One game that I’ve been keeping a casual eye on for the past six months or so (for a bit, it looked like a holiday 2010 release) is Brink. Now that it’s nearly here, I’ve been paying a lot closer attention. I’m quite jazzed for it, but also a bit scared.

Brink is, foremost, a first person shooter. Where it differs from others in the market is some unique twists in combat mechanics, a unique stylistic design and a very robust character customization that allows you to be, well, unique. While I am most excited for the games multiplayer side, it does have a single player campaign. The neat catch is that you gain experience points in both on and offline play which can be used for upgrading your character. This makes actually playing through the single player campaign an interesting prospect for people who may have otherwise skipped over it.

The story in the game seems pretty cut and dry. There’s a “City of Tomorrow” called “The Ark” that was built in San Francisco to house 5000 people but instead wound up trying to contain ten times that much. The inhabitants wanted more goods but the leadership wouldn’t cave to demands, so now there’s a resistance willing to take what they want by force. You can play as either the resistance or as the law enforcement of The Ark. I’m sure there will be more fine points in the story, at least I hope, so I intend on playing it first before moving into multiplayer to find out more about the world I’m fighting for or against.

The look of the game is highly stylized, but still with a grit that makes it look based in reality. It’s like if Disney was making a movie based on the Metal Slug franchise. Yeah, looks like that, and I love it.

While the game looks like a standard shooter at first glance, the moment I saw the parkour style sliding and leaping and wall running in the game, my eyebrow raised. It’s as if they’re trying to implement a Mirror’s Edge feel to an open world. While I was (and still am to some degree) a bit curious if this will have any real effect on the way people play a shooter, some of the in-game videos have got me wondering if it could make us rethink how we play.

The last element of the game I wanted to bring up, and probably the one I’m most excited about, is the character customization. With experience points gained from either single or multiplayer, you can buy new pieces for your wardrobe and new parts for your weapons. The way your character looks may not have a mechanical effect on the gameplay, but it’s something that I wish more games did. I want to feel like an individual in whatever world I play in, even in my shooters. As for your arsenal, you can only carry two guns at a time, so it becomes important that the weapons that you do carry are exactly what you feel comfortable with in combat. From the videos I’ve watched, it appears we’ll be getting a slew of options.

Now, the game is obviously something I’m excited about, but I am a bit concerned. With this being quite the year of releases for first person shooters, a genre that is getting more and more cramped, I worry that Brink won’t gain enough attention. Now, if the multiplayer component proves to be everything it appears to be, and is a bunch of fun, my worry will be without merit. Enough people will hear good things and start playing. But I can do nothing until it’s released but hope. Hope that the game is as good as it looks.