Timeshift is a horrible game that doesn’t have—wait… reverse that. Let's try this again.

Timeshift is a well-rounded game that although lacking in the story and motivation department, leaves the competition frozen behind in the fun department. It is also a prime example of what happens when a good design team is given the right resources and time to revise a solid idea, but in the end, lets potential slip through their fingers.

So what is the story of Timeshift? I’m still asking myself that too. There is an incoherent jumble of cut scenes, some only a few seconds long, that try to piece together the story as you play. Basically, a man by the name of Dr. Krone has stolen a prototype suit and gone back in time to create an alternate reality. It’s your job to use the other suit (properly known as the “beta” suit) to follow him and reverse his doings. Apparently, that means going back to an alternate 1943. To be honest, the story is equivocal and really serves no purpose other than a filler that they created to suit the game mechanics. This is the single-biggest stumbling block for Timeshift. There was so much potential and it feels as if they squandered a grand opportunity.

But do the gameplay mechanics make up for it? For the most part, yes. Your beta suit has the unique ability to pause, freeze, and even reverse time. Each of these mechanics has been used in one way or another individually for games, but not all three in one. Sure sands of time allowed you to reverse time, but that included yourself. In Timeshift, when time is reversed, you can still freely move about the world as everything is playing in rewind. Playing around with all of these things is loads of fun. My favorite thing to do is slowing time and trying to keep the bodies of my opponents in the air as long as possible with grenades and rockets.

Timeshift throws a couple of puzzles at you, but only two stuck out in my mind as showing the potential that the game had. You will have to freeze water to walk across it, or fire to run through it. But a lot of the puzzles involve some type of lever or button that opens a door for a single second forcing you to freeze time to get through it. This is ridiculous because who in their right mind would make a lever next to a door that only works for one second? No one. And sadly, there is a plethora of these cheesy puzzles scattered throughout.

The rest Timeshift plays like an average FPS. You will run from checkpoint to checkpoint pushing buttons or levers to open the next area. You will have to ride around on an ATV in a couple outdoor levels, which is kind of cool for a few seconds, but again, they never use this for anything exciting, only to get you to the next lever. There are also a couple places where you can shoot a turret gun, but your arsenal is just as effective and way more fun to use. You get your hands on machine guns, sticky grenades, flamethrowers, missile launchers and a sweet crossbow that shoots exploding darts.

Your suit not only can freeze time, but also regenerates your health when not being shot at. This breeds a hybrid gameplay of shooting, freezing time as your health regenerates, and then shooting again. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it’s not very challenging to say the least.

Timeshift has had a pretty significant upgrade since the initial demo released last year. The polycount is acceptable and the post-processing isn’t too bad, but what is most eye-catching is its excellent texture work. This game has some of the crispest textures I’ve seen. Although it doesn’t look as good as Crysis, the game will also actually run on your computer fairly well.

Last but not least, the multiplayer is unique in that you can lob grenades that have the same time manipulating abilities as the suit. This makes for some pretty wicket multiplayer matches. One of the coolest things that happened was as I was about to be blown to bits with a rocket, I threw a time grenade in front of me which slowed the rocket down long enough for me to get out of the way. The game features deathmatch, team deathmatch, player vs. player, capture the flag, king of time, and meltdown madness. Meltdown madness is pretty cool in that you throw time grenades that the opposing teams countdown machine to try and slow it down. Timeshift offers some of the most unique multiplayer opportunities to date, and I had a blast playing with my roommates.

In the end, Timeshift is the perfect example of ungrasped potential. Everything about the game screams at the possibilities it could have been. The time mechanics are so fun, yet the story and puzzles are completely sub-par and when you see the ending, you will wish you could have just rewound all the time you wasted on trying to figure it out.

Gameplay: 7.5
Wicked-cool time manipulation with lots of blowing stuff up in slow motion is fun, but the puzzles are a little anemic in their cleverness.

Graphics: 8.0
Everything is mediocre except for the grandiose texture work and the slow-motion explosions.

Sound: 7.0
The audio gets the job done. Nothing is over the top spectacular but there are a couple of cool effects here and there.

Difficulty: Easy
With the ability to cheat everybody by freezing time and stealing their weapons the game doesn’t put up much of a fight. Even the final boss is insanely easy.

Concept: 8.8
The idea of freezing, slowing and reversing time has enthralled audiences for years and years; this game allows you to do all three.

Multiplayer: 7.0
There are some really unique situations you can get into with your friends using chrono-grenades. Not ground-breaking in any way but you can continue to have a decent amount of fun with the multiplayer after you finish the disconcerted story in the single player.

Overall: 7.8
This game really deserves a better single-player campaign but sadly is only given a mediocre makeover from last year's version. The single saving factor of this game is being able to shoot and blow things up with complete control over time. It is just plain fun.