Itch for The Twitch

Sprint, Pop!, Jump, Spin, Bang!

Ahh, the satisfying sound of heads popping as you turn and jump as graceful as a dancer while shooting your weapons of destruction. Many gamers who got their start on the PC or have been a PC gamer for awhile will know that feeling I’m talking about. The running and jumping, the fast paced gun fights, and the simple objective of kill or be killed. It has been awhile since my twitch shooter itch has been satisfied but luckily not everyone on the PC has given up on skill based shooters yet. Now, I’m not saying any other shooters don’t require skill but with some of the games nowadays (especially on the console) just don’t take the amount of skill that a lot of other games require. I’m talking mostly about he old school shooters such as Unreal Tournament, Counter Strike, Quake, Tribes, etc.

There was a time where I was only a PC gamer. Didn’t really touch my console since nothing really captured my attention on it. We had an N64 and a gamecube about the time when I was starting to get pretty competitive in CS 1.6. Wanted to get into CAL and I scrimmed a lot with various clans. I also played a lot of Call of Duty 2 competitively. Lots of heads popped with my Kar98K semi automatic rifle. Delicious.

Fast forward to the era of the New gen consoles. The Xbox 360, PS3, etc. Games such as Call of Duty Modern Warfare were making their way onto the console and I was very excited. I’ve never really been a “Shooter” person on consoles before then. Only playing the classics such as Goldeney64. Playing CoD on the console didn’t feel…right. It was a decent game but it seemed like most of the skill was gone. Dressed up in perks, more weapons, and a level design which had snipers sitting on house tops and riflemen laying down in the grass in wait. The shooters on consoles were fun, but being a PC gamer, it’s hard to see many younger gamers get these games on the console but enjoying it for reasons I think are…lacking. I don’t want to start a console vs PC war but PC gamers know what they’re talking about when they say that PC shooters will always take more skill than a console. Ok, maybe not ALWAYS more, but it definitely takes a different kind of skill (The twitch factor).

Even shooters on PC nowadays are losing that aspect of simple skilled shooting. It’s more about perks, leveling, flashiness, large levels, etc. Look at Quake and how simplistic the way you could kill one another was. In a gunfight it came down to who had more skill, the lightning reflexes. Not who had the better gear or skill setup. As shooters become more complicated I believe they’re getting slightly less skill based. Being more complicated isn’t having the effect of being more complex in a “smart” way. Now, I’m not saying that this is always a BAD thing. I myself love the aspect of having a wide range of customization and variety of skills within a shooter. But it has been awhile since I’ve felt the excitement of a fast paced twitch shooter.

Gladly, it seems many developers are bringing the good ‘ole twitch back into PC shooters. Tribes Ascend is a great example as well as there are many different quake inspired shooters that are free to download. Quake even got a reboot being ported as a free to play game which you can play in your browser! These are the games I feel that shooters really show their best form. I’ll always have fun shooting people with my friends on the consoles, but nothing will compare to flying at 200+kph and shooting people mid-air in Tribes Ascend. That feeling is the heart of a shooter. At least for me it is since I do know this is the internet, and everyone has a different opinion. But no matter what your opinion is, if you love shooters, then I say this to you….

…Frag on.