As a gamer, I have already played a lot of amazing games, with great stories. I also gave some 10's here in gamespot, but not like this one. This game has one big flaw, and it's the first time in any game that I review in here that I will give a straight up, full loaded 10.
Story: Spec Ops: The Line is a tremendous game that "start's like any other, but it ends like nothing else" that you have ever played. The majority of people that plays games just want to have a good and fun time, not even considering the material in which they spand a lot of time. This is one type of entertainment and it is one that sells the most. But, can we have more than this? Can a game achieve to make us have higher emotions and think about what is happening in front of our eyes? Spec Ops answered this with a sense of cold bloodish themes like the price of death, the true nature of our sanity, what makes life valuable, why do we destroy everything we touch and the most important thing, how far should we call ourselves "Heroes".
The game start's off with an basic promisse, find General Konrad and his 33rd Regiment in the desolated city of Dubai. This plot sorrounds a Delta Force Squad that is sent there after the a distress call. The problem surrounding all this plot is that an entire batallion his trapped in the city, a lot of civillians are still inside Dubai and six months have passed since the huge sand storms hitted (continuosly) Dubai. So yeah, simple promisse.
When I started to play this game I was like a mindless kid, trying to find and kill the enemy make just to make my way through another shitty CoD ripp off, but when I found a voice log after the first our, everything in this game changed. The "enemy" that I was trying to kill in cold blood was instantly humanized and I was afraid to press the trigger again, in the middle of the game I had a huge struggle to keep on going since I had to make tremendously hard and heart breaking decisions that made this game turn into an complex and tremendously ground breaking social/psycological horror, story driven, third person shooter. This wasn't an mindless military shooter anymore, it was starting to be something way bigger. And to be honest, my second playthrought was even better, since that first hour was much more and I felt bad for not paying attention to all the details in the first time.
And let's talk about the ending... What a pleasent suprise to finish this game, even if I had to make a second walkthrought to finish it correctly, but even after that I felt didn't felt that I wanted more, I did not want more, the experience was completed.
Gameplay: The gameplay might be simple and very straight forward, but it is an solid Thir Person Shooter that was a lot of heart and soul. The cover mechanic is not hard and it's well implemented, the enemy A.I is solid, they will work and provide an good challenge, the battles are well done, the squad mechanics is good and the same goes for the A.I of them. Guns have weight and a great feel of recoil and punch. Now there is one interesting thing that the reviwer's missed, the gameplay evolves as the character progresses throughout the game. As the story get's darker, the gameplay becomes more violent, close and personal. The excutions become way more brutal and violent, your squadmates become more violent and more accurate, creating the feeling of "There is no control anymore", making the player feel pressured and more nervous each step and cover switch he makes.
Sound Department: Spec Ops truly delivers an superb soundtrack, it really helps the game atmosphere. The same goes to the sound design and also for the voice perfomeances.
Multyplayer: It's terrible and the game major flaw, but suprisingly playable and it is enjoyable. This multyplayer could ruin the game overall quality but there is one interview that saved this particular game. The developer's never wanted to make an Multiplayer extension for the game, since they only focussed on the game main story, and they gaved everything they had to ensure that this was something new and different from any other game out there. They might not have achieved this is the gameplay deparment but they trully exceeded the expectations in the single player and they delivered.
Story: 10 out of 10
Gameplay: 10 out of 10
Sound Department: 10 out of 10
Overall Score: 10 out of 10