To celebrate the existence of a competitive multiplayer that I don’t suck at I thought I would sploosh together a list of gaming genius-ness that Guerrilla implemented in their 5 star FPS, Killzone 3. See the link? 5 star…5 points on a list…yeah…it sounded better my head.
Killzone 3 is one of the stronger online shooter’s that isn’t directly in competition with everything Call Of Duty, and that continues to sustain respectable numbers through the months. I greatly enjoy the grizzly and gritty Helghan blasting warfare and here are my top five reasons why it’s totally awesome.
Reason # 1: The bizarre but addictive reward of seeing that points score mini-animation stack up you XP like a slot machine after each triumphant kill. I’ve mentioned before my theories on how important such details are to gaming, and Killzone 3 is no exception.
Reason # 2: The magnificently noisy choice of vehicles is something very few sane gamers can ignore; especially considering the best of them can be used online. Those exo-suits are walking mechs of pure destruction, taking a serious amount of co-ordinated firepower to bring down. It’s always amusing to see half a dozen players racing to get the first seats at the beginning of a match. As for the jetpacks…well…who doesn’t smirk when they soar over the heads of the enemy team, raining fiery death from above? Thought so.
Reason # 3: The overly brutal melee attacks are something I feel shouldn’t enjoy but yet I can’t help but find it horrifically funny very time I land one successfully. There is something beautifully gratifying in stabbing the schmuck that has been picking off your squad mates with a sniper for the past two rounds. The signature up-close-and-personal animations are masterfully executed.
Reason # 4: The alarmingly loud battlefields can be quite a shock to the system if you’re not prepared for them, the eerie lack of music amplifies the tormented cries of your fallen team mates, the crunchy-clicky-chunky reloading and the echoey gun sounds all subtly immerse you into the action in ways that twitch shooters like Black Ops never did. Play Killzone 3’s multiplayer with surround sound on and you have a game that will make you feel completely vulnerable and exposed from the second you spawn. That pervading sense of exhilarating danger really works in the games favour.
Reason # 5: Well thought out player classes are very rare in the online space, and very few even try to innovate with new abilities or unlockable skills. Killzone 3, despite having load outs that consist of borrowed ideas, somehow manages to thoughtfully balance the distribution of strengths and weaknesses between all of its classes. Not a single multiplayer career path is a dead end or a superficial whim to fill out the game. Every class has something substantial to offer in terms of play style and useful and practical advantages. The sniper class (Marksman) and the field medic are typically weak and niche’ load-outs in a lot of online games, but in K3 no such flaw hinders players or puts them off. It is truly to Guerrilla’s credit that the majority of multiplayer lobbies consist of the entire range of available classes.