There hasn’t been a lot of coverage regarding Splash Damage’s upcoming first-person shooter Brink in the past, aside from the confusing trailer shown right before E3. This is mostly due to developer Splash Damage having only shown the game to press during E3 2009, but that’s not the case any more. Brink was shown during the Penny Arcade Expo in Seattle last weekend, and while we weren’t able to get our hands on the game, we were treated to a pretty nice treat in the form of an eyes-on demo.

The game takes place on a floating city called The Ark. Global warming has increased the sea level of the oceans throughout the world, making The Ark the only livable place left on the planet. This caused all of the survivors to move to the island, and not all of them are on the same page on the whole “future of humanity” thing. This has resulted in two factions forming on the island: the Security and the Resistance.  The Security is a much more orderly, formal group, while the Resistance are a more rag-tag, urban bunch.

This is where you come in. The first choice you make in the game is what type of character you want to play. You can choose to be on either side of the battle, and from there you can choose from a number of playable classes including the soldier, engineer, medic, operative, and more. The character customization shown looked really robust. You could add a number of different items to your character such as pants, shoes, shirts, face paint, and even shoulder pads made out of a car tire. There seemed to be a lot of ways to personalize yourself here, and with the game’s unique, almost cartoonish art style, it appears you’ll have a lot of ways to make your character look pretty rad.

The demo shown placed the player in the shoes of a Security Soldier in an area called Container City, which was used as a demonstration ground for the game’s interesting control scheme called SMART (Smooth Movement Across Random Terrain). Basically what this means is that with the press of the sprint button, your character will navigate over, under, or around obstacles in his path depending on where your reticle is pointed. For example, say you need to find a way to get past a laser trip wire in the environment. You would simply sprint towards it with your cursor pointed under it, and your character would automatically slide underneath. Or say you need to vault over a wall, you would simply look up and sprint.  This actually looked really cool in action, and seemed like it worked rather well.

After the demonstration of the SMART system, the demo was thrown into a mission where the player was accompanied by three other team members, with the objective of transporting a welding vehicle across the level to gain access to what looked like a shipment crate. While traversing through the level, the Security ran into some pretty heavy Resistance fighters, who they were forced to take out in order to progress. The shooting looked terrific, the character models animated great, and the environments were rather eye-cathing themselves.

Another thing mentioned during the demo is that throughout the game, you can play either alone, or with a co-op group of up to eight players. Now, if you choose to play alone, you’ll be able to change your class throughout the levels at specifically placed terminals. But if you play in a group, you’re forced to stick with the one you start out with. The individual demoing the game also mentioned that if you choose, you’ll be able to play a game where every character seen, friendly or not, will be an actual person.

Now, choosing which class to play may be something worth putting some extra time into – expecially if you’re going to be playing online and forced to stick with it. The reason this decision is so important is because of the game’s mission system. As you progress through a level, you’ll be able to pull up a rotary wheel full of missions you can choose to take on. Depending on what class you’re playing, you’ll be tasked with objectives that fit their abilities. For example, if you’re a demolitions expert, you may have an available mission to blow up a door to create a shortcut for your team. The missions change depending on how the battle is playing out, and depending on how difficult they are, are worth a reflective amount of experience which can be used to upgrade your character. This was actually one of the more intriguing aspects of the game to me, because the objectives are totally optional, so you don’t have to blow up that door, and if you choose not to, the game will adjust accordingly.

Brink seems to be doing some extremely interesting things with the first-person shooter genre. Nearly every aspect of the game, from the movement to the mission system, seems to be adding its own new, exciting twist, which seems like it’s going to come together to form a truly special final product. This one looks like it’s a game to definitely keep on your radar.

Brink is slated for release on the PC, Xbox 360, PS3 in Q3 2010.