FROM COMICS TO VIDEO GAMES
As you remember who tried the original game, the story of Rogue Trooper Redux is based on the comic book created by Gerry Finley-Day and Dave Gibbons in the early 80s. The narrative context starts from the secular conflict that rages between the Norts and Southers factions for the dominance of Nu Earth, a planet that has become arid and
inhospitable after the massive use of chemical bombs that have compromised the integrity of the atmosphere, forcing the humans wear special overalls and respirators to be able to move on the surface. As the conflict evolved, the Souther faction began to create an army of super-soldiers created in the laboratory and perfectly able to fight in the contaminated territories.
The early stages of Rogue Trooper Redux play take place during one of the key events that are told in the comic strip, which is the moment when the GI army is trapped in the Quartz Zone and exterminated by hostile forces. The only survivor of the catastrophe is the
soldier Rogue, who is then charged with tracing the perpetrators of the massacre. The remastered edition brings a series of technical innovations to adapt – as far as possible – the visual experience and make it more modern with respect to the original counterpart:for this reason the characters, weapons and vehicles present during the adventure were remodeled, but the intermezzo sequences were also restored with
the addition of dynamic lighting and new special effects, as well as the polygonal structures of objects and buildings. Logically, the difference compared to the Rogue Trooper for PlayStation 2 is perceived, nevertheless the graphic restyling has not been able to solve those evident deficiencies of visual and conceptual characterization that afflict the production on an aesthetic level and not only.
A SUPERSOLD AND ITS BIOCHIPS
Although it is a third-person shooter of classical setting with obvious shortcomings of the type of implementation, the old Rogue Trooper did not fail to propose some interesting gimmicks from a playful point of view. Also in Rogue Trooper Redux the distinctive element on the interaction level is entrusted to the biochips implanted in the skull of each clone.
Curiously, when an GI soldier falls into battle, these electronic data can be extracted from his body and used as tactical support for an ally through three special slots available on the helmet,
rifle and backpack supplied by the troops.And since Rogue’s teammates will fall in the early stages of the game, all you have to do is extract these materials from your body and install them in your own equipment. So we have the Gunnar biochip inside the rifle, with which you can take advantage of an assisted sighting system and a sniper sight to strike the most distant targets with surgical precision.
At the same time it is possible to turn the weapon into a sentinel cannon: all you have to do is place the turret on the ground and activate it to distract the enemy or receive an effective fire cover.
Alternatively there is the option of the silencer, which theoretically should favor the stealth approach in cleaning up the maps.
During our play this last option was the least exploited, thanks to the fact that the mechanics do not stimulate at all to lean for a weighted strategy; while striving to be precise, it is almost mathematical to be discovered by some patrols present in the neighborhood, even from a considerable distance.
Moreover, the complete absence of indicators that allow to estimate the level of general alert is certainly not helpful in this sense: as you may have guessed, flattening the rifle and launching in an ignorant way forward turns out to be the only sensible solution to to adopt.
Then we have the Bagman biochip; placed in the backpack, allows you to build objects and upgrades recovering the wreckage from the corpses of fallen enemies, turrets or small mechanical remains that are scattered around the maps.
By accessing a special menu you can invest these resources and keep your equipment up-to-date. With the Helm biochip, finally, Rogue is able to bypass electronic defenses or create diversions using a hologram of the protagonist or calling the attention of the guards from behind the covers. Since this is a dated game, the campaign is predictably structured in single closed short-term missions, which envisage moving from an entry point to an exit point and crushing anyone who tries to distract the protagonist from the purpose of his mission.
