This review contains spoilers, click expand to view.
I was among those players who bought the disc and didn't know about Half-Life. Also, being a pal of Levelord and everything related to game development, I can write a huge review. Usually, I don't do it, but this is an exception.
First of all, it was 1998 and the same year, the same day the competing project of Valve software was released. SiN was the first massive game for Ritual Entertainment. It was influenced by Heavy Metal magazine and universe (design, posters), Quake 2 (monsters), and hell knows what else.
The story takes place in the futuristic city Freeport where the special police force HARDCORPS tries to deal with criminals. It appears the Freeport city bank was being robbed, and John R. Blade is sent to prevent the robbery and investigate the situation. However, it leads him to the SiNTek corporation, who's notorious CEO, Elexis Sinclaire, was long ago under Blade's radar. The existing drug U4 is being produced by SiNTek and adjusted enough to change humans to mutants. That madness should be stopped. That's the plot.
As you see from the story, you have to advance through the story and know more details about what's going on. The dialogues between main characters, that happen quite a lot, help to understand everything. The developers included short briefings between each location. Also, every map has its objectives. Sometimes even secondary ones that usually don't grant any advancements.
SiN is a solid shooter where you have multiple weapons to exterminate the villains. You fight them on the ground, under the water, sometimes kill using vehicles. You must admit, for 1998 to ride vehicles and have an extensive underwater levels was something new.
Game design is interesting, though, thanks to Levelord and the team. The game is not that linear. There are multiple levels you may skip, or you may explore, and that has a consequence on the future levels. For example, failing to deal with the water poisoning doesn't fail the mission but forces you to go back to the Freeport dam to deal with the goons there. I don't even mention secrets, hidden level passages, and marvelous Sinclaire mansion.
Characters suit the game, each one is memorable, especially Blade and Elexis, that till the end puppeteering the badass protagonist. It makes the game different from HL, where Gordon is just a mute. You don't feel him as a character because he is supposed to be you.
However, not only the competition with HL killed the game but bugs. In 1998 it was impossible to finish the game. You had to wait for the loading screen between the levels for a long time. One of the earlier bosses could freeze. Sometimes it could lead to the glitch and required to play the whole level again. Sometimes moving to Freeport subway level caused crashes (kernel32.dll). The bugs were fixed, but with the HL release and overall praise, the damage was done, and SiN didn't do well. Later on, the anime failed (just horrible movie), and SiN Episodes: Emergence also didn't succeed burying the franchise forever.
I truly regret the game didn't do well those days and later because it's worth playing, worth suffering on several levels, and worth remembering. Music, dialogues, levels, the whole world was worth believing.
If some fans try to make a reboot, remastered on any new engine, I will donate and, if possible, join the project giving all my energy to make SiN happen again and us to know how the hell Sinclaire was finally arrested by Blade. Or... They got married lol.… Expand
