I had been looking at this demo for a while now. I would stare at it as though it were some shiny toy train in the window at the store and I had the needs and desires of a five year old. I had downloaded the trailer for the game, and I found the concept interesting. The frontlines was where the action would be centered, a front along which enemy forces would clash in a struggle to control certain objectives. Once a side had captured an objective, the frontline would move in their favor, and a new battle would begin anew.
Or something along those lines.
Whatever the actual concept was, I found it interesting enough to look into downloading the demo. The demo for Frontlines: Fuel of War is huge; we're talking 1.7 GB huge. It had to be great, right?
So, after selecting to download it and playing Alien Hominid for a while, I was actually able to play the game. I started it up and waited to be amazed.
Upon getting to the main menu, you notice that there is some text at the bottom stating that the demo does not reflect the final product. I don't want to hear this. It really worries me. I realize that the model I was about to play could only be a prototype, but then that could be a warning sign stating that the demo is about to blow huge chunks of suck everywhere. I'm not a fan of huge chunks of suck. However, the main menu isn't really disappointing me. There isn't any early indicators that this game will be sloppy and ugly. I bravely hit the option to "Start Demo".
I'm treated to a cutscene involving some unnamed soldiers bickering about matters back home, or so I assume. I'm not really a fan of cutscenes in my shooters. Go ahead, crucify me and mutilate my naughty bits for being one of those trigger happy FPS cravers. I don't mind a bit of story in my video games. In fact, I quite enjoy it; just not in my first person shooters. I seek out these games for lightning fast gameplay and some solid gun mechanics. So, I skipped the beautiful cinematic. It really did look nice, but I was itching to get to the gameplay.
I'm rushed out of the helicopter and I follow my fellow soldiers up the hill. I'm taking in a little bit of scenery as a I rush along, but there's already a few problems I'm grappling with a minute into the game. The movement speed is surprisingly sluggish, and I'm sprinting. When fiddling with the stance changing button, I find that I can crouch, go prone, and stand erect like the Homo sapien I am. The prone setting is, as I expected, slow going. However, the movement while crouching is painfully slow. You couldn't catch a snail covered in peanut butter, slathered in molasses during the month of January while crouching. It's that slow. I don't see how this could be of any use during a fire fight. I don't think it even steadied my quirky aiming reticule.
After some linear running, I arrive at a site where bullets are flying and there are explosions going off around me. Finally, some shooting. I was starting break out in hives. A few red targets pop up on my heads-up display. The game has targeted my enemies for me, and I thanked it heartily. I began firing my fully automatic assault rifle in short bursts, as many hours of Counter-Strike and Call of Duty 4 have taught me, and I see little blips indicating that I'm hitting my target. My aim is absolutely dying after the first or second bullet. However, the target is absorbing shots as if his skin is made out of kevlar. This is a problem for me. I don't mind realistic recoil; I actually welcome it, but I don't like it when the realistic recoil makes it hard for me to kill completely ficticious enemies. It also doesn't help that these Red Star soldiers (that's really who you fight) have recoiless super rifles with telescopic sights. I'm getting hit on the lowest difficulty with automatic fire from five buildings away. I don't like this, but I soldier on. Heh heh, soldier on... Punny.
I continue on and I capture an objective by squatting over it like a mother hen and continue to move up as the frontline extends further. I come across these little RC cars. I'm told by an NPC that this small child's toy is actually a pack of C4 packed onto a remote wheel base.
Nifty.
I hear that there's a tank just around the corner, and I'm told that steering my little Hot Wheel from Hell into it is a good idea. So I deploy the bugger and begin to drive it away and around the corner.
FOR. FUCK'S. SAKE.
Driving this thing is horrible. I couldn't find a technique to actually steer it in a line. It swerved around like a rhino greased up, blindfolded, and pushed around on a circular Slip n' Slide. You can't just turn the camera and hold forward, it continues to keep going in the direction you turned the camera, even after you've stopped swerving the camera. I also found my little toy getting caught up on the smallest pebble and veering even more out of control. I hated driving this thing. I eventually abandoned the confounded device and just wandered off in search of a rocket launcher. I found one, and stuck to it for my tank-destroying needs.
I think I want to take the time to mention the mechanic for changing weapons. Holding the Y button brings up a little weapon wheel, where each weapon is assigned to a certain direction you choose with the right analog stick, as I recall. This is pretty good in theory, however, you can't really change weapons effectively unless you memorize what direction is what weapon. I suppose it was just attributed to my experience (or the lack thereof), and it would most likely get much easier after playing for a while. However, it's frustrating to take damage while fumbling with your weapon selection.
I once took so much damage during this time and die. I was showed to a funny little scene of flying backwards from above, and I was asked if I wanted to change equipment while a respawn counter ticked down. Think Call of Duty 4, minus the KillCam.
I'm happy to report that a little ways further, I found a little remote controlled helicopter, and its controls are much better than the tiny death car. It was easily maneuverable and never really got caught up on anything. If I absolutely had to complain, I would say that it was a bit overpowered if ever introduced into a multiplayer mode. That's just pure speculation, however. I found that my time spent on foot was coming to an end upon destroying an AA gun. I was told to hop in a tank and get my ass across a bridge, destroying enemy tanks along the way.
I was elated when I found that these ground vehicle controls were much easier than the tiny ground vehicle controls. A couple of complaints though. I made my way across the bridge, and upon looking back, saw that it was a necessity to destroy the tanks that were firing pot shots from down below. I edged up to an innacuous ledge, and tried to ease my tank down it, when I found my massive vehicle flipping down the small ridge. All while being fired upon by two or three enemy tanks. My tank suddenly exploded and I was thrown from the tank, shot to Hell by the other tanks, and grumbled some curses as my respawn counter ticked down the seconds until it kicked me back a couple of minutes. I redid the area, and the demo ended.
Now that the walkthrough of my experience is done, I'm going to just dish out some general thoughts.
Throughout my playtime, I found that large parts of the environment were destructible; an aspect that I find admirable. I found that railings could be demolished, small shed structures could be pulverized, and small bits of cover could be vaporized. Destructible environments is something in games that opens up new gameplay options and varies up a normally mundane experience. I liked the feeling of exposing enemies by sending their cover to oblivion with a well placed grenade.
I also would like to think that this game would be a blast in multiplayer. After scrambling about shooting Commies in the time I played through, I found that the area would be very workable as a multiplayer map. Multilevel buildings, ladders placed accordingly, sandbags scattered about, and some great back alleys for some flanking opportunities. I think coupled with the desructible environments, and nifty gadgets, multiplayer would eat up a large portion of my time.
I have some complaints about the AI. The enemies seem to take cover, and move accordingly, but my teammates looked and acted as smart as a bag of bricks. The first teammate I saw ran up the starting hill, mounted a little bit of ground cover, and began sprinting back and forth. This was the first encounter with the AI ever, and it was pretty telling of the rest of the AI. My teammates divided up their time with running back and forth and just being generally unhelpful. I had to complete every objective, I had to shoot every enemy, and I had to make every sprint from cover to cover into enemy territory. They would only follow once everything associated with Communism was cleared from the area. They looked generic and spoke generically. Big, tough, dumb guys. Generally, I disliked the AI.
With some polishing up and reworking of some game mechanics, this game has the makings of something I'd actually invest my time and money in. Generally, I liked it. It was just rough around the edges, but the game even says the demo is not the final product. My hopes are high.
Or something along those lines.
Whatever the actual concept was, I found it interesting enough to look into downloading the demo. The demo for Frontlines: Fuel of War is huge; we're talking 1.7 GB huge. It had to be great, right?
So, after selecting to download it and playing Alien Hominid for a while, I was actually able to play the game. I started it up and waited to be amazed.
Upon getting to the main menu, you notice that there is some text at the bottom stating that the demo does not reflect the final product. I don't want to hear this. It really worries me. I realize that the model I was about to play could only be a prototype, but then that could be a warning sign stating that the demo is about to blow huge chunks of suck everywhere. I'm not a fan of huge chunks of suck. However, the main menu isn't really disappointing me. There isn't any early indicators that this game will be sloppy and ugly. I bravely hit the option to "Start Demo".
I'm treated to a cutscene involving some unnamed soldiers bickering about matters back home, or so I assume. I'm not really a fan of cutscenes in my shooters. Go ahead, crucify me and mutilate my naughty bits for being one of those trigger happy FPS cravers. I don't mind a bit of story in my video games. In fact, I quite enjoy it; just not in my first person shooters. I seek out these games for lightning fast gameplay and some solid gun mechanics. So, I skipped the beautiful cinematic. It really did look nice, but I was itching to get to the gameplay.
I'm rushed out of the helicopter and I follow my fellow soldiers up the hill. I'm taking in a little bit of scenery as a I rush along, but there's already a few problems I'm grappling with a minute into the game. The movement speed is surprisingly sluggish, and I'm sprinting. When fiddling with the stance changing button, I find that I can crouch, go prone, and stand erect like the Homo sapien I am. The prone setting is, as I expected, slow going. However, the movement while crouching is painfully slow. You couldn't catch a snail covered in peanut butter, slathered in molasses during the month of January while crouching. It's that slow. I don't see how this could be of any use during a fire fight. I don't think it even steadied my quirky aiming reticule.
After some linear running, I arrive at a site where bullets are flying and there are explosions going off around me. Finally, some shooting. I was starting break out in hives. A few red targets pop up on my heads-up display. The game has targeted my enemies for me, and I thanked it heartily. I began firing my fully automatic assault rifle in short bursts, as many hours of Counter-Strike and Call of Duty 4 have taught me, and I see little blips indicating that I'm hitting my target. My aim is absolutely dying after the first or second bullet. However, the target is absorbing shots as if his skin is made out of kevlar. This is a problem for me. I don't mind realistic recoil; I actually welcome it, but I don't like it when the realistic recoil makes it hard for me to kill completely ficticious enemies. It also doesn't help that these Red Star soldiers (that's really who you fight) have recoiless super rifles with telescopic sights. I'm getting hit on the lowest difficulty with automatic fire from five buildings away. I don't like this, but I soldier on. Heh heh, soldier on... Punny.
I continue on and I capture an objective by squatting over it like a mother hen and continue to move up as the frontline extends further. I come across these little RC cars. I'm told by an NPC that this small child's toy is actually a pack of C4 packed onto a remote wheel base.
Nifty.
I hear that there's a tank just around the corner, and I'm told that steering my little Hot Wheel from Hell into it is a good idea. So I deploy the bugger and begin to drive it away and around the corner.
FOR. FUCK'S. SAKE.
Driving this thing is horrible. I couldn't find a technique to actually steer it in a line. It swerved around like a rhino greased up, blindfolded, and pushed around on a circular Slip n' Slide. You can't just turn the camera and hold forward, it continues to keep going in the direction you turned the camera, even after you've stopped swerving the camera. I also found my little toy getting caught up on the smallest pebble and veering even more out of control. I hated driving this thing. I eventually abandoned the confounded device and just wandered off in search of a rocket launcher. I found one, and stuck to it for my tank-destroying needs.
I think I want to take the time to mention the mechanic for changing weapons. Holding the Y button brings up a little weapon wheel, where each weapon is assigned to a certain direction you choose with the right analog stick, as I recall. This is pretty good in theory, however, you can't really change weapons effectively unless you memorize what direction is what weapon. I suppose it was just attributed to my experience (or the lack thereof), and it would most likely get much easier after playing for a while. However, it's frustrating to take damage while fumbling with your weapon selection.
I once took so much damage during this time and die. I was showed to a funny little scene of flying backwards from above, and I was asked if I wanted to change equipment while a respawn counter ticked down. Think Call of Duty 4, minus the KillCam.
I'm happy to report that a little ways further, I found a little remote controlled helicopter, and its controls are much better than the tiny death car. It was easily maneuverable and never really got caught up on anything. If I absolutely had to complain, I would say that it was a bit overpowered if ever introduced into a multiplayer mode. That's just pure speculation, however. I found that my time spent on foot was coming to an end upon destroying an AA gun. I was told to hop in a tank and get my ass across a bridge, destroying enemy tanks along the way.
I was elated when I found that these ground vehicle controls were much easier than the tiny ground vehicle controls. A couple of complaints though. I made my way across the bridge, and upon looking back, saw that it was a necessity to destroy the tanks that were firing pot shots from down below. I edged up to an innacuous ledge, and tried to ease my tank down it, when I found my massive vehicle flipping down the small ridge. All while being fired upon by two or three enemy tanks. My tank suddenly exploded and I was thrown from the tank, shot to Hell by the other tanks, and grumbled some curses as my respawn counter ticked down the seconds until it kicked me back a couple of minutes. I redid the area, and the demo ended.
Now that the walkthrough of my experience is done, I'm going to just dish out some general thoughts.
Throughout my playtime, I found that large parts of the environment were destructible; an aspect that I find admirable. I found that railings could be demolished, small shed structures could be pulverized, and small bits of cover could be vaporized. Destructible environments is something in games that opens up new gameplay options and varies up a normally mundane experience. I liked the feeling of exposing enemies by sending their cover to oblivion with a well placed grenade.
I also would like to think that this game would be a blast in multiplayer. After scrambling about shooting Commies in the time I played through, I found that the area would be very workable as a multiplayer map. Multilevel buildings, ladders placed accordingly, sandbags scattered about, and some great back alleys for some flanking opportunities. I think coupled with the desructible environments, and nifty gadgets, multiplayer would eat up a large portion of my time.
I have some complaints about the AI. The enemies seem to take cover, and move accordingly, but my teammates looked and acted as smart as a bag of bricks. The first teammate I saw ran up the starting hill, mounted a little bit of ground cover, and began sprinting back and forth. This was the first encounter with the AI ever, and it was pretty telling of the rest of the AI. My teammates divided up their time with running back and forth and just being generally unhelpful. I had to complete every objective, I had to shoot every enemy, and I had to make every sprint from cover to cover into enemy territory. They would only follow once everything associated with Communism was cleared from the area. They looked generic and spoke generically. Big, tough, dumb guys. Generally, I disliked the AI.
With some polishing up and reworking of some game mechanics, this game has the makings of something I'd actually invest my time and money in. Generally, I liked it. It was just rough around the edges, but the game even says the demo is not the final product. My hopes are high.