I just wanted to offer my own first impressions of Rage and idTech 5 now that I've played it a bit (I just finished returning supplies to Dan Hagar).

Overall, I don't think it is as bad as some people have said, although I can understand some of their criticisms. id isn't alone in being guilty of focusing on action first and character and event second. It's a major problem in Western game development and the reason why I prefer Japanese games for depth of character and story (i.e., writing). I wish the Western developers would adopt the approach of writing story first, then create the game engine and design to serve the story. Sierra used to do this, for example, and certain other Western titles like The Longest Journey did it, so it isn't like it's unknown, but it's generally been abandoned in favor of focusing on action (anologous to Hollywood's problems with "big blockbusters" that look nice but don't make a lasting emotional impression). I don't feel like there is any reason for my character to do the tasks being assigned by NPCs because there has been no effort to establish context such as world settings, events, individual character backgrounds and developments, etc. Doom 3 had better rationale and it was fairly simple, but Rage offered a great premise and then ignored developing it.

Graphics are okay, but even with the high rez textures set in my rageconfig, the textures still look worse than Doom 3 without mods. It's a bit distracting, but then I never really cared for the "Wild West" setting, anyway, even though I have certainly watched my share of spaghetti western movies. I disliked FONV for the same reason (well, FONV is just ridiculous with the stereotyping which also sits poorly with me). I haven't tried the "Texture Detail" setting because it says not to use it unless you have a six core CPU (umm... I have never seen a six core CPU in any system offered on the shelf or on web sites, although I am sure someone could custom-build such a machine, but even then, the textures for a 20 GB game look worse than an 8 year old game).

Many of the events are quite silly and make no sense for a post-apocalyptic setting. Buggy racing? Ugh. This is as bad as Bethesda's puzzle games in TES and FO, or any other company that does such things. Look, if I want to play a racing game, I'll go get one (and I don't want to play racing games anymore, by the way). Being forced to do such things in an action game with no alternative choices is extremely poor design. Not racing isn't really a choice since you need to upgrade your vehicle and the only way to really do it is to race and get the coupons for upgrades. If it was an optional task, it would be okay even though it is totally silly. Yeah, we're struggling for survival but we can waste resources on racing buggies... huh?! If you weren't wasting resources racing, maybe you wouldn't need to ask someone to play delivery person for supplies! Same problem for the various "chance" games (i.e., they really make no sense and seem to be thrown in with no context offered).

The acting is great, which is what I expect from id after Doom 3. Same with the character art (and I usually don't like Western character art, but for some reason id's appeals to me, or at least doesn't turn me away, anyway). It's interesting that so few people notice efforts to offer diverse character portrayals with varied voices, personalities, aesthetics, etc but complain about repeated "clones" in other games. id did a good job with this in Doom 3 and Rage shows the same approach, although I still think Doom 3 was a bit better (still, I haven't finished Rage yet).

I really liked the interactive interfaces in Doom 3. That's the type of thing that needs to be done more often. I don't really see that in Rage, unfortunately.

And the lack of controls... sigh. Look, id, exactly how do you explain that you did not allow customizing more than 5 mouse buttons in idTech 4 for Doom 3 and blocked Logitech's software from binding keys for the buttons, and now you STILL have the exact same problem in idTech 5?! This is ridiculous! Users must be allowed full control of customizing their control interface however they wish. Heck, I have less control than with Doom 3 because I can't even change some hardcoded keys such as Tab! Big step backwards here.

Same with sound, at least as far as I've checked so far. Doom 3 had incredible sound even though it had issues with properly recognizing 5.1 (which I hope will be fixed with the new BFG edition). Rage's sound is okay, but it's very bland and insignificant when compared to Doom 3.

One other thing that must be mentioned is the sixist writing/context. More specifically, it is assumed that the Ark survivor is male. This is annoying when you do not have any reason to identify with the character because there has been no effort to develop any sort of background at all. Also, regarding the actual setting and context offered, it makes no sense. The opening scenes show that the Ark volunteers appear to be all male, but if you were really trying to store people in cryogenic suspension for future repopulation efforts, you would want to have predominantly female volunteers (and even more specifically, you would screen for fertility and overall health, of course). This is simply due to limitations of human reproductive physiology, so the way the setting is presented just starts off on the wrong footing and doesn't draw the player into the game world.

So, in the end, at least so far, I feel the way some people do who have stated that there is good potential here but it hasn't been realized at all. The opening movie was excellent both technically and for setting context (although see my comment about sixist and inaccurate approaches to such a setting). However, once the opening ends, there is no effort to establish context and character so that an emotional bond draws the player into the world. Instead, you are simply given tasks to do. Rather than the elaborate setup, you might as well just have a text menu of selections for the same tasks. You can take out the driving, too, because it serves no purpose and does not draw the player into the world (not unless the player happens to be a hobbyist for car racing and buggy building, perhaps, but that's a very limited demographic).

[EDIT]:

I forgot to add a couple of points I wanted to mention.

Humor! Although some people don't seem to like id's humor in Doom 3 (and possibly Rage, too), I find it hilarious! Dan Hagar: Mixom stock owner. Hey, at least we know that the demons should forget their plans to invade Earth, right? Not much left anymore!

The weapon and ammo variety is good, although I wish that id and other companies (e.g., Bethesda and many others) would not level the offerings so blatantly.

Regarding story and FPS genre, it's worth remembering that FPS games such as Half-Life, Deus Ex, Bioshock, and Halo are famous for their stories, so it is not true that an FPS doesn't need or should not have a good story, good character development, etc.

Depth of character and story sure but this isn't fallout, ID makes FPS and this is one, controls don't really bother me but i agree story is lackluster, very buggy but i like it just fine.

The player's ark was only stuffed with soldiers on purpose. The women were placed in other arks.

Also, I thought the buggy racing was actually pretty cool. It really added a sort of Mad Max flavor to the game. As for how realistic it is given the setting, I'd like to point out that although the world is barren, it's not nearly as treacherous as the world of Fallout, where even the water is poison. The people in Wellspring actually have it pretty good.

But other than that, I agree with you completely. Rage's plot was horribly undeveloped and wouldn't be able to carry anyone along at all. Sure, id's stories have always been simple, but that's not really the issue in this case. At least in Doom 3 you had a clear beginning, middle, and end. Rage is just a mess.

The reason the game is large is because of the large texture covering the world to give a unique look to each place.
About 7 GB of this is multiplayer, so if you are low on space and don't care about multiplayer you can delete the multiplayer component.

Which content and characters would you prefer removed from the game to provide the money and time to provide for the duplication of character sounds, voice acting, animations and models to provide for a gender choice? (I don't mean that to be snarky, but people seem to forget that adding more content requires more resources.)

sixist... No, it's not sixist, that is not very good to say either. As state aboce, they were soldiers. If you don't know the premise it is not fair to assume some sort of hate thoughts of a person. Killing Floor had this same problem. They ahd no female character models and a few select people called them sixist. Which is utter rubbish, they were a small company who didn't have the time or resources to spend on making female characters, so again, unfair to assume such thoughts. In fact, you're sixist for assuming that men look at women as lesser, implying the fact that they are pigs

The racing I also disagree with. I am not a car enthusiast to any extent, and I loved it. Most of the replayability of this game would be gone for me without the racing, but the decision to make only racing during multiplayer was not so good. But still, Ioved the racing and I know a lot of other people who did. This assumed demographic you spoke of woulda liked it, but you are not counting countless other people who enjoyed it such as myself.

Last thing I disagree with is the textures, but you did say that you weren't into the theme, so fair enough, I can understand that would not help. I think the close up was not good, but the distance shots were beautiful.

Otherwise, most of it I agree with. I hope that you enjoy the rest of the game, you still have a bit to go,a nd there are quite a few great sections ahead of you!

There is no need to do that. Instead, the survivor should be female, at least if only one six is possible, because it is far, far more likely that a female would be the surviving soldier than a male. This would vastly help draw the player into the story, and it would help id have a much better image as a company (as well as the industry overall). Not doing this only undermines the game, company, and industry, especially for this type of story and setting.


I explained why it is sixist. Females are also soldiers. That has nothing to do with it at all. There is no need to assume anything about anyone's mindset when you are anolyzing media content that is offered. You anolyze what is there. That's called "content anolysis" and doesn't have anything to do with the mindset of anyone. In my summary, I did not say anything about any id employee or their possible person viewpoint. I stated the fact that the writing/context that is offered is sixist due to forcing the protagonist to be male, and that this forced choice is even worse because it undermines the ability of the player to be drawn into the story and events taking place. Basically, it does not fit well with the premise that is introduced by the opening scenes. Just the opposite, in fact.

Of course, this is my academic background, too, and many people may not recognize sixist content when they experience it. That's why I mentioned it, though. I hope that id takes it to heart and avoids such things in the future because it would really help this type of game.

i like the mad max style racing and vehicle customisations. people who bought the game but rant about hating on races are lame, you knew there was gonna be racing in the game and you bought it anyways. btw, it isn't sixist unless we have big boobed bikini women strutting around wellspring, i suppose you're a feminist? everything is sixist to a feminist. the main reason why soldiers are predominantly male is because men in general are physically fitter than women and are more aggressive in combat but i reiterate, PREDOMINANTLY.

then again, we're all entitled to our opinions, i like this game and i'm playing it more than most games that i owned recently. it looks great after the tweaks but some textures still look crappy upclose, no biggie. the gameplay and orginiality more than makes up for it. i said it's 'original' because this is the only post apocalyptic game that incorporates roleplaying AND customised vehicles along with combat catered for fps. i played fallout 3 and using the vats system svcks, not using it makes the game feel weird, it was designed for vats gameplay anyway but rage, it is the standard serious sam style of fps and i like that.

still don't like the game? get your tweaks right then go watch mad max 1 to 3 and open rage again.

Also, I can't help it but when I see the OP's avatar I can't help but think OP would want the female character(s) to be underage asians as well

sixism? none.
deep story? meh...
japanese games? Ugh...
i also disagree on the Doom3 comparisons, I was thinking on the other end

But hey, it was very interesting to see your first impressions, and while I disagree on most of it I think it's great that different people can experience something different.

Except: No way in hell should the character have been female. NO. A female soldier is more likely to survive? You are insane. Where did you get that data, exactly? Lol now I have the impression that you're a girl. Am I wrong?

lmfao xD Ah, well, it was still cool to read this.

In depth impressions should probably wait until you've made and completed the Eastern Wastelands. Your opinion on some things will most likely change.

I'm offering my impressions, not hating, especially when I specifically state that it isn't anywhere near as bad as some have claimed.

The racing is totally out of place for the game settings. The problem is it is forced and should be merely one approach, not a requirement. That's based on the various claims by id. I watched the Mad Max films when they first came out, by the way, long before they (and Mel Gibson) were well known. If the racing actually FIT the context of the story, it would be okay, even if it was a requirement and not optional. As it stands, it just completely ruins the believability of the game world and story because of the way it was implemented. By the way, notice that in Mad Max, this was NOT done (i.e., the world of Mad Max relies of fuel as a very rare supply in great demand, as well as other supplies such as the usual food, medicine, etc... Rage does not have any of that and that is why the racing is so very out of place for the game world).

Umm... this does not have any role playing elements at all, I'm afraid, or at least not unless you want to claim that every game where you play some type of protagonist is automatically "role playing." I will never accept such a concept of defining the role playing genre because it makes any genre distinction almost meaningless. Heck, look at trying to sneak and snipe in Rage. The game tells you to do it but the enemies psychically detect you regardless of whether you are sneaking or not with very few exceptions. There is no development or progression of character, and obviously you do not get to choose a character to create and develop. The latter point is not required for an RPG, but the former is (i.e., you have to have a role that you choose to play, but Rage really does not have that).

My tweaks are just fine, I assure you. The game plays well aside from the problems I have mentioned, and most of the issues are not technical but rather design flaws.

Yes, I am a feminist, but there are many different types of feminists and different individuals and groups often conflict with each other. No, believe me, I am pointing out a very serious design flaw that is sixist, and I do not usually state that almost any content or design is sixist. In this case, though, it is. I doubt it is intentional, of course, but that is why game development companies need people from the social sciences and humanities (or they will continue facing the very negative criticisms from many areas, even from other professional game developers and industry journalists such as Gamasutra's editor-in-chief).

If you want another example of sixism, consider the fact that you see no female gang members (at least as far as I am, and that's several gangs that are only male). This implies that only males are violent, gang-oriented, etc, but that's very sixist and not true. Bethesda and other companies have this tendency, too, and I have commented on it before (as have other people in the community, even going so far as to create mods to fix the issue in some games).

As for your views about soldiers as well as male/female dichotomy, I'll just say that you are mistaken about female capabilities and are repeating a stereotype, not actual fact. Or we could say that your points about males are mistaken, if you want view the issue from that perspective... although it's also worth noting that physical six is not restricted to male/female binary categories, and even using such categories would require some specific definitions. For example, in general, females are actually much more resistant to pain, have much higher stamina, much greater flexibility, and other various physical qualities that make them much better fighters than males in many situations. Basically, it's like comparing elves and dwarves in LotR. Both races are quite competent at fighting, and Gimli and Legolas learned this through their adventure together despite initially being somewhat at odds with each other.

I won't go off onto a lengthy academic discussion any more, though.


That was uncalled for and I think you know it.

FYI, it is a fairly typical Western ethnocentric view to consider people of Asian ethnicity to be far younger than they actually are. For example, one of the young women who graduated from my university landed a job in America, but the middle school kids in her apartment complex thought she was their age. It's a very unfortunate assumption and should be avoided because we can choose to avoid making such assumptions about people.

As for my avatar, Hatsune Miku is stated to be 16, so she is not underage. She is adolescent, but not underage for many things, including marriage in Japan (with parental consent). In fact, the age of consent for six varies by state in America, and in some she would not even be underage for that (Michigan is 16, for example).

Regardless, that comment was totally uncalled for by any measure and does not constitute a positive community on these forums.


I anolyze games and have since electronic gaming began. I play many different games and do a lot of comparison and contrast of design, content, etc.

Let me explain a critical point where you are incorrect despite protestations to the contrary. It is far more likely that a female would survive simply by the odds because if such a project as Project Eden were undertaken in these types of circumstances, the vast majority of the Ark members would be female, plain and simple. That's required due to human reproductive restrictions. You know, Genghis Khan has been said to have fathered 20,000 children. Whether that is accurate or not is irrelevant to the basic fact that one male can impregnate many, many females in a relatively short time, but full term pregnancy, birth, and initial nursing of offspring would be well over 9 months. Therefore, this type of project requires that the vast majority of Ark members be female and, more specifically, be fertile females of child bearing age in generally good physical health.

If there is some concern about fighting and survival capabilities, women are at least as competent at fighting and surviving in many environments as men, and some environments actually favor them. For example, if such an event occurred (i.e., large asteroid hitting Earth) the aftermath would be very likely be a new Ice Age, and women are far better at withstanding cold than men. Obviously, many women are excellent fighters, too, including physical melee combat of various kinds. Same thing with males. Some men are better at certain types of fighting, and some men are simply not competent fighters at all.

You would screen for all of these factors, but the odds are far higher that a women would be the Ark member rather than a male simply because of the far higher ratio of females to males in order to reproduce and repopulate the human species (which was the intent of Project Eden, after all).


Perhaps, but unlikely. As I said, many of the things I mention are basic design flaws. A couple are technical issues. Also, I am already familiar with the ending since I watched a video of it online to see why people were complaining so much. Unlike some people, I feel empathy for the game designers. Specifically, they can't win because if they include boss fights (e.g., Deus Ex - Human Revolution) people complain, and if they do not include boss fights (e.g., Rage) people complain. Sure, people can claim that the complaints are coming from different people, but both of those examples are FPSes. The same is true for other elements such as story and character development (i.e., FPSes can have good story and character development, or not... just because a game is an FPS does not mean it cannot have a good story and good character development).

There are works where the ending has been so poor that it ruined the entire work for me. That's just me because I hate poor endings even if the rest of the work has been stellar.

Really, though, lackluster elements often cause people to simply stop playing even if later elements might improve things. That's quite normal and one big reason why the majority of players of games have many that they never finish (although there can be other reasons, too).

Lol, there is so much to debate, but my point is made: These are only your opinions, and only opinions

We just happend to disagree with almost all of it, lol.

Hm... but I'd like to see some people support your view point, I'd like to see more from that side

you watched a video to find out the ending? i can tell that you're a booksmart but you're out of touch with reality. you should go out more often.

Using your logic with regards to woman being used for fertility and making better soldiers and there being lesser need for men, combine the two, add say 6 months downtime out of the 9 and come to your own conclusion. Personally though while I do think the reasoning is partially valid, you need to add balance and probably not look for problems where the don't need to exist. A choice of six would have been good but not including it doesn't make the game sixiest, by not mentioning the lack of race selection would that make the sixist argument racist? Hell, it's probably ageist too.

The boss fight example is poor, there are two reasons for complaints in Deus Ex. One, there are those that like to play that type of game stealth and not have any kills, forcing them with the boss fights broke that build for some people. Two, the boss fights were sourced out and their implementation was quite jarring, crude, and had very little relationship to the rest of the game. Another reason it isn't a fit comparison is due to id being famous for their epic boss fights, their abscence being somewhat unexpected for some.

The car thing confuses me, if there's a genre that almost dictates their inclusion it'd be the post apocolyptic setting if you follow any kind of popular culture. If it weren't for the vehicles there would likely have been no RAGE made in the first place if you look at interviews.

The not feeling it important to finish the game before doing an I depth anolysis I find surprising. Watching the end on YouTube isn't quite the same thing, I would have felt being fully informed was a basic requirement but I guess that'ts you call.

Exactly what I was thinking,

It's what we'd call an... anolysis flaw

I may double post here, but everyone will more than likely live.

You have given me a brilliant mod idea.

FUEL!!!

I reckon that would make the car stuff so much cooler, and it would make you really think about where you were going, it would sue up some surplus money and it might allow for some extra missions. It would also be cool (and unrealistic, but so are huge mutants) to have the feltrite meteor rain thing when you are driving, but make it so taht when you are nearly out of fuel, a minigme comes up (potentially, maybe a 33% chance) where you have to collect fuel in your path and if you collect a certain amount in the alotted time, you can keep going with say half a fuel tank left, but if you miss out,I guess you'll just have to get a lift. (Though It hink that a mod that disables getting a lift should be implemented if you are in battle, as it is not really a good feature....)

Now I am getting a huge feelign that your "academic background" is actualyl stemming from an arts degree... And social sciences have no place in the gaming industry unless the company is trying to make a realistic setting, and really, im getting a nother feeling, this one telling me that this isnt meant to be one of those realistic settings. Just a thought....

As for your thing about women being better at various physical aspects than men, then why is it that in pretty much all fields, the world record is held by men? Flexibil;ity I completely agree with, women are generally better at that. As for the other ones, i disagree and your so called "facts" aren't facts, they are some ranodm things you are claiming without any backing. Now I don't care if men or women are more physically capable of things, and I am not sixist in any way whatsoever, but you need to understand when certain people are good for certain things. Women are said to be better nurturers, and the reason for that is because in most cases, they are. But you dont see me jumping up and down calling out sixist.

In the case of your female to amle ratio in terms of continuing survival, i dont think anyone claimed you are wrong, but why would there not be all female arks, and all soldier arks,a nd all male arks, and all pet arks, etc etc. Mayeb civilians were kept in different locations. It dones't matter what the odds of having a female as the character is, it isnt the case, it isnt sixist and you are the first to care. This alone shows that it really isnt sixist because we have had plenty of people pointing out crap about this game since day one, adn this is the first we have heard of this. And they looked damn hard to find problems.

I will say again. THIS IS NOT sixIST.

Deus Ex and RAGE are completely different games, reven different genres, which you yourself were pointing out earlier. Remember, what you were saying about genres

As a lot of people have said, don't look for problems where tey don't exist, it really is uncalled for. And yes the post about your avatar while amusing and possibly somehwat accurate was also uncalled for.

I would also like to point out that none of this is a personal attack, I am simply debating (and rather successfully )pointing out major flaws in your arguement. Try anolysing it from a logical view point rather than an opionated one adn you may find different results. Have fun with the rest of the game