Review
Played on: PC
Released: 2011
Recently, I played the old Xbox 360 title Frontlines: Fuel of War, review here, and enjoyed its unique take of a moving battlefield through its campaign. I was happy to learn that this small developer was behind a rather hyped shooter from this era, namely Homefront. I decided to finally play this one too. Both titles are partially connected in their story when it comes to the same world conflict that escalated from the war fought in Frontlines
That said, Homefront is about defending your local neighbourhood in a USA invaded by North Korea. My hope that this reminded me of Frontlines was quickly crushed as I began playing. Homefront is heavily influenced by the linearity and action focus that is Call of Duty. The massive impact COD had on other shooters in this generation is tremendous, not a bad thing as such, but in regards to my hope that it reminded me of Frontlines, it's disappointing.
Recently, I played the old Xbox 360 title Frontlines: Fuel of War, review here, and enjoyed its unique take of a moving battlefield through its campaign. I was happy to learn that this small developer was behind a rather hyped shooter from this era, namely Homefront. I decided to finally play this one too. Both titles are partially connected in their story when it comes to the same world conflict that escalated from the war fought in Frontlines
That said, Homefront is about defending your local neighbourhood in a USA invaded by North Korea. My hope that this reminded me of Frontlines was quickly crushed as I began playing. Homefront is heavily influenced by the linearity and action focus that is Call of Duty. The massive impact COD had on other shooters in this generation is tremendous, not a bad thing as such, but in regards to my hope that it reminded me of Frontlines, it's disappointing.
Let's take a closer look.
Although I still own an Xbox 360, Homefront is not available as a backwards compatible title on Xbox Series X/S. Instead, I opted for the Steam version on PC, opening the possibility to play at a superior 4K@60fps compared to the X360 version running at 720p@30fps. Including a massive bump in texture and picture quality. It works with a connected gamepad too but requires button re-mapping.
Strangely enough, Homefront still has some of the quirks of its controls inherited from Frontlines, with a static way of bringing up the iron sights and aiming down the gun. I’d excepted the movement being the quicker and better flowing nature of a COD game from the same era. Homefront is all about moving forwards slowly and being thorough to take down all enemies before moving out in plain sight, it's best to completely stop to aim properly and only move when not engaging in gunfights.
Charmingly enough, Homefront takes place in typical US locations: like the city suburbs, at a mall and even out on a countryside farm. Depicting that homeland feel for Americans, seeing their neighbourhood and local residences being invaded. In turn, this focus on specific location confines Homeland's variety in environments. It overstays the areas it depicts and offers little visual variety.
Although I still own an Xbox 360, Homefront is not available as a backwards compatible title on Xbox Series X/S. Instead, I opted for the Steam version on PC, opening the possibility to play at a superior 4K@60fps compared to the X360 version running at 720p@30fps. Including a massive bump in texture and picture quality. It works with a connected gamepad too but requires button re-mapping.
Strangely enough, Homefront still has some of the quirks of its controls inherited from Frontlines, with a static way of bringing up the iron sights and aiming down the gun. I’d excepted the movement being the quicker and better flowing nature of a COD game from the same era. Homefront is all about moving forwards slowly and being thorough to take down all enemies before moving out in plain sight, it's best to completely stop to aim properly and only move when not engaging in gunfights.
Charmingly enough, Homefront takes place in typical US locations: like the city suburbs, at a mall and even out on a countryside farm. Depicting that homeland feel for Americans, seeing their neighbourhood and local residences being invaded. In turn, this focus on specific location confines Homeland's variety in environments. It overstays the areas it depicts and offers little visual variety.
Worse still, each stage is extremely linear, offering only a few areas here and there with freedom to walk about. It’s clearly heavily influenced by COD in this era, but it’s such a sad backwards step compared to the unique open feel that Frontlines offered. It’s never about a moving battlefield or a sense of various approaches to attacking enemies, it’s about going street after street and taking down the bad guys in a pre-determined path.
I gather the multiplayer offers more of what Frontlines used to do, but I’ve not tested this, nevertheless I wanted an open approach like Frontlines for the singleplayer experience.
Gunplay works fine, albeit the somewhat static feel of switching between aiming at the hip and down the sights, lacking the flow and speed COD had in this era. Gun sounds are good for their time, although little variety in the feel of the various weapons. I did enjoy the times I could control a large, six-wheeled, gun turret car with a remote. It felt powerful to regain control of gunfights by blasting the hell out of the enemies with it!
Although I did enjoy the dark depiction of a fallen America and feeling the sadness and brutality of homes being torn down and people killed in the opposition against the invaders, there were just too many cliché and forgettable scenes to give memorable real impact. It feels like a poor man's COD of its time and such a departure from the solid premise the same developer laid with Frontlines.
Homefront is never bad but never great either. It’s just a forgettable military shooter with a somewhat unique setting, drowned in overused ideas and mediocre battles.
