

I think the demo is the first level. Seems like it. We did get to drive the submarine in the training session.

Maybe Volition will beef up the weapon affects. They should have known better given the initial response Unreal got.

I spent most of my time in the "glass house" demo, digging tunnels and seeing how deep I could get my holes. You just have to remember not to fall in...

It's the best mining sim I've ever played.

3dactionplanet's demo review says of the "glass house" portion:

"I drilled sloping tunnels, dug nearly bottomless pits, and carved delicately balancing monoliths, only to blow out their support and watch with glee as they toppled over. I also performed a short-lived ceiling-blasting experiment; rather, I was short-lived while performing it - debris showered down from the ceiling, and I was frozen in awe as a slab broke off and quickly extracted its vengeance on my fragile head."

Do they know some setting that I don't know? I didn't see any gravity effects resulting from my damage to other surfaces (like the levitating window), but I can't say I tried, either. Perhaps locking the geometry locks it in every way, and if you blow chunks of unlocked geometry loose, then they will fall. However, I do remember blowing away big chunks of the ceiling and there were no resulting debris falls. I may have to reinstall the demo to give it another try.

I went and answered my own question. I tried blowing a chunk of wall free by carefully removing all of the support from around it, and it promptly crashed to the ground. It even bounced a couple of times and settled at the lowest point possible. Nice, but I wonder what it does for gameplay since it took about five minutes for a 10' cube. I also tried to get hit by some debris, and succeeded, but it did only minimal damage.

Next, I blew out all of the support for the glass house, and it hovered in place. I even jumped down underneath it to verify that there was not a shred of support for it.

So, locking the geometry for an object locks it in space, it does not just make it invulnerable to change but still subject to gravity.

I drilled a tunnel through the walls up to the point where I was able to jump down to the glass house. I have some screenshots if anyone is interested. It was fun. :)