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Lost Planet - Mission 00 (Intro)
Hello again gamers!
There's a new game series today, an old Japanese classic from Capcom that was an incredible success in its time in the East but that unfortunately never really got the chance to shine in the West.
PLOT
"In a distant future humanity is forced to abandon Earth to look for new planets to colonize. One of these colonies is E.D.N. III, a dead planet characterized by extreme climate conditions.
The planet's initial colonization fails tremendously as humanity discovers that the planet is not dead but inhabited instead by extremely hostile insect-like creatures.
Cold reigns supreme, but an incredible source of energy is also discovered that can revolutionize humanity's life, thermal energy.
The problem is... the only way to reliably extract thermal energy is by fighting and killing the planet's native and hostile inhabitants, the Akrids.
And so humanity develops the perfect weapon to fight against this resilient life forms, the Vital Suit or VS in short are piloted mech-like exoskeletons armed with the latest tech and weapons.
VS technology is the edge humanity needed to win over the Akrids and so a second colonization attempt of the planet is made shortly after.....
150 years after the initial first colonization the player will start his adventure as Wayne Holden, a soldier that lost his memory after an initial tragedy.
The main goal in the game will be to find out who you are after the memory loss, all while of course trying to survive E.D.N. III and all its dangers."
THE GAME
The first Lost Planet game, titled "Lost Planet: Extreme Condition" reached our side of the world for the first time in 2007 through XBox 360 and PC platforms while PS3 got its own release one year later, in 2008.
Speaking of the game, it was ambitious to say the least, basically a sci-fi alien third-person shooter with a lot of emphasis on mechs driving and shooting.
No seriously if you are a fan of mechs in general you have to try the Lost Planet series at least once, in fact that is the focal point of the game. Smashing, shooting and destroying things while piloting a VS is probably the most satisfying thing you can experience in Lost Planet.
Aside from the mech side of things, "standard" combat is played in third person, a good variety of futuristic weapons is also included in the game's package including an "upgraded" version of most weapons that are usually used as mech weapons that the player can attach and detach from a mech freely at any time.
Another main focus of the game is the freedom it gives in movements due to the presence of a grappling hook that will help the player reach objectives, fight in advantageous spots and aid in general exploration.
The last but not least game's focus is the thermal energy. It is the resource needed to keep you alive in the cold and that allows our protagonist to heal its wounds very quickly in combat.
The problem is that thermal energy drains over time due to the extreme temperatures and the player starts their missions with a limited supply of it. Thermal energy can only be collected by proceeding with the mission through various means (the most common is by killing Akrids), so in a sense the player is "forced" to proceed at a certain pace through the level, especially in the game's higher difficulties.
Gameplay develops in "missions" that are usually quite long (lasting up to 30 minutes each if the player decides to explore all available areas) and with few checkpoints.
The storytelling is not that great with characters that sometimes have very bad facial animations and that also use odds voice tones in circumstances where it probably shouldn't be the case, but if you can overlook these problems the storyline is actually immersive and constantly pushes the player forward to discover more of it with each mission.
Overall great game for a change of scenery and from modern shooters, good story, good concepts and great mech combat, what's not to love?
Players be warned tho, being an old game it sometimes can feel very clunky and heavy especially in player movements and animations, but this also contributes in the overall difficulty and feeling of the game.
The intro mission of Lost Planet
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