The Alphaville Herald

Unreal:SL Reviewed

by Alphaville Herald on 08/03/05 at 11:41 pm

an in-game game review by Koden Farber

Everyone has one of those days when you just want to shoot something. On days like this a good first person shooter comes in handy. Unreal: Second Life is the Bedazzle Team’s attempt at FPS in second life. The project itself is is reportedly coming to a close (Bedazzled seems to get bored with their projects in a hurry), and will soon be a distant memory. What was U:SL like, and was it worth your time when it was here? This article will try to answer that question, if only for the historical record and to inform future SL game development projects.

Summary:
There isn’t much to say about U:SL content wise. It’s a first person shooter with many of normal FPS elements; deathmatch, team deathmatch, and capture the flag. There isn’t a back story to why you’re shooting each other, but hey, since when did you need a reason to pick up a gun and start wailing on people?

Weapons:
There are 6 available gun types, but I’ve only used 4 of them. This is because 3 of them are free and I’m too cheap to buy any of the other ones.

The Inferno [Free]
This baby’s my personal favorite. You get 15 shots before you reload and you can unload them in about 3 seconds. The reload time is about 2 seconds, so you may want to move somewhere save while you are auto reloading. I’m not sure how the damage is per shot but the rate of fire is nice enough to make it a very deadly weapon.

The BTG3600 [Free]
I could never figure out how to use this properly. I think the trick was to lead your shot a little but I’m not sure. I think it’s safe to assume that this weapon is a heavy hitter. I would hope at least because you can only get one shot off every 3 seconds.

The Saedaku Flamebringer [Free]
It’s a great weapon for the fact you can hit moving targets pretty easily and the flame stick for a while giving constant damage. The rate of fire is constant and the weapon never reloads. The major problem is that the weapon causes major lag. It’s not bad when one person is using it, but when you have two or three people using this at the same time, all the flames lag you badly.

The Saedaku Tactical Folder Knife [L$600]
They say don’t bring a knife to a gunfight, but I couldn’t resist. This little beauty can be thrown to deal minor damage, or slashed to deal massive damage. I think if you get three or four good swipes on your opponent their going down. It takes you about 2 seconds to throw the knife, and about one to slash. The knife comes with short cut keys to ease the use of the knife. It’s a great weapon if you want to get up close and personal.

Review

Learning curve: 2 minutes [Just enough to get set up]

Gameplay: 8/10 without lag, 3/10 with.

This game is very lag sensitive. If the server is lagging, you are better off not playing. If you always lag even on good days, avoid playing this. If your system and connection can handle intensive places, this is worth playing. After getting your equipment, its very easy to figure out what your doing; kill or be killed.

Graphics and Sound: 10/10

It’s beautiful, just plain beautiful. The game has a perfect battling atmosphere.

Keep Factor: 5/10

Lag is a major factor in playing this. The flame thrower lags badly and can scare you from the game. Though if everyone uses the infernos, it’s a very fun to play and light on the lag.

Overall: 8/10

Flaws aside, this is a very solid game. If the project wasn’t closing down I’d say this shows major potential to be something even greater than it is already. Anyone can get started playing because it costs nothing to get the life pack or three of the six weapons. I say you should try this while you still can.