Sauerbraten (AKA Cube 2) is a free online multiplayer first person shooter. OK, so maybe the name doesn't roll off your tongue, and perhaps the idea of a free first person shooter isn't original; but, Sauerbraten offers something most free games don't have: an active online community that you can play against 24/7.
The main "selling point" of this game is that it has an active community. People go online and beat the crap out of each other on a daily basis. You're almost never waiting around for someone else to get online, like other free multiplayer games. You can jump on, play a few rounds of death match, and get back to work -- or you can stay up all night in a gory frag-fest.
Of course, that frag-fest doesn't come without a price. The networking side of Sauerbraten has a dual personality. At time, networking code in Sauerbraten isn't as robust as some of the retail games out there; at times you'll find yourself facing the wrong way, inside of a wall, or in the middle of nowhere. And for all of its failures in networking, Sauerbraten seems to shine when you're engaged in a massive battle with 16 or more people engaged.
The game itself uses the standard WSAD key combination for movement, space for jump, and mouse for aim/fire. In other words, Sauerbraten isn't going to win any awards for originality or creativity; but, for those of us who are used to the current generation of FPS games, the control scheme works flawlessly.
The audio in the game is, well, annoying. For me, I was forced to disable the in-game audio and play my own mix of MP3 in place. I wouldn't classify the audio as bad, as in the right situation it could be excellent, but the repetitive use of two songs and the same sound for gunfire gets really old, really fast. Unfortunately, this isn't limited to Sauerbraten, as many free online multiplayer games have this flaw.
Countering the flaws in the audio department are Sauerbraten's graphics. I'll admit, you're not going to get Xbox 360-quality graphics out of this game, but the textures are used very effectively and nothing feels out of place. The textures are also fairly colorful and have an overall quality to them that helps the game flow well. You're not going to see Halo 2-level bump mapping, but since the game is so fast paced, you probably wont even notice the graphics.
Gameplay is fast paced and hardcore in Sauerbraten. You spawn quickly and die even quicker. There's almost no escaping the fact that no matter how good you are at Counterstrike, Halo, or Unreal, because Sauerbraten is just that much more difficult. The pace of the game is so fast to a fault: newcomers will have a difficult time mastering the game as they get used to the near-epilepsy-inducing speed of the game. Of course, once you do get the timing of the game down, the fast pace only adds to the addictiveness of the game.
Overall, Sauerbraten is a top-notch game. It does have a weak singleplayer mode, but that can be forgiven, since you'll spend many hours blowing things up.
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