The way GHTP manages to straddle FPS and sports styles without really becoming either is probably its biggest achievement. Those two categories are perhaps the most re-played by the average gamer, and so creating something in-between should spark the interest of the mass market as well as the superlatively niche paintballing aficionado market (if one exists beyond Greg Hastings and his close chums). Each battle pitches teams of 3, 5 or 7 against each other in a relatively small area peppered with bespoke tournament paintball stuff and things. We don't know the technical definitions, but to the layman these would probably be termed walls, fences and trees. You then take control of one of the paintballers, darting around each pitch, poking out from behind obstacles and unleashing a volley of paint at your opposing team members.
If you've just blasted your way through Halo 2, Half-Life 2 or some such, you may now be thinking 'so what's so good about that?'. After all, on paper it's nothing more than a very restrictive FPS formula. But in action, even the most egomaniacal first-person fan would be at least slightly impressed by GHTP simply because of the quality of the AI opponents. Because you are only facing a very small number of enemies in such a concise little arena, they all behave as we assume real paintballers would. On the later stages it can be a real struggle even when your whole team is chasing down the last single opponent. You'll see the perforated stream of yellow paint
pellets course across the sky from a certain direction, so you sprint across the field and dive to the other side of the fence that your target seems to be hiding behind. It's one of those hair trigger scenarios, with only a few slabs of timber between you and victory. In an average FPS, at this point you'd just stand up, look down over the fence and shoot the digital doofus in the head. In GHTP, however, you stand up, look down and see nothing. Having commando crawled around to a nearby tree while you were readying for the confrontation, he suddenly pops out around the corner and pings you straight in the facemask. Splat.
The excitement and consistent tension comes not just from the sharp AI and small play areas, but also the one shot, one kill rule that further intensifies the experience. You can't just take a bit of collateral damage to the upper thigh, charging through shotgun fire like most shooters, which calls for some precision tactics and the subsequent light strategising again makes it feel more like a sports game. There is some respite and a glimmer of hope when you take a hit though: a little meter pops up and gives you the opportunity to sneakily wipe the paint off your clothing. If you hit the meter when the ticker's in the right spot, you've got away with it; if you miss, you'll get rumbled by the ref and possibly penalised. It's highly unsporting, but a nice touch anyway, adding plenty to the duration of multiplayer battles.
