We're going to have to change our ways at some point. Year after year we collectively moan about the lack of innovation in first-person shooters, and then, when a game does come along that dares to be different, we shoot holes in it for not being more like those we purport to hate, but actually can't get enough of. Hence the annual updates masquerading as franchise sequels, while the more daring and interesting shooters are overlooked and promptly forgotten about.
In the case of Shattered Horizon, however, we can be forgiven for our lack of appreciation. The outer space-based shooter from Futuremark - its debut game after more than a decade of making benchmarking software - didn't exactly receive the most effusive of praise upon its release in 2009, earning a 6/10 from Eurogamer's then-space junkie Jim Rossignol in a review that was entirely well-reasoned and fair.
For all the good stuff that the game provided - a detailed and compelling backstory, a innovative UI and controls, and brilliantly realised zero-g environments that rewarded the spatially aware - a notable lack of content was high up the list of criticisms. As it turns out, however, it's problems were by an order of magnitude more fundamental than just a lack of content. In aiming for the stars, Shattered Horizon was almost doomed to wander gaming's outer reaches from the moment it was conceived.
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