Final Glimpse: The famed Nazi-killing series moves into the third dimension.
PC gamers are long familiar with the highly regarded Commandos franchise of WWII strategy games, where you pit your sneaky tactics against the evil Nazi war machine and doled out huge helpings of death. With the latest edition, Commandos Strike Force, console owners finally get to experience the same wartime excitement, but with a modern twist.
Similar to titles like Command & Conquer, the Commando series is making a big paradigm shift as it moves from a top-down strategy game to a first-person 3D shooter. Die-hard fans of the franchise shouldn’t fret, however; despite the radical change, developer Pyro is promising that Strike Force won’t be just another generic run-and-gun fragfest. They know their fans love the strategy elements and so are incorporating these into the FPS style of gameplay. This means that running around like a maniac blasting everything that moves will likely get you killed within seconds; instead, using your noggin by planning a strategy, playing smart and using your tactical advantages will be the keys to success.
Few details have been released about the story, other than the game will take place in France, Norway and Russia where you’ll be responsible for planting Nazis into the cold, hard ground. The missions and map designs will be quite open, giving you the freedom to play the way you want – so you will be able to engage in standard FPS battles if you wish, or be sneaky and take a more subtle stealth approach.
How you tackle a situation will depend upon the characters you have under your control. There will be three Commandos available for you to play: Green Beret Frank O’Brien is the all-purpose soldier who can use heavy weapons like machine guns, bazookas and mounted MG42s; sniper William Hawkins is the long distance killer who can slow down time by staring through his scope and holding his breath, sort of like a sniper version of bullet-time; and the spy George Brown, who can sneak up behind enemies and kill them silently with a garrote or poison gas grenades. Best of all, like Agent 47 in the Hitman series, Brown will be able to steal the uniforms off of killed enemies and walk around in hostile territory relatively unnoticed. However, the catch is he will only be able to fool those of a lower rank; so if you steal an officer’s uniform, the grunt foot soldiers will leave you alone but a fellow officer will become suspicious and could blow your cover if you get too close. Encounter anyone with a higher rank and they will instantly know you’re a spy and attempt to ventilate you with several hundred rounds.
Like Brown, the other Commandos will have the ability to perform silent kills. For example, Hawkins can throw knives or grab enemies from behind and stab them in the back; in fact, you may end up using your knives quite frequently, since the instant you pull the trigger the enemy will be on full alert. When you successfully perform a silent kill, the view will temporarily shift to third-person so you can watch your Nazi killing prowess in all of its bloody glory.
Up to two Commandos will be available per level and the game will pre-select them for you. You will only be able to control one at a time but can switch between them on the fly; so if your Green Beret is pinned down, you will be able to switch to your sniper, take out the enemy, and switch back again. The Commando you are not controlling will be taken over by the computer and behave appropriately, meaning they should stay behind cover an not go running out into the open to play catch with German potato mashers. In some levels (there will be 14 in all) you will go solo, while others will have you fighting side-by-side with friendly NPCs.
Despite the big change in gameplay style, Strike Force will integrate elements of its predecessors; for example, instead of the classic overhead view, there will be a radar map pinpointing enemy locations. In place of the previous enemy “cone of vision”, there will be an Awareness indicator displaying an enemy’s alert status – if it’s green, they have no clue you’re there but if it’s red, you’d better find some cover and fast.
The Commandos series has a reputation for being quite tough and so the developers are trying to balance the gameplay to satisfy all skill levels. This is not to say it will be easy; the fact that there will be no in-mission check points should be indication enough that this will not be a walk in the park. Commandos has always been about challenging the gamer and rewarding smart play, and Strike Force is looking no different.
Naturally, you can’t have a WWII FPS without online multiplayer (it’s the law, you know) and so the game will support up to eight players over Xbox Live. Gamemodes include deathmatch, team deathmatch, Postmen (no word on what this one entails, but it sounds like it might be a CTF clone) and the intriguing Sabotage mode where you need to obtain codes from the opposing team to arm a bomb. However, in order to get those codes, at least one member of your team has to be a spy. The cool twist is you don’t try to rack up kills; instead, when you inflict enough damage on an enemy, he will fall injured to the ground which will allow your spy to interrogate him and get part of the code. The interrogation takes time, however, so your team must protect the spy until he gets the code – but remember, your opponents will be trying to do the same to you. It sounds like a very interesting and fun gamemode that will really require good teamplay, and will hopefully make up for the fact that there will be no co-operative multiplayer.
Graphically, Strike Force is looking good with nice character detail, realistic animation and big sprays of blood. The environments are typical of WWII shooters, meaning you’ll see lots of destroyed buildings and ruined landscapes. Since many of your missions will involve stealth, you’ll be creeping around at night and sticking to the shadows while trying to find that perfect snappy uniform to “borrow”.
