‘Rage 2’ confirmed, puts a target on ‘Borderlands 3’
“Doom” developer id Software is returning with a sequel for its less well-known first-person shooter “Rage” but this time with a more colorful, off-the-wall tone if a 15-second teaser is anything to go by.
The claim that Walmart Canada’s accidentally published list of upcoming games last week was based on speculation may be true, but one project it got right was the surprise existence of “Rage 2”.
Released May 14 after several days of teasing through Bethesda’s Twitter account, the “Rage 2” announcement trailer adopts a curiously celebratory tone, especially for something set within a grim and smoky post-apocalyptic context.
Article continues after this advertisementSoundtracked by exuberant Andrew W.K. song “Ready to Die”, grubby bandits pose for the camera against clouds of pink and yellow powder paint, or they wield guns, bats and blades against backdrops of wreckage-strewn wastelands.
Bethesda is now dangling the prospect of a May 15 gameplay reveal, snippets of which may have been cut into the announce trailer. Official website beth.games/rage indicates that “Rage 2” will be releasing for PlayStation 4, Windows PC and Xbox One.
A rare new franchise from id Software, the studio closely associated with the foundational first-person shooter series “Doom” and “Quake” since the mid-1990s, “Rage” boasted state-of-the-art graphics, punchy combat, and a post-apocalyptic mystery to unravel, albeit with guns instead of magnifying glasses.
Article continues after this advertisementGenerally well received, “Rage” was a competent shooter but viewed as largely derivative of established genre features rather than innovative in the ways its studio predecessors had been.
That sort of genre-redefining achievement would come 6 years later with the release of critically acclaimed franchise reboot “Doom”, and yet id and its publisher Bethesda are not finished with “Rage.”
Aside from a grotesque bandit population, driving sections and a three-finned boomerang, the Wingstick, appear to have been retained from “Rage”.
“Dive headfirst into a dystopian world devoid of society, law, and order,” reads the website blurb. “‘Rage 2’ brings together a true open world FPS experience where you can go anywhere, shoot anything, and explode everything.”
Depending on launch timing, “Rage 2” could be entering a first-person shooter arena that contains late 2018 releases “Call of Duty: Black Ops 4” and “Battlefield 1” as well as wild west epic “Red Dead Redemption 2”.
Anticipated for early 2019 are off-world sci-fi action games “Anthem” and, perhaps more significant given the tone of this “Rage 2” teaser, “Borderlands 3”, whose best-selling predecessors have likewise dealt in post-apocalyptic wastelands, oddball characters and combat-oriented adventure. JB
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