Developer: id Software
Rrp: £7.99 (Humblebundle, Steam and Bethesda Store)
I remember playing this game around the time it first came out. I was all hyped up about it because it was from id Software and they had never steered me wrong before. Sadly this game was something of a disappointment. Oh, I remember enjoying it well enough but it was all very forgettable leaving no lasting impression. In fact a good way to think of it is like buying a hamburger from McDonalds, sure its tasty and fills the void for a short time but what do you really remember of it? Its memory just merges with that of every other burger you’ve eaten.
Rage suffers from the rather major problem of that its trying to be a open world game while operating under first person shooter rules. What do I mean by this? Well in games such as Fallout and Borderlands if you kill an enemy you can collect and use the weapon they were using. Yet in Rage the weapon disappears. You have to wait until you’re given a weapon before you can use it which is very much a thing first person shooters do. Another example is the way that you can’t explore the world like you can in games like Fallout, Borderlands or Far Cry as there are invisible walls that stop you from accessing areas that you really should be able to get to.
If I want an open world RPG set in a wasteland I have Fallout three, four and New Vegas as well as the Borderlands series and Mad Max. If I want an FPS I have plenty to pick from but even limiting myself to Bethesda’s stock I have Doom (2016), Doom Eternal and the Wolfenstein series. There just is no real reason to give this game the time of day as its the worst of both genres.
Some games don’t age well because the mechanics they used get modernised and improved upon making going back to the way they originally played difficult. Others have the issue of the graphics becoming so outdated that they become unplayable for any new audience. In Rage’s case it’s both. Graphically the game looks dated and ugly and sadly it lacks the charm or stylised aesthetic that something like Borderlands has. On top of that there have been several games that have done everything Rage did but better, and in several cases they already existed before Rage did.
I wish I could recommend this game but I truly can’t. Even its story is lacklustre and the ending comes out of nowhere and is very unsatisfying. It doesn’t answer any of the questions the game raises leaving several plots unresolved and unless they pick those back up in Rage 2 (which would not come out for another eight years) it feels like a waste of potential.
