Brink (video game)

Brink is an upcoming first-person shooter video game developed by Splash Damage for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. It offers team-based multiplayer missions that are equally playable in offline single player mode, with authored narratives, persistent player characters and an approachable nature.[1] It is also developer Splash Damage's first original title, as past titles were part of existing franchises.
In Brink, two factions, "Resistance" and "Security", fight in the previously utopian city known as The Ark, a floating city surrounded by the waters of a flooded Earth.[1] The Ark was designed as a prototype of a perfect city, with renewable resources and no pollution, large enough to support 5,000 residents. However, due to many refugees entering the city from other parts of the world, its population has grown to over 50,000, meaning there are not enough resources to go around - resulting in the city being on the brink (hence the name of the game) of a civil war.[7]
Brink will feature Steamworks integration, including Valve Anti-Cheat.[8] Its technology is id Tech 4 with a new rendering framework and improved support for multiple CPU cores.[3]Gameplay



Two Resistance characters in the docks area, looking out to The Ark.
Brink is a first-person shooter with a focus on fluid, parkour style movement similar to that seen in games such as Assassin's Creed and Mirror's Edge and co-operative play. Online play is also a focus of the game, allowing up to sixteen players to play online, eight on each team. The game features both cooperative and team-based competitive options as well as the ability to play against bots.
For this movement, Splash Damage has developed the SMART (Smooth Movement Across Random Terrain) System.[9] It allows players to maneuver around complex environments without equally complex input by analyzing their position and judging what they are trying to do.
Players can customize characters which are based on several archetypes and additional items can be bought with experience points earned by completing objectives.[1] Unlike some similar games (the Call of Duty series for example) the same experience points can be earned in both single player and multiplayer.
The player can choose to play one of four character classes, the soldier, the medic, the engineer and the operative. The Soldier class can resupply teammates and use high explosives to destroy key targets. The Engineer class enhances their teammates' weapons and can place stationary turrets. The Medic class is able to heal fallen teammates and increase their teammates' health. The Operative class can perform acts of sabotage, interrogate fallen opponents to provide intel on enemy locations and disguise themselves and operate as one of the enemy.
While in gameplay, both multiplayer and campaign, the player can bring up a "wheel" of sorts providing various objectives to fulfil. Each of these objectives give a specific amount of experience.
The Squad Commander system provides players with context-sensitive missions. The player's specific position on the map, his relative skill, current progress in the overall mission, and a wide variety of factors influence the available missions.
[edit]Plot

The game takes place in the near future in an enormous floating city known as "The Ark," off the coast of San Francisco. It was only meant to support 5,000 people, but ended up having to provide for ten times as much. The thousands of people in the city quickly became unsatisfied with the lack of food, clothing, and particularly water, and formed a faction known simply as "The Resistance," demanding more of these essentials. After the Ark's leaders refused, they armed themselves to seize power for themselves and distribute water and food freely, claiming that the Ark has plenty of renewable resources. The Ark had little need for a security force at the outset, but quickly began recruitment and went on a firearm shopping spree to counter the Resistance. Now the only place on the Ark where there is any level of peace is the area around the capitol, where the Ark's leaders are frantically trying to contact the outside world for aid. The Resistance are looked at by security as terrorists, and the resistance look at the security as oppressive soldiers hired by the Ark's "leaders" to crush the Resistance.
[edit]Pre-order bonuses

At QuakeCon 2010, Splash Damage announced Brink's digital pre-order bonuses for several digital retailers (GameStop, Best Buy, Amazon.com, Direct2Drive, Walmart, and Steam) in North America. These bonuses will expand the players customization, with Doom, Fallout, Psycho and Spec Ops packs.[10]