Reviews VideoGame / Homefront

Great new I.P

Homefront is a new I.P developed by Kaos Studios and published by THQ, detailing an invasion by North Korea. As far-fetched as that sounds, the development team managed to develop a cool, unlikely but plausible backstory showing North Korea's rise and America's fall. The main reason this troper bought the game was due to the story, and the story doesn't disappoint. This game actually shows the true colors of a brutal occupation. Even though hostile enemy invading the U.S has been shown before, like the Russians invading in Modern Warfare 2, but whereas Modern Warfare 2 only shows military vs. military, Homefront shows civilians getting beaten, families separated, parents gunned down in front of their children, and bodies being dumped into mass graves (There's even an instance where you have to hide in the mass grave to escape being shot). The story even goes into the race riots that would happen should such a war ever happen, and you even spend a fifth of the game fighting racist survivalists. The main problem with the story, however, is that it's VERY short. It clocks at around 5-7 hours, and if you rush through it, you can probably beat it in about 3-4 hours. The story seems to end rather abruptly, too, with a cliffhanger. It's too bad, because the story is very good. Luckily, Homefront sold decently well (Despite mixed reviews), and a sequel was already planned before the first game was even released, so the story might be concluded in Homefront 2.

Gameplay wise, it's pretty much standard shooter controls. You aim down your sights to fire your gun more accurately. You can sprint, jump, knife etc. The game does go out of its way to make it feel like you're a civilian fighter rather than a Bad Ass Super Soldier. First off, you're only given a few magazines of ammo maximum. Unlike in Call of Duty where you can carry up to 300 AK-47 bullets, you can only carry a maximum of 90 here. Recoil also seems to be higher in this game, and health is lower (though this is balanced by a faster regeneration). These small tweeks does help shake things up a bit to keep the gameplay from being the same cliched gameplay we're seeing in every military shooter these days.

Overall, Homefront is a fun game, with a great story, and fun gameplay. This troper highly recommends picking this up.