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Field Commander is the first turn-based strategy game to grace the PSP and it's certainly worth a look. It's not going to take your breath away with beautiful graphics or stun you with anything sublimely new and original. Field Commander is turn-based strategy by numbers, it does nothing new but what it does do it does well.
The first thing you will notice when the game loads is the variety of options in the menu, which is a nice surprise and while most will rush straight into missions or multiplayer mode they would be well advised to check out the tutorials. These are well implemented, helping to ease the player into the game without being over-long or complicated.
Once the tutorials are over (or skipped over) most players will head straight for the mission mode. With around 30 missions to choose from, which cover a variety of different situations, there is a lot to get stuck into.
The missions have varying objectives, from "rescue X", to "destroy Y before it escapes" and so on. All are well designed and are pitched at a nice difficulty level, where the player is unlikely to feel cheated by unfair AI. Every now and then a mission will bite you a couple of times before the correct strategy sinks in but it never feels cheap or unfair.
The gameplay, especially within the missions, works very well and is structured effectively. All the units' strengths and weaknesses make sense and although the variety of units never becomes truly expansive it builds nicely throughout the game and is more than adequate.
The units come in four main varieties: land, sea, air and infantry. Certain units whup the ass of other units, and so on and so forth. On anything but the easiest difficulty setting it's essential to alternate offensive / defensive strategies effectively in order to be victorious. The battles are depicted in 3D evocative of an early PS1 game; they will however be skipped at every occasion once the novelty wears off. The map itself is isometric and, whilst unspectacular, keeps things simple and easy to use, the way it should be.
Attached in a perfunctory fashion to the missions is a storyline, which although it will be ignored by most who just want dive into the game, is well done if a little formulaic. As usual a nasty band of people want to take over the world and it's your mission to stop them by, you guessed it, killing things and blowing stuff up. It's likely the storyline will be forgotten as soon as the game departs the PSP but the music might prove enduring. Even if reluctantly on the part of the listener, the militaristic melodies are of the kind that commit themselves to memory.
Field Commander is the Ford Focus of the genre; it's solid, reliable and enjoyable but nothing new or all that exciting and it will leave you wanting that little bit more. It's all the PSP has in the way of strategy though, so if it's the kind of game to float your (gun-toting) boat you might want to set sail. |
