Conflict: Desert Storm

"An interesting diversion"

With all of the big name third person shooters coming out soon for the Xbox, such as Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon and Brute Force, other titles in this genre may unfortunately be overlooked and ignored even though they are done fairly well. One of the games that I falls under this category is Conflict: Desert Storm.

The game takes place during the 1991 Gulf War where you can take control of either the U.S. Delta Force or the British SAS. You start things off in the Middle East on August 2nd, 1990 where you need to rescue a member of your team from captivity. You then gain a few more members over the next couple of levels and have a total of four members that either you or you and some friends can control for the remainder of the game.

Graphics:
While the graphics in the game are not awful, they aren’t mind blowing by any means. But one thing they definitely do is compliment what the game is trying to be, a war-based shooter game.

The textures are mediocre, but the character animations are done rather well. If you tell everyone to “fire at will” everyone will raise their guns up and get ready to fire, and then if you cancel the order they will put them back down. They also move fairly life-like, however I did notice a couple times where the characters jumped back and forth, but it didn’t happen that often.

Shadowing effects aren’t too shabby either, they adjust to the characters movements really well, the only complaint I have is that the bullet shells that fall after firing are shadowless (but they still look good).

The camera is done really well, so you will really have no problems running around. I hardly ever had to change the camera, which is nice so you can concentrate on getting your team together and getting them to act properly

Other graphical effects include things like draw distances where at times there will be sandstorms and such causing your view to drop dramatically.

But to be honest, there is nothing in the graphic category that really screams amazing, it is just your average graphics.

Controls:
The biggest problem I had with the (default) controls is that they aren’t inverted, so that means up is actually up and down is actually down. Of course, this sounds like the proper way to do it, but the majority of games uses the inverted control scheme where down is up and up is down. Because of this, everyone is now used to that way of moving around, so it just makes the learning curve that much longer.

The controls are really complex; you have quite a number of things that need to be learned. I recommend using the tutorial mode first so you know how to do the majority of things, but even after you completed it you will find that there are still things you need to get used.

Once you have been playing the game for a little while and finally got used to the controls, you will find the controls are really enjoyable for the most part and that you will have hardly any problems with them.

Gameplay:
There is lots to talk about in the gameplay category of Conflict: Desert Storm, but I will still try to keep it as short as possible for you.

As it was previously mentioned, for the majority of the game you have four team members that you can take control of: an assault trooper, sniper, heavy weapons expert and a demolition expert/medic. You have to tell each one to follow you, hold position, fire at will, don’t fire, and so on…you can also hit up and down on the D-pad to take control of other members instead of the one you started with. So if you really need to blow something up, take control of the explosions expert yourself and make sure things are blown up right.

When looking after your teammates, you really have to strategically plan where to place them. Things like moving your sniper to a high spot, or moving your explosions expert in at the right time while you tell the rest to cover him are definitely a nice aspect for those who enjoy games that make you think.

The computer AI is nothing to sneeze at in the game either, they definitely propose a challenge regardless of what difficulty level you selected before the game started, even from the beginning of the first level. Which could be good to some but bad to others.

Of course, because of the AI difficulty issue that means some levels are going to be really hard as well. But for some reason they just jump around from easy and difficult alot, it’s almost amusing. But regardless, when you finish a mission you definitely get a sense of accomplishment.

A really enjoyable mode in the game is multiplayer mode; you can play up to four players co-operatively. So this means you don’t have to fight each other but play the regular campaign in its entirety, only there is no need to tell the other teammates where to go as they are controlled by your friends.

So really Conflict: Desert Storm is just a fairly well, thought out tactical shooter in terms of gameplay. It has lots of nice aspects in it, especially the multiplayer mode.

Sound:
The sound is great for the most part. Your team’s voiceovers are done quite well, they will sometimes whisper to each other or sometimes yell, depending on the situation. But when it comes to battles they are always yelling things that basically tell you what’s going on around you so you don’t have to keep checking all directions, which is nice when there is about 10 games attacking at once.

Hands down, the most annoying thing in the game are the voices in the tutorial mode. Your instructors have some of the most pestering voices you’ll hear in a video game for a long time, so much that you wish there were subtitles so you can hit the mute button.

The game is really done well in terms of sound effects. You can hear bullets whizzing by your head, every weapon has its own unique sound, explosions sound nice and full, and the list can go on. Definitely enjoyable stuff.

The music is not bad as well, it gives the game a nice atmosphere. But even so, you won’t be focused on the music as much as the sound effects because we all know how much we love hearing things blow up!

Longevity:
There are quite a number of missions in the game to complete, and having the difficulty jumping around a bit, while being annoying to some, will make you play this game longer as its more of a challenge.

You also can save only two times per level, which means you can’t just save after you go around every corner, so if you die you won’t be too far behind. You have to decide where and when to save it so that if you die you won’t have to go back to the very start, but if you forget to save or save too early…well you’ll have to play quite a bit over again.

Once everything is said and done though, there isn’t tons to come back to. Sure, the multiplayer mode adds a nice replay value to the game, where you can just pick it up and start playing with some friends. But since it’s the exact same as the regular campaign mode, some might get bored with it as they already finished the levels. And plus with all of the big name stealth shooters coming out really soon, you will most likely spend more time with those than coming back to this one after it’s completed.

Overall:
Conflict: Desert Storm is a great diversion and definitely gives you a good feel of a war/tactical shooter. Unfortunately, as I already said, it will probably be overlooked quite a bit since other (and more anticipated) ones will be here real soon.

Nonetheless, I would definitely recommend this to any fan of strategic shooting games. You should at least consider giving it a rental to try it out, it will definitely quench your thirst until Ghost Recon and Brute Force.

- Josh McConnell

Graphics – 7.0
Average for the most part, nice character animations though.

Controls – 8.0
Takes a bit to get the full grasp, but once you do get the hang of things you’ll find the controls fairly enjoyable

Gameplay – 8.5
Really fun squad-based action, only a few small issues with things such as difficulty levels.

Sound – 9.0
Great sound effects and music. Your teammates’ voiceovers are nice, but the trainers in tutorial mode need serious help.

Longevity – 7.5
Having a fair amount of missions to complete and the multiplayer mode is nice, but things may get boring for some in multiplayer since it’s the exact same missions as the regular campaign mode.

Overall – 8.0
A great game to say the least, fans of the third person shooter genre should definitely consider checking it out.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 11/01/02, Updated 11/01/02