World in Conflict

Remember Command & Conquer? I mean the first one, not the resulting sequels that have come out over the years. I remember the very first mission in C&C for the GDA, or what ever the "good" guys were called. A shit ton of troops storming a beach and jacking up the bad guys. It was AWESOME. I was 15 when that game came out and loved the series ever since.

World in Conflict (here on called WiC) gave me the same kind of feeling as when I played C&C for the first time. WiC is set in a alternative world where the Russians invaded America instead of going broke and falling apart. Russia also invaded Europe a few months before that, which set the stage for the invasion of the US. You play as a promising young officer with the duty of saving America from the big, bad Red Army.

WiC takes a different approach to unit management than the standard RTS. Instead of gathering resources, creating a huge force and then crushing the enemy, WiC gives you a set amount of command points to purchase new units with. By doing various tasks during the missions, you will be given access to better units, more resources and tactical aids. This lends some to the idea that Americas military is mobilized in Europe, leaving only a small force in the U.S. Its inventive, actually adds to the feeling of being short on resources and saves you the trouble of having to build bases. Which you don't really do in the game. Generally, its all about holding strategic points until you have to move on to capture another one. At these points, you can leave units inside the circle and defensive positions will be built. These defensive positions, at a max of three, will slowly build over time and not cost you anything. They are standard on every map and will normally build three kinds of defense. One for soldiers, one for tanks and one for anti-air. More on those later.

The game is really fucking impressive to look at. That, of course, demands some higher end hardware if you want to run the game at peak quality. My rig falls into "medium" status and the game is amazing to look at. All the little details are done well and big battles are really something to behold. The cut-scenes in the game are also well done, with no stone being unturned. The really neat part about WiC is beyond its amazing visuals. The games story is solid, giving you characters that you begin to either really like, or really hate. Its a more personal story than others. You also have Alec Baldwin narrating the story while your missions load. I found that to be a nice touch since he doesn't cheese it up to much and manages to convey the feelings of a solider who did a lot and say a lot in the defense of his country. It's an interesting premise, considering no single country has invaded the United States in the modern era. It really hit home for me, thanks to the short but well done cut scenes with soldier's calling home and the President. You begin to care for the characters in the story, which is more than I can say for the "Best Story Ever - Bioshock".

The game play is fairly easy to learn as it keeps lose to its C&C roots. All point and click, the control over your units is easy to manage. You have the standard mini-map to keep track of any large scale battle you may be fighting, along with the ability to assign unit numbers to groups of units. It does prove useful in keeping tanks, helicopters and ground troops separate and using this ability will help keep accidental slaughter to a minimum. As stated above, you will be given access to a limited amount of command points that you can spend to purchase reinforcements. These units will be air dropped into a specific location that you pick on the map. You will also be given access to tactical points, which you can spend to call in air strikes, tank busters, artillery, airborne troops and other stuff which can save your butt. As I said before, the main idea of the missions is to take and hold various strategic points on the map and hold them for a period of time. There is no base building and the only way you gain access to more powerful units is by completing secondary objectives with in the main mission. This cuts down on the confusion that some times can appear in many RTS games.

The game, on normal mode, was some what challenging. Thanks to the limited amount of command points you have to spend, each unit matters. Losing two or three heavy tanks at the wrong time can be a very bad thing. Getting reinforcements takes about 20 seconds and you have to wait another 20 seconds after that before ordering more, which you normally wouldnt be able to do since command points are earned rather slowly. Again, though, command points are capped for each mission and you will stop earning them once you reach the cap. So keeping your units alive is a priority. I did find, though, that it seemed that the Russians had an unlimited supply of troops to throw at me. An invading army, I would imagine, would have a harder time reinforcing their troops than the defending army, but apparently the Russians built a couple million tanks, helicopters and other stuff and brought it all over to the US.

While the single player mission is able to be completed in around 12 hours, where WiC really shines is in multiplayer. The game types are rather similar , everyone starts with the same amount of command points and its more of an attrition battle while you save up tactical points for a nuke. Tactical points are earned for destroying your enemies units and that can be harder than it sounds. In the games I have played in, a lot of people will take armor, support and air trees at the start and most will ignore ground troops. Which makes sense because ground troops get their asses handed to them by just about everything. Even with a balanced group of soldiers, you will find that ground troops will die from helicopters, tanks and artillery rather quickly. They are needed though, which sucks for anyone who gets stuck playing that role. While the game play tends to be repetitive in both single and multiplayer, its the tactics that make MP so much fun. If you have a group of players that work together, cover each others flanks, provide air support and anti-air support, that group becomes hard to beat. Each player, though, needs to know their role or you will find yourself losing more often than winning. Being the lone wolf type will not fly in MP. You also need a variety of air, ground and support. A group of players with all tanks will get decimated by helicopters. Same goes for helicopters against someone playing support with lots of anti-air. Another part that makes it interesting is that you can not stay put for very long. If you are a type of player who turtles up and believes a strong defense is the best offensive, than a couple of precision artillery strikes will cure you of that mind set real fast.

Over all, WiC is a strong entry into the RTS market. With a good story, amazing visuals and solid game play, I could see it making a run for RTS of the year. If you don't play online or just are an antisocial person who hates multiplayer, the single player mission is almost worth the price tag. While its good, the problem is that its short and I got drawn into the story so I beat the game in one day. I would keep that in mind before picking it up.