Tribes 2
January 22, 2002
It seemed to come out of nowhere to become the leading squad-based first-person shooter. The following Starsiege Tribes developed was proof enough that a well-made team game was something a lot of gamers wanted. It had no appreciable off-line play, offering mainly a great game of capture the flag, although it did have a few other modes on offer. After more than two years, the game has remained essentially peerless, despite the release of FPS titles which featured more team play and online elements than ever before. With the release of Tribes 2, which drops the Starsiege name, the original can finally finally pass the torch. Read more
Star Trek Star Fleet Command 2
January 22, 2002
It is an awkward task for programmers to turn popular board games, such as Star Fleet Battles, into a PC game that is consistent with the original. Starfleet Command II manages to create an excellent game while maintaining the unique qualities of the old table top system. The game uses many components of the first PC game but adds some noteworthy features, such as new races (the Mirak/Kzinti and the Interstellar Concordium) and a campaign. The game has higher requirements, and a typical install of about 1 gig (aauugh). The graphics are improved and SFC2 does feature an excellent multi-player option. I recommended installing the latest patch immediately to eliminate bugs from their Christmas rush release. One major problem I uncovered, was the longer you play a campaign, the slower the campaign gets. I wrote Interplay about this issue and was reassured it would be fixed shortly. As of this writing, no new patch as been released and the campaign turns are becoming prohibitively slow. All bugs aside, the campaign system is good, combining multiplayers (the Dynaverse), freedom and storyline. Read more
Advance Wars
January 22, 2002
Advance Wars is one of those games that you’ll just pass by in the display case, because it lacks a brand name or fancy packaging. But Advance Wars is one of the most engrossing and lengthy titles for Game Boy Advance yet. This game is packed with so much to do, you’d be hard pressed to finish this game anytime soon, especially with replay-value modes such as the various multiplayer options and the map creator. Even if you’re not a strategy fan, AW is designed for gamers of all ages with different tastes. Read more
Tropico
January 21, 2002
Tropico quite simply is a city building strategy game. The hook is that you take over as the new Presidente of a small Caribbean island. Sounds pretty boring when you say it out loud. So maybe I should say it again. Read more
Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2
January 21, 2002
Wish you could bust a 720 Roastbeef to Varial Heelflip all in one move with your skateboard? I did too, until I picked up Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 off the shelf at my local computer store. Following up the greatest skateboarding game ever, Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 is bound to keep you on the edge of your seat. The graphics are a huge improvement over Tony Hawk Pro Skater part 1, Neversoft seemed to have put more work into graphics for this game, and it seems to have paid off. The Tony Hawk series still proves to be the greatest skateboarding series ever. Again I can’t help but stress the graphics, they are great! When you look at the faces of the skaters they look like the real people, and the movements are very realistic. Read more
Star Wars Galatic Battlegrounds
January 21, 2002
It’s funny that one of few Star Wars games out there has to be a re-done version of Age of Empires 2. Is that a bad thing? Not really. AoE2 was a great game and lends itself to the SW universe rather well. I’m a big fan of Star Wars, but I almost think that Galactic Battlegrounds should have been released as an expansion pack for AoE2.
Instead of different cultures, SW:GB is broken down into the six primary factions that play a major part in the current movies. You can pick the Empire, Rebellion, Wookies, Gungans, Naboo, or the Trade Federation. (Funny how the newest movie got 3 civilizations.) With the lower number of civs to worry about, each of them now has a single-player campaign at least, which was a big beef that I had with AoE2. Instead of having some civilizations with identical troops, each civ has its own graphics set for each unit. The Wookie and Gungan basic trooper look totally unique to each other.
Sure, there are some significant changes to the game, like the inclusion of air units, but it is still easy enough to see where units have simply been translated over. Scouts have become speeder bikes, siege units are artillery, castles are fortresses, trebuchets are cannons, and monks have become Jedi or their counterparts the Sith. Some of the units are fairly cut-and-dry conversions, but others like the monks/Jedi/Sith are a whole other matter. Force-wielders can convert units like monks, but you have to hit ?ÄòC’ for it to work. The default function for them when you right click something is to whip out their lightsaber and start whittling. They aren’t slow wusses like their monk brothers. When you have them fully upgraded, they book across the screen and seem to absorb massive damage from most units without flinching ?Äì they are weak against bounty hunters. The one ability that they did lose was healing, for which you have to create a medic droid from your Command Center (Town Center). Oddly enough, the droid medics can’t heal each other since they are robotic, so you need a worker droid (R2D2 for the Rebels) to follow them around and keep them healed.
On to some of the cooler changes. Sheep and turkeys have become banthas and nerfs, but (and this is a big but) you can now build an animal nursery and garrison them inside, generating so much food per game minute. Two nurseries with 10 banthas each gave me more food than I could ever hope to spend. Buildings have to be juiced by power cores or they only work at 1/4 their normal efficiency. I converted one of the computer’s air bases with my Jedi Master, then tried to pump out a few X-wings but discovered that their production crept worse than trying to play Tribes2 on a 486. Makes it a bit harder to scout out the enemy early and build a barracks in their backdoor. It seems to be possible to leech off of an enemies power core, so it’s still possible to find a backdoor.
Air units make it a pain to defend your base until you get some anti-air turrets into place. Now you have to worry about attacks from three fronts instead of just two. They don’t have a lot of life, though most civs can add shields to them. It might seem like it would be easy to smack your friendly neighborhood enemy with an air rush, but run into a few upgraded anti-air turrets and your flyboys turn into pretty fireworks.
Graphically, the game looks good with all the animated features on the buildings that AoE2 sported. If a building is outside of the range of a power core, it has beacon lights on it that flash red and turn green once the power is turned back on. The Wookies look a bit odd to me, but thinking back Chewie was a fairly odd guy anyway (hopefully he won’t mistake me for a droid and try to rip my arm off for that). The sounds really stand out. Everything sounds as if it was ripped straight from the movie. Some of the taunts sound a bit odd, but they are so close to the real thing that it’s hard to decide if they are the originals or not. Speederbikes howl like they did in the forests of Endor (luckily I haven’t seen any ewoks yet), and Jedi ignite their lightsabers as they go into battle.
You might have noticed that I compared Galactic Battlegrounds to AoE2 a few times, but it’s hard not to. If you never played AoE2 but are a diehard Star Wars fan, you are in for a treat. Even if you played the other game, this one still has enough differences to make it a blast. Playing through the single-player scenarios will unlock bonus missions that recreate battles from the movies. The one thing that seems to be missing though is Bobba Fett, but I’ve got a hunch that he’ll show up in an expansion pack for the game around the time that the next movie is released. Just remember: The Force will be with you always!
Star Trek Voyager Elite Force
January 21, 2002
Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force brings a refreshing new approach to a genre of clich?©s and overused concepts. It fuses the concepts of FPS action and story-driven game play together to create unique in many ways. Read more
Star Trek Star Fleet Command 2
January 21, 2002
The successful and unique Starfleet Command released in 1999 offered many trek fans a chance to get dirty fighting in those epic battles they have seen in the show. Unlike some other uses of Star Trek licenses, a very through job on the original game. At first glance, this game looks to be the same as its predecessor. However, after a few hours with it you will see the improvements and changes that have been added could be appreciated. Read more
Star Trek Star Fleet Command 2
January 21, 2002
Starfleet Command Volume II Empires at War is a new real-time space combat game from Interplay. Whether or not you like the game really comes down to what you are looking for. If you want a complex starship combat simulator, this is a good game for you. If you want a strategy game with a driving story, look elsewhere. Starfleet Command 2 has eight playable races, two of the races, the aggressively pacifistic ISC, and the missile happy Mirak, are new to the series. Each race has a different combat strategy, ship design, and some even have unique technologies. Starfleet Command 2 has two one-player modes, single battle skirmishes, and campaigns. The game also offers a free online gaming zone where either mode can be used for multi-player battles. Read more
SimGolf
January 21, 2002
So you want to build a golf course, eh? SimGolf will give you everything you’ll need to do exactly that. You’ll also get to customize every aspect of your course as you try to build the ultimate golfing resort in the world. It’s laughably easy to get started and fiendishly difficult to accomplish your goal. But is it yet another masterpiece from a certain gaming god? Read more