History repeats itself

I find myself struggling to present you my thoughts on Singularity simply because while there is fun to be had, nothing that the game offers is new or original, playing it actually gave me an almost constant feeling of deja-vu, "been there, done that" kind of thing.
During the course of the nine hours that it took me to finish the story, I kept thinking "Hey! This remind of x,y or z game!" simply because Singularity "borrows" most of its elements from other games.
It has an upgrade system, like in Deus Ex, System Shock or the more recent Bioshock, the upgrades are not as well balanced here since around half-way through the single player campaign you become a semi-god in a game that wasn't too difficult to begin with. Trust me, nothing will be able to stand in your way or even present a decent challenge in the last few hours of the campaign.
The game revolves around time manipulation (Timeshift and Timesplitters) and while the idea is sound the execution is flawed, so much more could have been done with this concept to spice up the gameplay, at the end of the day the time manipulation device (TMD) - presented to you in the first hour or so - is basically a better melee weapon and a tool to be used in combination with the standard weapons, it could also have been a very interesting puzzle solver....but it's not, oh, it also works as a gravity gu....device!

Story
Set in 2010, players are given control of Captain Nathaniel Renko, the silent protagonist(Half-Life) sent to investigate Katorga-12, an island located in the Pacific Ocean which seems to be emitting a lot of radiation. Not much is known about this island but it seems the Russians were conducting weapon research and development there during the 50's in an effort to counter the American atom bomb.
After crash-landing and while investigating the island, Renko is somehow thrown back in time and into the 50's, altering the past along his way with disastrous consequences for the world's timeline.

Certainly not the most original story-line in the world, lacking any major plot twist or any kind of suspense, but it's competent and serves as a backdrop for the game just fine. The amount of exposure given to the cold war conflict in the first few minutes of the campaign was actually a nice touch, setting up the rest of the game quite well and leaving you wanting more. It's a shame that by the end of the game the story seems to drag a bit more than it should.
As a side-note I would like to point out that there are three endings available depending on your last decision in the game.

Gameplay
As any good Raven Software game, this is all about shooting guns, yes there is a TMD strapped to your wrist but it's only fun when you use it in combination with some other sort of weapon. Luckily that's where the game shines, it presents the player with a ton of options when it comes to disposing of enemies. Yes, the standard pistol, shotgun, assault rifle and sniper are present and you can probably go through the whole campaign using only these, even if that would strip Singularity of most of it's fun, using and exploring every weapon and possibility to dispose of enemies is the best part of the game, it can lead to some spectacular deaths, even just using some of Singularity's most unique weapons by themselves can produce some amazing results, it's all left to the imagination of the player and how different does he want this game to be from just another shooter.

In-between shooting you'll have some puzzle sections, they are usually simple and easy and that's the main problem of Singularity, so much more could have been done with the great time manipulation mechanics that they had at their disposal! Let the players also use their imagination in these sections, maybe providing more than one way to solve a puzzle for example.

It feels as if this was a decision on Raven's part rather than a mistake or lack of ability, their intentions must have been to focus the player as much as they could on the shooting portions of the game, making the puzzle sections more of a quick distraction that prevents the action from getting stale.

Graphics
Singularity visuals while never being outstanding do their job, it shares the same problems with many other shooters that use the Unreal engine, mainly the lack of color variation and textures that take a bit of time to load.
The enemies feel pretty much the same, they either have a gun and are human or don't have a gun and are mutant, the weapons and their design on the other hand feel powerful, nothing like unloading the mighty shotgun into an enemy, cutting him(or it) in half!

Sound

The atmosphere seems to be one of the main concerns of Singularity in the first few minutes so it's a weird feeling when you hear the goofy Russian accents, they just feel out of place in a game that tries to take itself seriously. Aside from that the sound effects  and music don't really stand out and are pretty forgettable.

Conclusion
Without being brilliant, Singularity sure is fun! At the end of the day that's why we play videogames. Yes, it doesn't do anything original or groundbreaking but it gets the gameplay basics right, what is described as wasted potential in the puzzle sections can also be seen as a way to keep the game focused on the action, it just depends on what the player prefers.

Year of Release: 2010

Plaforms: Xbox360, PC, PS3
Developer: Raven Software

7 out of 10