Hard Reset

The Short


Pros
- Fast paced throwback to vintage FPS mechanics
- Only two guns with dozens of upgrades streamline the system
- Massive numbers of robots to gun down
- Difficult but not unfair; even the "Easy" difficulty may prove a challenge
- Plenty of stuff to blow up constantly
- Excellent sound design and beautiful graphics

Cons
- Short; only two or three hours
- Actually quite linear
- Only a few enemy types that get recycled
- Story that is presented during load screens is boring and unimportant

If you hate robots, this is the game for you. 

The Long

Remember when shooters were just that: shooters? Where the point of the game was to grab a bunch of guns and just blast stuff without any semblance of story or reason for shooting them except they want you dead in return? The FPS genre has taken several steps away from that, first with Half-Life and next with games like Call of Duty 4 that replaced shooting with scripted events. A few games like Painkiller and Serious Sam have cropped up that took us back to our "roots," before our health magically recharged and we had to find cover constantly. Now we have Hard Reset, a homage to those older games, set to put you on a robot-blasting, high-octane thrillfest from start to end.

And guess what? It works almost perfectly. 

Plus you get to kill a jillion robots. 

Hard Reset is made by a group of guys that also worked on the previously mentioned Painkiller games. For those who've played those games, you know pretty much what you are getting into with Hard Reset. Painkiller was characterized by having massive numbers of enemies (like Serious Sam, but not quite as insane) that is threw at you, giving you tons of guns and weapons to deal with them and having you strafe, blast, and run backwards for a good chunk of the game. It was awesome and fast paced and no cover was required.

Hard Reset is essentially this with robots and about a thousand times more explosions. It also has some interesting upgrade-system elements as well as some streamlining of ammo that really does the game a lot of favors. 

Too many robots!

At it's core, this is what you do in Hard Reset: You shoot a crap-ton of robots. When you go to a new area, tons of robots start crawling out of the woodwork (and I mean tons) and it's up to you to blast them. Usually they'll keep coming for several intense, explosion-ridden minutes, until you finally clear the stage and head to the next area, where this battle arena repeats. If this sounds repetitive you would technically be right, but it never feels that way, mostly because of the excellent level design. Something Hard Reset does very well is fill the environment with things that blow up. Barrels that explode are placed liberally around the battlefield. Conduits and automated shops can be shot and emit a several-second long blast of electricity, frying any robots that run into it. Generators on walls can be rigged to blow, as can cars. Even some of the robots (the round little crawlers) blow up on death, which can cause huge chain reactions among their own ranks. Hard Reset is punctuated by explosions happening constantly with one of the challenges to not get caught in the aftershock. Because every area is unique and moves so incredibly fast you never get bored. Instead it's like one massive, jaw-dropping experience after another, and it's near perfect in its execution.

Your way is blocked by a few doors, but as a whole it doesn't keep you from shooting for very long. 

Another neat gameplay idea is the concept of only having two actual guns. You have your "lead shootin" gun and your "plasma" gun. Each uses one type of ammo ("Red" and "Blue," respectively) so it's simple with regards to what you have to pick up. However, thanks to a simple but still extensive upgrading system, your default weapons can be changed mid-battle into other types. Some are standard, like a shotgun or rocket launcher. Others are more unique, like a plasma gun that can fire an orb that time-slows any enemies trapped in it. All these guns can in turn be upgraded, so your shotgun will fire bouncing pellets that stun once it's powered up. All the while they still only use the two basic ammo types, so you don't have to go searching for shotgun shells or rockets; just use the same ammo. This also means you get to choose which gun you unlock when, so you can fully tailor it to your playstyle. Very cool idea. 

The cyberpunk robot dystopia of Hard Reset has a stunning art style, too.

Graphically, Hard Reset is gorgeous, especially considering it is technically an indie game. From the exquisitely clever and beautiful menus when you first launch the game to watching the rain drizzle across the sidewalks and buildings of a neon, flashy cyberpunk city, Hard Reset looks really, really good. I cranked it up to max everything and was shocked at how well everything animated, exploded, and just looked stationary (the guns especially animate and have very good looking effects to them). Unfortunately my computer couldn't handle it in high-octane situations (read: 90% of the game) so I had to turn the resolution down a bit, but even then it still looked very good, and when the framerate is staying consistent it's smooth as butter as well. If you have a killer rig this is a great game to show off, as it isn't technically all that taxing (though I don't know how they pulled it off) but has a killer art design and graphics regardless.

Sound is also excellent, with the exception being the voices. They are gravelly and bland as you'd expect from this type of game, but luckily they don't come up very often. Gunshots and robot noises sound excellent, however, and since the story only shows up during loading screens you can just ignore it completely (I did). 

Find upgrade points (cash?) around to buy new weapons and upgrades!

So what isn't good about Hard Reset? Well, it's short, clocking in at around 2-3 hours on the Easy difficulty. It's also worth noting it's called "Hard" Reset for a reason: this game can be very difficult, especially for those not used to the old-school FPS types of games. On Easy you could probably bludgeon your way through, but on the more intense difficulties it'll wipe the floor with you. Luckily it has an "EX" mode that lets you play again with your same weapons and upgrades, which makes things a little easier. So despite being short, at least it is very strongly encouraging you to go back for multiple playthroughs. 

Another problem is lack of enemy variety. You have the little crawly ones, the little crawly ones that explode, the charging big ones, and the big ones with guns. Expect to kill a trillion of these (with a few others mixed in, but not a lot) over the game's short single player. While that isn't bad as it just throws hordes at you at every possible instance, it wouldn't have hurt to have seen it mixed up a little. 

Lastly is that there is no multiplayer whatsoever. Which I suppose is fine seeing as I hate it when people tack multiplayer on to singleplayer focused games, but the gameplay in Hard Reset screams old-school team deathmatch to me. Oh well.

At least it lets me kill a trillion robots. 

As it stands, if you have any affection for old-school FPS shooters, you owe it to yourself to get Hard Reset. Like the Serious Sam games, it's a homage to an older era, but unlike the Serious Sam games it actually uses modern gameplay conventions to refine and perfect those old methods rather than simply giving it a pretty coat of paint. It's fast, fluid, and straight up fun. I honestly can't recall the last time I had this much fun in an FPS. At the incredibly low price of $20 standard on Steam, this is a game you really shouldn't miss out on. 

Four out of five stars.

Serious Blade Runner vibe, guys.