Garry's Mod: Way more than just a mod

Introduction

This is a holistic review of the popular gaming mod game known as Garry's Mod (yes, I did say mod twice). Following the popularly of Valve Corporation's Half-Life series, Garry's Mod is a way for users to expand their imagination in a sandbox environment (oftentimes either in cool or silly ways). You can still run, jump and shoot without falling under the restrictions that traditional first-person shooters impose on you.

Concept

Garry's Mod was originally conceived as a mod for Half-Life 2 but later made into a standalone game published through Valve Corporation on 29 November 2006. There is no in-game story setting compared to the Half-Life or Doom series, an is meant to be a "blank slate" of sorts. Think of it as LEGOs in a digitized form where you can generate in-game props and characters and use them according to your own designs.

Graphics and Audio

The graphics are a little dated, as the Source engine that served as the baseline of the game is more than ten years old. Regardless, the visuals for the game have held up fairly well. There's also no music for the game. Audio quality in the game's pretty solid and sounds good if you're using a Dolby Surround 5.0/7.1 speaker or headset.

Gameplay

The base mode of the game is an open-world sandbox where the only limitation is the player's creativity. Users have free reign on what they want to do in the game, by using different contextual menus to generate props within the game such as chairs, balloons, tables, and other inanimate objects that make up the game world. You can also use characters and creatures from Valve's gaming franchises, such as Team Fortress 2's Heavy, Gordan Freeman from Half-Life, and their associated weapons. One weapon that is unique to Garry's Mod is the physics gun, where you can manipulate characters and put them in ridiculous posts. Google Garry's Mod memes and you'll find all sorts of silly things in your search query.

The game itself is not a difficult one. The only difficulty lies in getting in-game achievements. Save for one exception, you're going to be spending a good amount of time grinding them all if you're a completionist. There are single player and multiplayer mode available where you can play either by yourself or with other players that have the game.

If you're an experienced map/modder, chances are you'll also be spending hours on end crafting new items including skins and weapons as well as new levels for the Steam Workshop. If you're looking to expand the amount of content for the base game, You can download different mods to supplement the core mod set from there as well. The amount of new material that is available within the Workshop is virtually limitless, with modders adding new items regularly. If you want to play with other players using mods, you'll need to make sure that they have the same mods as you do.

Conclusion

Garry's Mod offers players a unique sandbox that allows them to experiment with different modifications and take gameplay to the next level, limited only as far as their imagination can take them.

Summary

This is a great sandbox game that offers you superior replay value to even the best of triple-A titles that are out on the market.