Return to Castle Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory

"Free games that don't suck make me say "Holy Crap!""

The year is 1943. The war is World War II. It's been long and bloody, with no end in site. With both sides running low on men, new bodie...erm, soldiers are needed on both sides. However, which side will you choose? The Allies (which include: the Americans...and that's it. I guess the French and English weren't in this WWII) or the politically correct Axis (from a kinder, gentler, genocide-free Germany)?

Presentation: 8/10
Aspects from the previous Return to Castle Wolfenstein game can be found in Enemy Territory. There is an introductory movie, however, since there is no real story to this game (The aforementioned ''story'' is purely from my brain, not from the game), it's more there for show, to give the user some idea, as small as it is, what they're going to be doing. Unfortunately, because the game was a free download, to keep the file size down, the movie was heavily compressed, so it's not the best looking. But, after you watch it once, you'll never watch it again, so no big loss, right?

Also kept is a modified limbo menu. This one is simpler and easier to navigate. Instead of having to go through a multiple screen selection process, it's all been put in one. You might think that this would make it unnecessarily cluttered, ergo, this is not the case. You can now just select your team and then you're good to go.

The server list is about the same as it was before, but now it's much easier to apply server filters so you can filter out servers with friendly fire or other such options.

Graphics: 8/10
Enemy Territory is running on a modified Quake 3 engine. Being from 1999, it simply can't compete with up and coming games like Half-Life 2, Doom III, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Oblivion. However, it does hold it's own. The fire effects from the flamethrower simply haven't been touched by any other game out there. The environments are pretty as well, with levels such as the Radar having thick underbrush and luscious trees. The engine also does weather effects decently with snow and rain being done better than most. It's also a very versatile engine in the sense that it works well on a multitude of video cards, whether they be for the cutting edge gamer or for the budget gamer. It ran at about 30fps with spikes up to 70fps and dips to about 20fps on a GeForce 2 MX 400 32MB IDE at 640x480 with all the settings turned down, and it ran at about 65fps with spikes up to 95fps and dips to about 35fps on a GeForce 4 Ti4200 128MB 8x AGP at 1024x768 with all the settings turned up.

Sound: 9/10
Not too much to complain about here. All the guns sound very nice, full enough and with plenty of bass, although I can comment on exactly how accurate they are to their real life counterparts. The voices can be corny at points, but for the most part they sound very professional.

Also worth noting is that sound is actually an integral part of them game. Your footsteps make noise, which can give away your position to them enemy if you're not careful. Details like this are very welcomed.

Gameplay: 9/10
A clever twist in Enemy territory would be the XP system. With the XP system, you earn experience every time you kill someone, or blow something up, or heal someone. The XP gets you upgrades such as faster reloading, full heal, flak jackets, and the like.

As you can see, this isn't a standard deathmatch game. Not just because of the XP system, but also because it's team-based, with different classes on each side. Basically, in the 6 maps offered in Enemy Territory, the Axis have something the Allies want, or want to destroy, and in turn, the Axis have to defend it. This can be accomplished with teamwork, as going alone won't get you wins.

This can be both a curse and a blessing. You may join a game where everyone works together to reach their goal; the engineers are blowing up key objectives or protecting them with landmines, the medics are healing people, the field ops are clearing large groups of enemy soldiers with their air strike and replenishing soldiers ammo supplies, the covert ops spying on the enemy and bringing them down from the inside, and the soldiers...soldiering.

Or you may join a server where you play with idiots who have no idea what they're doing; the engineers are off planting landmines in places where the enemy will never go or where you yourself often walk, medics who heal none, field ops killing their own team with their air strikes, covert ops who are just the covert ops so they can have the FG42 and refuse to spy (or when they try to, they give themselves away very easily), and soldiers...who can't soldier.

However, more times than not, you don't end up with total Neanderthals, making for a fun experience.

Controls: 10/10
Standard FPS controls for the most part. You know, WASD and the likes. Really, there isn't all that I can complain about here.

Lasting Appeal: 10/10
There's so much you can do. Every game is different. Sometimes you find yourself owning, other times you find yourself getting owned. It makes for diverse experience.

Rent or Buy?
Neither! It's frigging free!

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 08/19/03