For example, I didn’t fall in love with Titanfall 2’s environmental art design—it felt a bit generic to me, like it was meant to be the backdrop for a shooter, as opposed to the Sevastopol in A:I or the station in SOMA that felt like existing locations.
Ditto BioShock: Infinite. The world felt like it was built around the premise of being an arena shooter, not the other way around.
BioShock 1 & 2 are exactly what I’m talking about though.
Even Borderlands 2 has great world-building: the corporate history that can be inferred from the level design, the weapons & the NPCs makes it one of the richer games I’ve played.
Would love to hear others’ thoughts on your favorite FPS environments!
I’m surprised you don’t mention any bethesda titles (fallout3, oblivion, skyrim…) since they’re just an already existing world you’re put into with their own factions an politics you can integrate and influence
I’ve got about 2k hours in Skyrim so I definitely love a Bethesda game, but what I’m thinking about are simple arcade shooters with less of an RPG structure than TES or Fallout.
Admittedly Borderlands has skill trees and classes, but I feel like it’s safe to call it a shooter first & a roleplayer second. But DOOM, Bioshock, Portal, Metro—if there’s more to your character than their name & their gun, the game barely acknowledges it. :P
Ah, I was gonna recommend the original Deus Ex but it is also an RPG
I see what you mean, you want a "shooter first "game where it doesn’t feel like the world was built around you, all i can say for that is boneworks.