Right off the bat I should inform the honourable reader (not you, the next guy that reads this) that I’m not an avid fan of online-multiplayer. I will go out of my way to avoid multiplayer and if you’ve read any of my reviews of games that have multiplayer, you would have noticed I generally say “yeah it’s fun for a bit if you can get some friends to join in.” Because that’s what I think of online games so if you’re really into online games you’ve got to wonder am I the right guy to listen to. I bought Halo 3 for its story, not the multiplayer; Gears of War 2 for its characters, not to discuss whether the shotgun has been nerfed or fixed; and The Orange Box for Half Life 2, not for Team Fortress 2…which incidentally is what this game is trying to be but I’m getting ahead of myself.

 

Brink is set in the near future (2045) where the world has flooded, while Kevin Costner is off fighting Smokers above India, our game is set somewhere in the Pacific where an artificial self-sustaining island (the Ark) is running into a few problems. The Ark was designed to house the few select elite but ended up having over 10,000 gate-crashers when the seas rose. Sending them away would mean certain death so the ark was spilt. The select few (the founders) get to live on the nice purpose built part of the Ark, while the refugees (the guests) have to live on cramped islands made up of the ships that brought them to Ark. Now however the Ark is wearing out, they’re running out of resources, water rationing is getting strained and the Guests are all set to rise up to take the Ark from the elitist founders.

 

 

The player gets to follow both sides of the story. The security force intend on keeping status quo and protecting the fragile stability of the Ark. And the Rebels as they attempt to wrestle control from the founders and attempt to leave the Ark. Both sides have their own opinions, their own reasons and neither is right or wrong. The game gives us (the outsider) a nice shade of grey while to the actual characters everything is either blue or red.

 

In the campaign mode there are eight linked levels which are important for both of stories. Naturally however whatever the Security Force wants the Rebels want the opposite? So they take turns defending and attacking. So if the security wants to steal a possible nerve agent from one of the Rebels compounds; then the Rebels want to protect a vaccine from the fascist pigs. Each level has a number of objectives so for that one the security force have to guide a robot to the nerve agent, blow up a door, repair a crane and then run it to their choppa. All the rebels have to do is hold them back until the time runs out. This mode is the offline mode and it’s good for learning a couple of things; how the game works, what various skills do, the layout to each of the level and how to hate the AI. Not the enemy’s AI, which generally does a good job, but your Allies AI which forces you to singlehandedly complete every objective on the map if you want to succeed. This follows over to online play when to bulk out the teams bots take the place of human players.

 

 

Each task can only be done by the right specialist and so we come to the Team Fortress style classes. You have the soldier that is slightly tougher, can refill allies’ ammo and can plant explosives. The Engineer that can open doors, build turrets, increase allies armour and plant mines. The medic can, oddly enough, heal people and can also increase their allies’ health. And the Operative can hack things and disguise themselves as the enemy. Each class however is poorly defined and at lower levels and are almost completely indistinguishable. The weapons you can carry are only determined by which size of person you’ve chosen. Heavy can carry big weapons but is slower, Light can move faster but only carry smaller guns while the Medium is the unspecialised middle-ground for pussies. This ends up with the bizarre situation where enemy Medics are more dangerous than your team’s soldiers. Oh and you can freely switch between classes at one of the terminals meaning you’ll never be unable to complete an objective because everybody decided to turn up as soldiers.