I *really* liked this game, so I wrote a bit of a review. If you just want the link to where it is so cheap right now, here (/edit: it was a temporary sale, price is back up, but game is cheap on other sites):
https://www.humblebundle.com/store/homefront-the-revolution-freedom-fighter-bundle
Homefront 2 didn't interest me much. I finished the first one and it wasn't a good game. On the rails shooting gallery that felt too long even with its pathetic four hours of playtime.
Second one wasn't developed by Kaos, but when I learnt that it's being cooked by Crytek UK, known as the muppets behind Haze, my enthusiasm didn't exactly grow. Plus all the trouble during development, bankruptcy of the publisher, change of dev team to Frankfurt, then back to UK, unpaid salaries of emplyoees, half the dev team leaving, then Deep Silver buying the project (followed by the return of the previously left devs, incl. game director Hasit Zala)...
No good game could have come out of this mess, could it ?
Well, according to reviews, no, it could not and it did not. For inexplicable reason (well..of course it was money) Deep Silver decided to release the game around 4 months before it was finished, at a time when console versions were almost unplayable due to low framerates, and PC version was a lottery ticket - one had it unplayable, the other could play, plagued by huge and numerous bugs.
To Deep Silver's credit though, they allowed Dambusters (new name of Crytek UK aka Free Radical) to finish the game post-release, via some hardcore patching. Of course, the low sales and low review scores are set.
But, patch it they did!
First the technical side then. Homefront 2 looks fantastic, almost photorealistic at times. Cryengine has amazing lightning. War zones have, particularly at night, impressive atmosphere. Framerate is pretty much perfect now - 60fps almost maxed out in 1080p (on 2500K@4ghz, GTX1070) without any significant drops or stutters. There are some ocassional glitches here and there, a bit of pop-in, but nothing too distracting. The patches also added ability to tune HUD (turn off almost everything) and FoV.
Now on to the game itself. Unlike the first one, Revolution is much more open affair. It takes place in Philadelphia divided into multiple zones. These zones are either Red, where most of the battles against Korea took place (Revolution takes place 4 years after the US lost the war), so they are bombed out and reminded me of the 2029 scenes of Terminator 2 (Revolution also takes place in 2029, probably not a coincindence). These zones have great atmosphere and contain the FarCry/STALKER like gameplay with taking over bases and open combat against KPA armed forces.
Yellow zones are full of civilians and instead of open combat, you need to play a guerilla rebel, taking out enemies stealthily. These most reminded me of City 17 from HL2 right after you arrive, except here you are an active saboteur, not just an observer.
Thanks to these zones the game is nicely varied, it is not constantly the same killing gameplay all the time.
I like games that show their interface through ingame object - in STALKER it was PDA, in FarCry 2 you hand held the map, in Homefront you have a korean phone
The arsenal is great. There are not many weapons, but each can be modified in multitude of ways and each upgrade feels worthwhile. The punch and feel of the guns is flawless, the sniper rifle is one of my favourites. That reloading animation never gets old. You can transform guns completely, for example make uzi from a pistol, or a flamethrower from a crossbow. Plus there are bombs strapped to RC cars or teddy bears at your leisure.
The game surprised me. I only gave it a chance because of the free weekend and I ended up buying it and finishing it since I enjoyed it so much. I liked it significantly more than FarCry 4 or Division, which I played right before Homefront.
That said, there are some flaws. The most significant one for me - the silent ****ing protagonist. Oh how I hate this trope. There is even a moment in the game when another character shouted at me "Say something Ethan!" and my lovely Ethan just looked, the mute idiot that he is. Please devs all over, stop with this nonsense. It is not adding to immersion. It is hurting it.
Another flaw is that the AI could be better. Felt a bit too canon foddery at times. Too bad we will probably never see AI exceed or at least match what first FEAR offered in 2005.
Anyway. Great game. Give it a chance. Oh and that easter egg is effin' awesome.
Here are some gameplay vids I took:
red zone:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bSG7au_RII
yellow zone:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weXgxB3PevE
I also finished the DLCs. They are great. Short and linear (all three have around 5-6 hours of playtime combined), but polished and nicely round out the story. One is a prequel, the other two take place after the ending.
And Ethan finally speaks in them! It is amazing what wonders are done when main character speaks.
Few screenies I took from Beyond the Walls, the epilogue of the game:
https://www.humblebundle.com/store/homefront-the-revolution-freedom-fighter-bundle
Homefront 2 didn't interest me much. I finished the first one and it wasn't a good game. On the rails shooting gallery that felt too long even with its pathetic four hours of playtime.
Second one wasn't developed by Kaos, but when I learnt that it's being cooked by Crytek UK, known as the muppets behind Haze, my enthusiasm didn't exactly grow. Plus all the trouble during development, bankruptcy of the publisher, change of dev team to Frankfurt, then back to UK, unpaid salaries of emplyoees, half the dev team leaving, then Deep Silver buying the project (followed by the return of the previously left devs, incl. game director Hasit Zala)...
No good game could have come out of this mess, could it ?
Well, according to reviews, no, it could not and it did not. For inexplicable reason (well..of course it was money) Deep Silver decided to release the game around 4 months before it was finished, at a time when console versions were almost unplayable due to low framerates, and PC version was a lottery ticket - one had it unplayable, the other could play, plagued by huge and numerous bugs.
To Deep Silver's credit though, they allowed Dambusters (new name of Crytek UK aka Free Radical) to finish the game post-release, via some hardcore patching. Of course, the low sales and low review scores are set.
But, patch it they did!
First the technical side then. Homefront 2 looks fantastic, almost photorealistic at times. Cryengine has amazing lightning. War zones have, particularly at night, impressive atmosphere. Framerate is pretty much perfect now - 60fps almost maxed out in 1080p (on 2500K@4ghz, GTX1070) without any significant drops or stutters. There are some ocassional glitches here and there, a bit of pop-in, but nothing too distracting. The patches also added ability to tune HUD (turn off almost everything) and FoV.
Now on to the game itself. Unlike the first one, Revolution is much more open affair. It takes place in Philadelphia divided into multiple zones. These zones are either Red, where most of the battles against Korea took place (Revolution takes place 4 years after the US lost the war), so they are bombed out and reminded me of the 2029 scenes of Terminator 2 (Revolution also takes place in 2029, probably not a coincindence). These zones have great atmosphere and contain the FarCry/STALKER like gameplay with taking over bases and open combat against KPA armed forces.
Yellow zones are full of civilians and instead of open combat, you need to play a guerilla rebel, taking out enemies stealthily. These most reminded me of City 17 from HL2 right after you arrive, except here you are an active saboteur, not just an observer.
Thanks to these zones the game is nicely varied, it is not constantly the same killing gameplay all the time.
I like games that show their interface through ingame object - in STALKER it was PDA, in FarCry 2 you hand held the map, in Homefront you have a korean phone
The arsenal is great. There are not many weapons, but each can be modified in multitude of ways and each upgrade feels worthwhile. The punch and feel of the guns is flawless, the sniper rifle is one of my favourites. That reloading animation never gets old. You can transform guns completely, for example make uzi from a pistol, or a flamethrower from a crossbow. Plus there are bombs strapped to RC cars or teddy bears at your leisure.
The game surprised me. I only gave it a chance because of the free weekend and I ended up buying it and finishing it since I enjoyed it so much. I liked it significantly more than FarCry 4 or Division, which I played right before Homefront.
That said, there are some flaws. The most significant one for me - the silent ****ing protagonist. Oh how I hate this trope. There is even a moment in the game when another character shouted at me "Say something Ethan!" and my lovely Ethan just looked, the mute idiot that he is. Please devs all over, stop with this nonsense. It is not adding to immersion. It is hurting it.
Another flaw is that the AI could be better. Felt a bit too canon foddery at times. Too bad we will probably never see AI exceed or at least match what first FEAR offered in 2005.
Anyway. Great game. Give it a chance. Oh and that easter egg is effin' awesome.
Here are some gameplay vids I took:
red zone:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bSG7au_RII
yellow zone:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weXgxB3PevE
I also finished the DLCs. They are great. Short and linear (all three have around 5-6 hours of playtime combined), but polished and nicely round out the story. One is a prequel, the other two take place after the ending.
And Ethan finally speaks in them! It is amazing what wonders are done when main character speaks.
Few screenies I took from Beyond the Walls, the epilogue of the game:
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