Why is Homefront's Campaign so awful?

Sarcastic Gamer examines the awful Homefront campaign to pinpoint where it went wrong.

From the article: "Homefront was a game I had eagerly anticipated since 2009. I really had heard nothing but good things about the game. Frontlines: Fuel of War and a well made mod of Battlefield 1942, called Desert Strike, were two of KAOS Studios previous shooters. Both were well received and I thought that the Frontlines single player was fairly fun, although it was overshadowed by the multiplayer. In any event, I had high hopes for Homefront. After playing through the single player, I think that “awful” may be an understatement.

How bad is this game? Lets pile on, after the jump."

[BeaArthur]

Because they knew MP is what sells that type of game to the majority of players so they focused on that.

[thrasherv3]

I honestly could not tell they focused on multiplayer...

[kuge456]

How bad?
MS likes it,Some reviewers give it 8 even 8.5
It should be good.

but both of us know it's overrated.

[StupidDude]

while, it's an awful game, and i actually agree with every point brought up in the article...

this piece was very poorly written, sorry to say.

[Cajun Chicken]

Because it's short. It's not actually awful.

[ceedubya9]

I have yet to finish it, but my time with it has not been bad at all.

[aaronobst]

I thoroughly enjoyed the campaign... All 4 hours of it

[pr0digyZA]

I really enjoyed the multiplayer. The single player was definitely its down fall. To me it just felt strange like it was... how do I say this- uh cheap. The single player didn't have the best quality, It definitely has potential but they need to do something that separates it from the crowd.

[Simco876]

I rented this game last night and am playing through the single player.

The story I think is on an epic scale, but the article is right about the gameplay. Its horrible! I would like to see a HomeFront2 with a single player game build first, then tack on multiplayer.

[cogniveritas]

IMO, this kind of game NEEDS to be longer for the desired effect. When I played it, I was thrown into a virtual world in chaos that I had no familiarity with so a homefront invasion didn't pull any "proud to defend the homeland" strings with me.

Something like this would be better left to a company like Rockstar. First you need about 10 or 15hrs running errands and building a life, and making friends & enemies in the game. You need to get to know the people and places and to see "Freedom" in action including all the joy and pain that comes with it. Then slowly introduce the possibility that changes are coming.

Then it's time to unleash the foreign invasion about 20hrs into the game. You see familiar places being destroyed and occupied by hostile forces. You see familiar shopkeepers that you used to have friendly banter with now being tortured or killed. And you see all that you have worked for now being taken from you. Now your old local enemies are ready to put aside petty differences to defend the nation you both call home. Once all that has been acheived, I will feel more invested in the battle.

[undercovrr]

The storyline is good and creative for a shooter, but the gameplay and graphics just don't hold up. The graphics look literally like dirt and the gameplay is very very generic and gets boring really fast.

[Psycho_Mantis]

I was actually one of the poor shmucks who almost bought into the game untill i herd it had a 5 hour campaign...i stopped paying for 5 hour campaigns a long time ago. And i dont think the MP will tie me over till Battlefield 3.

[josephayal]

awful? are u crazy buddy? IMO is better than Crysis 2

[darren_poolies]

I loved the Homefront campaign, the only problems were that it was too short and the graphics were a bit of an eye-saw.

[andron]

It gets worse the more you play it, though it's not the pits bad per se.

Sp part could have used some more polish and a few more levels. The game just stops when the story really should take off. They could have done much more out of it. I really like level 3 though, that is the best together with the end level (7). The rest is forgettable.

Also the trophies for completing whole levels without dying are killing me. Because of bugs and bad design I must do level 5 yet again. Great idea to have respawning enemies pouring out from two sides on the last firefight in the level. Bugs made me replay level 2 three times to make it in one go to. The AI of my companions just froze in two different places and I had to start the level over...