Introduction
WWIII is on the horizon. Dawn and dusk collide over the malden Islands and you’re caught in between. Use all the resources at your disposal to hold back the coming night. Infantry, armor division and air arm - all at your command to beat back the forces of world oppression. But first you have to make the climb through the ranks...Welcome to the Army, Soldier! Hope you survive the experience.
Presentation
The feezability of this game is amazing. There are so many different things that your person can do, that you really need to remember which keys do which things. The original keyboard setup uses the newest method of moving around, W is forward, and S is left, stuff like that, personally I didn’t like it. Some people do, and if you get used to it it puts all the options you will need during a heated battle withing reach of your hand while you are moving. If you don’t like it, completely customize the keyboard.The included mission editor has a high learning curve. To say the very least it is not the easiest thing to figure out, nor move around in. It is not similar to any mission editor previosly released in any game, but it has its advantages, including allowing you to program AI into your missions.
Overall, not bad presentation for such a powerful game.
Graphics & Sound
The sound is this game is very realistic. Stereo sound is used very wisely, you can hear where your teammates are, where the bullets are whizzing by your head (or did you get hit?), and where vehicles are. The sound effects for the vehicles and guns are very realistic, even though some of them, like the M112 sounds, get annoying.The graphics are amazing. It would be a perfect 10 if the landscape wasn’t so boring. You need a high-powered computer to see things the way they should be (tested on a 1ghz Athalon with a Voodoo 3). The men are not blocky, but smooth 3D looking, the explosions are quite realistic (even though the crashes are delayed). Dead people actually look dead, not like boards with a human skin on them. The landscape is good in most levels, but in certain ones the desert just goes on and on, with no changes, and it is mundane and flat. The hills are nice looking, and the houses look like houses that exist in war zones. You also can view your person/vehicle via 1st person, or in third person, and in third person, unlike most games, when you do things like reload, you see your guy actually reload the gun.
Gameplay
Intro to gameplay: Reagan is in power in the West; Gorbachev holds sawy in the East. Glasnost is about to change the face of the globe and peace is on the horizon. But peace is not a popular option. A rebel faction seeks to widen the Cold War gulf between Red and Blue - permanently... You start out as a United States military private in the army based on the island of Malden. You are part of a NATO peace keeping task force. After recieving words about large enemy movements, you are pulled from training camp, given an M16, and sent to go fight. After your squad learns that you don’t have a chance, you retreat, and move to another island. Later in the game you get your chance to drive a tank, fly helicopters, be the gunner in both of those vehicles, and be in charge of a squad of guys. In other missions you get to be Special Forces, armed with HK MP5s, and satchel cases, mission: go reek havoc.
With many different things you can do, this game allows you to do many unique things. In games such as Delta Force and Rainbow Six, you could be an infantryman, and that was all. Here you can drive tanks, go on patrol with jeeps, fly missions with Apaches and Blackhawks, and still run around on the ground. As you get higher in rank (either by being great, or having your buddies killed), you get more control, and can do more with people. Your aresenal of weapons is well to say the least impressive. You can carry everything from smoke grenades, to flares, and M16s to LAWs (light anti-tank weapons).
The gameplay allows this game to take war games to a new level. Never before could you do so much, in one game.
Oh, and one more thing, this is realistic, no cheats, and you can’t be Rambo, you will die, and ya know what, when you retry it, you will die again. Then you will learn tactics.
Lasting Appeal
This game allows you to make your own missions, not just maps, but actual missions. You set where your allies go, who is in charge of each squad, what type of support you have, and what the enemy does. You have 4 different maps to choose from even though more can be downloaded (not at time of writing). You also can hop online, and play the game verse your friends, or enemies... You can be anyone from the commander of your entire team, to a lowly, expendable private, either way, you will be needed.
The game also has a few levels that will take a few tries, and hey, when you finally win, just make it harder...
Conclusion
Want a game that is fun, realistic, contains many new ideas, and is overall well done, this is it. It is out now, and will most likely have many mods coming out for it. Operation Vietnam is already being worked on.My opinion: You want to go to war, you want to drive tanks, you want to fly helicopters, you want to be on the front lines... one game: Operation Flashpoint.
