yeah, it's only apparent in some circunstances, like, when the locust are shot with a shotgun, they actually drop their weapons and sometimes they'll fall down and kneel in pain. So, i was playing in hardcore and that wasn't as apparent, in casual it seems that it is more visible. I thought that hardcore was the medium difficulty and I still think it is cause in causual the game is a walk in the park. If you turn down the blood too it looks more natural and cohesive too cause you only see the sparks coming out your armor, just makes it all more difficult to know when you're hitting the enemies but they fall down pretty easily with a couple of shots anyway. When you shoot a locust in hiding it won't seem retarded anymore cause once you do it they'll die most of the times so, casual makes the game look a lot cooler even if it gets way too easy specially playing wasd and a mouse. The game should still have recoil and the hardcore challenge minus the locust hp that should be cut to a half and even when shot at a distance they should act like they felt it, it seems that they only will get hurt when it's upclose.