Wow... despite this being one of GOG's most requested games, people's opinion of it seems rather lack-luster

Heh, that's what I was just thinking. I think this is going on my list to pick up when I feel like playing games for their "historical impact" on gaming, rather than just for fun.

I'm not saying you have to love this game.

I'm just saying that if you don't love this game you have no soul....

I have loads of souls. I just need more Grand gems.

I may eventually get this, but $5.99 is too much for a game that I'm going to be able to play for like a week then not again for ayear.

Anybody playing for the first time that wants to chime in about the experience.

Back when I bought it, it was already several years old game, and I bought it due to the praise. I think it (+ the expansion pack) was quite ok, but nothing that special. Or maybe they were somewhat special, I don't remember playing quite similar squad games.

Anyway, apparently it was good enough for me to buy the sequel, Syndicate Wars. Which I forgot to ever actually install and play, of course. It is there somewhere, I guess.

The highest point in my life, regarding Syndicate that is, was when someone proclaimed that Syndicate is a very hard game, and the expansion pack even more so, so that he doesn't believe anyone has actually finished at least the expansion. I could tell him "I have". Damn I was so proud! If it was a Steam game, I would have some kind of Ultra Achievement heart in my account I believe.

(I don't remember if the game had different difficulty levels, but if it did, I most probably played the hardest, being the challenge freak I am. As far as I can remember, it was at times quite challenging, but I don't remember regarding it (near-)impossible.)

Damn, now I feel I should replay it, just to remember how hard it really was (or wasn't).

What? No, eww! I don't store PETS' souls. It would be cruel to enchant a dagger with a kitten.

Pets...

Pet...

Pet-ty...

Petty...


-___________-

If I get a kitty, im going to name it Azura's Star in honor of this thread.

Most of the requested games are just there because of nostalgia reasons. People list the games that they enjoyed playing back in the days. And many older games have aged horribly, and only a person who was there, who has nostalgic ties to it, can fully enjoy the game. There are of course many games that have stood the test of time, that are fun 20 years after their release (Ultima 7 is a good example), but I would say that most are not, in particular not the very early entries in a genre. Syndicate is one of those relatively early entries in a genre, it did a lot of new things, things that seemed really cool at the time the game was made, but in some ways the game is like a very young child, stumbling around in an awkward way.
I would not call Syndicate a bad game, not at all, the problem is just that it has been surpassed. Controlling the squads in Darwinia feels a lot smoother than controlling the agents in Syndicate, even though the controls and basic mechanics are roughly the same.

I'm not sure but I'll be trying it soon!

And here was me thinking that having a soul may have actually prevented me from loving a game with so unscrupulous gameplay ... ;)

The odd thing is, however, that I probably would have bought it again (if it had come with the expansion). It's strange - even though I know that I never liked the game in all my previous attempts to get into it, there's something that keeps me trying. Perhaps because in theory a game that mixes global strategy with local battlefields and individual units/characters should be straight up my alley. Or perhaps I keep searching for the reason why the game was so popular. I have a similar relation to Half-life - started it a dozen of times, but never got beyond the second map; after a while I inevitably think "bah, it's just a shooter" and uninstall it.

Try using it on the Atlantic Accelerator mission - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVwATzewfNw - and see where it gets you.

Yeah, but that mission is hardly typical. In fact, the difficulty spike there is quite notorious.