When my eyes laid upon this game, I remembered one thing, it is now delisted, a quick search said that the reason was that 2K, said that the partnership licenses expired, and the common theory is that its related to the licensed music in the soundtrack.
So, 2K took the easy way out, to delist the game, cause having to use an entirely new soundtrack would require work and money.
So, I thought, “eh why not?” So here we are.
Having to put myself through Unreal Engine… I will bear this cross. Its not that great of a game mind you, but someone has to, and this is pretty much filler while I find something else to play.
Yes it crashed on me once, considering its Unreal Engine, just once is impressive.
Anyway, lets get on with it.
Story & Setting
For a while, Dubai has been hit by the worst series of sandstorms in recorded history, quickly causing a humanitarian crisis.
UAE politicians, while urging everyone to lay down, and that “everything is under control,” have quietly abandoned the city, leaving all the population to a wretched fate.
During all of this, Colonel Konrad, Commander of the 33rd Infantry Battalion US Army, just returning from a tour in Afghanistan, volunteered his men to humanitarian aid, going as far as defying high command orders of abandoning the city, making the 33rd be branded a traitorous company.
As hard as he tried to keep things in order, eventual CIA meddling made the situation even more dire, driving locals to become insurgents, and making the already demoralized 33rd become unruly, forcing Konrad to make difficult, morally questionable decisions.
On their last attempt to leave the city, refugee caravan in tow, the 33rd failed spectacularly, the last thing ever heard from Colonel Konrad, was a repeating radio transmission relaying the fate of the caravan, casualties, too many.
Weeks after the fact, The US Military, decided to quietly send in a small Delta Force team, their mission is simple, carry out reconnaissance, confirm the presence of survivors, and call for Evac, quick in and out.
It was supposed to be a simple mission…
Gentlemen, welcome to Dubai.
UAE politicians, while urging everyone to lay down, and that “everything is under control,” have quietly abandoned the city, leaving all the population to a wretched fate.
During all of this, Colonel Konrad, Commander of the 33rd Infantry Battalion US Army, just returning from a tour in Afghanistan, volunteered his men to humanitarian aid, going as far as defying high command orders of abandoning the city, making the 33rd be branded a traitorous company.
As hard as he tried to keep things in order, eventual CIA meddling made the situation even more dire, driving locals to become insurgents, and making the already demoralized 33rd become unruly, forcing Konrad to make difficult, morally questionable decisions.
On their last attempt to leave the city, refugee caravan in tow, the 33rd failed spectacularly, the last thing ever heard from Colonel Konrad, was a repeating radio transmission relaying the fate of the caravan, casualties, too many.
Weeks after the fact, The US Military, decided to quietly send in a small Delta Force team, their mission is simple, carry out reconnaissance, confirm the presence of survivors, and call for Evac, quick in and out.
It was supposed to be a simple mission…
Gentlemen, welcome to Dubai.
Presentation
Its an Unreal Engine game, Unreal Engine 3 to be precise, so, the usual Unreal Engine thing, looks great in screenshots, coin toss as to how its gonna run.
There is a nice attention to detail, with your character model changing as the story progresses and as he takes cutscene damage, the same goes for the 2 companions, as well as execution moves becoming more brutal as the game progresses.
There is a nice attention to detail, with your character model changing as the story progresses and as he takes cutscene damage, the same goes for the 2 companions, as well as execution moves becoming more brutal as the game progresses.
Since there are a lot of things involving sand, they went out of their way to flesh it out quite well, like being almost blind when fighting in a sandstorm, or sand being thrown into the air when a grenade explodes, or sand getting everywhere.
There are some environmental elements which are destructible, but not enough to say fully destructible environment.
Enemies have some variability to them, like different models giving variations to insurgents and grunts, as well as an easy way to tell elite and heavy enemies at a glance.
There are also some civilian models, but they get reused quite a lot.
Although uniforms become a problem once you start shooting US soldiers, since, well, same uniform as your boys.
There are a lot of graphic depictions of war crimes, whatever you may feel about it, I am sure everyone knows the white phosphorous scene, at least.
There are some environmental elements which are destructible, but not enough to say fully destructible environment.
Enemies have some variability to them, like different models giving variations to insurgents and grunts, as well as an easy way to tell elite and heavy enemies at a glance.
There are also some civilian models, but they get reused quite a lot.
Although uniforms become a problem once you start shooting US soldiers, since, well, same uniform as your boys.
There are a lot of graphic depictions of war crimes, whatever you may feel about it, I am sure everyone knows the white phosphorous scene, at least.
The scenes when the main character goes schizo are pretty cool tho.
There is also a lot of environment story telling, with a lot of graffiti, that ain’t subtle at all, eye roll worthy in fact.
There are some pretty cool locales, especially when fighting through penthouses and hotels, and some really nice vistas.
Some loading screens have plot relevant stuff, besides the usual game tips.
Lets move on to sound now.
There is the licensed music, which is used pretty well when used to add that extra push to make engagements more interesting, but its lacking when it tries to drive something plot relevant home, I’d say it was better when those moments were quiet.
Don’t know, Little Dark Age is better background music for war crimes, I can settle with From Roots To Needles, but I digress…
Your companions, as well as your character will make calls regarding enemies, like warning of flanking maneuvers, or pointing out that someone is out of cover, or informing the presence of more dangerous enemies, etc.
Enemies do the same, and you can also hear them give orders to each other, like flanking, or to lay suppressive fire on you.
As the game progresses, you can hear your character go from cool, calm, and collected, to erratic, angry, and violent, both when giving orders, or getting angry when having to reload, or getting erratic when executing enemies.
Although you can tell the usual writing problems with this kind of story, with writers who don’t know how military procedure works. The amount of insubordination…
There is also a lot of environment story telling, with a lot of graffiti, that ain’t subtle at all, eye roll worthy in fact.
There are some pretty cool locales, especially when fighting through penthouses and hotels, and some really nice vistas.
Some loading screens have plot relevant stuff, besides the usual game tips.
Lets move on to sound now.
There is the licensed music, which is used pretty well when used to add that extra push to make engagements more interesting, but its lacking when it tries to drive something plot relevant home, I’d say it was better when those moments were quiet.
Don’t know, Little Dark Age is better background music for war crimes, I can settle with From Roots To Needles, but I digress…
Your companions, as well as your character will make calls regarding enemies, like warning of flanking maneuvers, or pointing out that someone is out of cover, or informing the presence of more dangerous enemies, etc.
Enemies do the same, and you can also hear them give orders to each other, like flanking, or to lay suppressive fire on you.
As the game progresses, you can hear your character go from cool, calm, and collected, to erratic, angry, and violent, both when giving orders, or getting angry when having to reload, or getting erratic when executing enemies.
Although you can tell the usual writing problems with this kind of story, with writers who don’t know how military procedure works. The amount of insubordination…
Mechanics
Its a third-person cover shooter, it had the problem of coming out at a time in which this genre was oversaturated.
It has the obligatory turret sections, which was the style at the time.
That one shooting targets from the sky segment, that’s on every modern military shooter since COD Modern Warfare.
Regenerating health, although you can go down quite quickly if you are careless.
There is quite the variety of weapons, some having some special features to them, like the basic rifle having a silencer option, or snipers having zoom options, or the P90 having laser sight, etc.
It plays as you would expect, it doesn’t reinvent the wheel, and, it can become quite monotonous, sometimes even tedious, allegedly, this was by design.
The sand related mechanics are interesting, like using sand to blind enemies when a grenade explodes, or using sand to bury them thanks to the destructible props, as well as using those destructible props for sneaky things, like breaking the glass under their feet, or destroying protective barriers behind them, or shooting the red barrels/crates to explode.
It has the obligatory turret sections, which was the style at the time.
That one shooting targets from the sky segment, that’s on every modern military shooter since COD Modern Warfare.
Regenerating health, although you can go down quite quickly if you are careless.
There is quite the variety of weapons, some having some special features to them, like the basic rifle having a silencer option, or snipers having zoom options, or the P90 having laser sight, etc.
It plays as you would expect, it doesn’t reinvent the wheel, and, it can become quite monotonous, sometimes even tedious, allegedly, this was by design.
The sand related mechanics are interesting, like using sand to blind enemies when a grenade explodes, or using sand to bury them thanks to the destructible props, as well as using those destructible props for sneaky things, like breaking the glass under their feet, or destroying protective barriers behind them, or shooting the red barrels/crates to explode.
Shoot, Commit War Crimes, Go Schizo, Shoot Again. All in a day's work.
Most choices, don’t matter, yes there are parts in which you will be asked to decide, but, it either amounts to nothing, or all it changes is how that scene plays out and maybe a cutscene, or there is a “but thou must” choice you HAVE to do.
At least there are multiple endings, but all they require is choices in the final chapter.
And, the game will try to shame you regardless of what you did, or to hammer in that you never had a choice, yada yada. Or that you should just stop playing and spare the pixels of their misery.
Enemies have their variety, but nothing we haven’t seen before, the regulars, the tankier elites with better weapons, the bullet sponge heavies, snipers who hit hard, and CQC specialists either as shotgunners, or crazy knife guys.
Sometimes, enemies won’t die outright, although they are out of the battle, you can still kill them using the execution move, they drop ammo when you do, you can also execute them after hitting them with a melee attack, they can stand back up when you hit them with melee, so do be quick.
There are multiple grenade types, frag, sticky, and stun, self-explanatory what they do.
Ammo and grenades are replenished with boxes, hard to miss them.
There are also intel collectibles for lore, if you care enough to look for them.
And, yes, that’s about it.
At least there are multiple endings, but all they require is choices in the final chapter.
And, the game will try to shame you regardless of what you did, or to hammer in that you never had a choice, yada yada. Or that you should just stop playing and spare the pixels of their misery.
Enemies have their variety, but nothing we haven’t seen before, the regulars, the tankier elites with better weapons, the bullet sponge heavies, snipers who hit hard, and CQC specialists either as shotgunners, or crazy knife guys.
Sometimes, enemies won’t die outright, although they are out of the battle, you can still kill them using the execution move, they drop ammo when you do, you can also execute them after hitting them with a melee attack, they can stand back up when you hit them with melee, so do be quick.
There are multiple grenade types, frag, sticky, and stun, self-explanatory what they do.
Ammo and grenades are replenished with boxes, hard to miss them.
There are also intel collectibles for lore, if you care enough to look for them.
And, yes, that’s about it.
Final Thoughts
Are you familiar with Oscar bait? A movie made just for the purposes of getting as many oscars as possible, a movie which is meant to appeal to critics, rather than movie goers.
Then, Spec Ops The Line is the gaming equivalent, gameplay wise its ok nothing special, allegedly, they went out of their way to make it player hostile, in order to focus on, and drive home the narrative its selling.
I haven’t played any of the other Spec Ops games, so I can’t compare it, all I know is that its vastly different to them, which alienated the core fan base.
But, it got the critics alright, and its the military shooter equivalent of Silent Hill 2 for pretentious long winded video essays.
As for the narrative? Eh, it can be preachy, but at least it isn’t too predictable.
Although it did have a lot of things which made me chuckle, like, a CIA agent with a conscience, the DJ who is having far too much fun, that one part in which the protagonist goes, “wait we did this already.”
Did I enjoy the game? I mean, its alright, I have replayed it a few times, its one of those, you play when you have an afternoon with nothing to do kind of games. Story wise, doesn’t do anything for me, but it might do for you.
If you like Apocalypse Now, and Heart of Darkness, it might be your thing, as its heavily inspired on those.
Although you can’t legally buy this game anymore, which in on itself is a bad thing, you aren’t missing much if you skip it, so, up to you.
Then, Spec Ops The Line is the gaming equivalent, gameplay wise its ok nothing special, allegedly, they went out of their way to make it player hostile, in order to focus on, and drive home the narrative its selling.
I haven’t played any of the other Spec Ops games, so I can’t compare it, all I know is that its vastly different to them, which alienated the core fan base.
But, it got the critics alright, and its the military shooter equivalent of Silent Hill 2 for pretentious long winded video essays.
As for the narrative? Eh, it can be preachy, but at least it isn’t too predictable.
Although it did have a lot of things which made me chuckle, like, a CIA agent with a conscience, the DJ who is having far too much fun, that one part in which the protagonist goes, “wait we did this already.”
Did I enjoy the game? I mean, its alright, I have replayed it a few times, its one of those, you play when you have an afternoon with nothing to do kind of games. Story wise, doesn’t do anything for me, but it might do for you.
If you like Apocalypse Now, and Heart of Darkness, it might be your thing, as its heavily inspired on those.
Although you can’t legally buy this game anymore, which in on itself is a bad thing, you aren’t missing much if you skip it, so, up to you.
Pros
- + Attention to detail on models and environment.
- + You can see as the characters deteriorate physically and mentally.
- + Very nice locales to fight in.
Cons
- - Preachy storyline.
- - Average and uninteresting gameplay.
6
Gameplay
Its not bad, but it isn't good either, the best word is, average, besides the cool environment interactions, it doesn't stand out too much, its your average cover shooter.
8
Graphics
Its Unreal Engine, of course its gonna look pretty, there is some nice attention to detail, and there is some really good art direction and cinematography in the cutscenes.
7
Story
Its preachy, and player hostile, I can understand people liking it for being "subversive" and I do give it points for that, but otherwise, its for certain types of people, I am just not one of them.
8
Sound
The use of licensed music in the action sequences is on point, but on some other parts it leaves a lot to be desired, but, the auditory information and battle chatter is fantastic and very immersive.
2
Replayability
Its short, and once you know the twist, there isn't really much else, unless you wanna collect the intel, and do higher difficulties, there is no incentive.
7
out of 10
Overall
Spec Ops The Line, is a game for a certain type of player, its not a stand out of cover shooters in any shape or form, instead, it focuses on driving an anti-war narrative, its a military game, for people who don't like the military or war for that matter, the story can get preachy, actively shuns the player for playing the game, and condemns the decisions you can't avoid, its all part of the crafted narrative, which can only appeal to a certain demographic, outside of that, its an OK time waster if you are in the mood for a quick and dirty cover shooter.
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