I have always been a fan of this series dating back to it's debut on the PC. Now they take the series to the console for the first time so this was an easy purchase for me. Overall the transition to the console was not a bad thing but, there was just something missing from to what I expected after playing the PC games. The series has always been popular more for the online aspect than any of the single player campaigns and they pretty much holds true here as well. Still, even though they fall short at making a breakthrough game for the console, it is a worthy pickup and stays true enough to what is expected from a
Battlefield game.
Story: The story is based around the Soviet state of Kazakhstan where there is an uneasy state of war beginning from terrorists. The U.S. is leading a UN force to quell the situation. However, this does sit all to well with the Chinese as they are not sure about the show of force. So, in turn, they send their own forces to protect their own interests. What is a little unique about this is, you will be switching between the US and the Chinese forces as you play through the mission based single player campaign. There are 20 missions in all and you will receive media broadcasts from both sides reviewing your last mission as you play through. Of course, both sides will not being saying the same thing on what actually happened so you get a little feel about the propaganda of war. You will have different types of missions as you play from flat out assault, defending certain areas, or even just recon. All of the missions don't take to long or are to short to play through which keeps to game going at a good pace. Once you finish a mission you will be given a rating system of your performance. This includes how fast you did the mission, your shooting accuracy, your point total, how many soldiers were lost in battle, and more. You are given stars depending on how you did in each sections pre-determined goal. These stars affect what rank you are and as you play more missions you will go up in rank. The higher your rank the better your equipment will be going into the next battle. There are a lot of other ways to gain stars as you play. For example, destroying certain things if you come across them on the battlefield or using a certain weapon with good efficiency will gain you some extras stars speeding you up in rank. This rank system is well done and is what encourages you to re-play missions trying to better than your best performances to gain more stars. In all, the story keeps you interested and being able to play two different sides to the conflict helps everything stay fresh.
Game play/Controls: The game play at it's core does not vary to much from most other first-person shooters. There are some nice inventive ideas that come with it though. In all you will run around with your other troops taking over and defending different areas of the map. Each soldier type has their own unique feel to them and can perform certain tasks others can't. Depending what type of soldier you are, you will have four different weapon/tasks options to choose from. For example, as a rifleman you have your assault rife, you can switch to the built in grenade launcher on the gun, or you can choose to just throw your grenades. Or as an engineer you will have a shotgun, bazooka, or you can perform a task that repairs vehicles. Each soldier has their place on the battlefield and can be used at different times to make the battle more efficient. Controlling your foot soldier is easy and the camera doesn't cause many problems with aiming. You can adjust the sensitivity of your of the controlling if you feel the aiming is to tight or loose. Besides being able to be different soldiers you can also drive quite a few different types of vehicles. This ranges from tanks, jeeps, to even assault helicopters. These are used quite a bit throughout the game and certain missions they are a must. Although these vehicles adds a lot of fun to the game play they are also a little tough to maneuver. It is really hard to get the same feel from a controller as you can with a PC using the mouse and hey-pad. They did a good job at trying but, controlling these vehicles are a bit "clunky" and can get you in trouble in tight situations. They are still a welcome part of the game and adds different gaming experiences even if you play a mission over and over again.
There are a couple of unique game play features that this game has to offer. The first one, and the best one, is the "Hot Swap" feature. This gives you the ability to change between soldiers on the fly. As your playing a mission you have can swap to any solider you have a clear line of sight of and take over that soldier with just a push of a button. This gives you a lot of control and has different uses. You can swap to another soldier in the middle of "hot spot" that needs attention if you are a long distance away saving you a lot of run time is one use, or you can change soldier types on the fly depending on the situation. For example, if you are using an assault troop and all of a sudden a tank shows up in front of you, you can quickly look for an engineer troop, "Hot Swap" to him, change to his bazooka, and take out the tank. This can also be used to quickly get inside vehicles as well. If you have a soldier operating a vehicle you can "Hot Swap" to him and you will be instantly inside that vehicle controlling it. Since each soldier on your side has a symbol on top of their head showing what kind of troop they are, there is no trouble with finding the right soldier for the job. This is my favorite feature of the game and truly adds a lot of fun and also keeps the game play flowing at a nice pace. Another feature that is different but, adds some arcade feel to the game is quick awards your soldiers can earn as you play through a mission. If you go on a quick killing spree with your soldier you can earn "pump-ups" for him. These include faster fire rate, faster re-load times, more health, and more. Even if you "Hot Swap" from a soldier that has some pump-ups to another and then later you come back to the first one, his pump-ups will still be on him. This has more of an arcade feel but, it does not make your soldier super human. It will help but, I never got the feeling that these pump-ups changed the total outcome of a mission. These features are well put together and help the overall game play. The "Hot Swap" feature is extremely fun to use and once you get it down you be flying over the battlefield in no time.
The only real complaint I have with the game play, which is kind of a big one, is the over all feel of the single-player mode. What I mean by this is, the spawning system of enemy troops feels like your online even when your playing single-player. You will quickly notice enemies spawning all over the place. For example, if you are clearing out an area and take out everyone to the right, then quickly look left to take on that side, you maybe start getting shot from behind as the enemy has spawned in the area you just took out. So, if you move to the area that you cleared thinking it's safe, it may not be safe for very long as the enemy may spawn on top of you. This can be expected playing online but, not found often in a single-player campaign. This is not something that can't be played through and you will find yourself getting used to it. You will quickly learn to make sure it's safe before venturing into an area you think is cleared just to make sure. If you play a mission more than once you will start to notice the spawning pattern and it won't be such of a surprise the next time.
The AI in the game is a nice surprise and is well done. This is a good thing considering there is no difficulty levels to adjust in the game. Your allied soldiers will fight well enough besides you to be affective. If they see an unmanned M-60 in a bunker they will jump on it and use it. I even found myself, once in a while, complain as I had a guy in my sites and a computer ally would takes him down robbing me of my kill. This works both ways as the enemy soldiers are smart enough as well and are not mindless drones running around. They will snipe pretty well, go after your vehicles with prejudice, and use some strategy in their assaults. For experienced players you will probably not have to much trouble getting through most of the missions but, getting a really high rating can be tough to do in the later missions. In all, the game play and controls are well done enough to keep the game flowing at a good pace and with some new tweaks the game has to offer it has enough to offer for a worthy console first-person shooter.
Graphics: The graphics overall are above average for the PS2 and everything looks decent enough. Still, nothing really stands out at you and has a "wow" feeling. The vehicles look good enough but, a little square and the soldiers running around with you look pretty good. I did like the way the helicopters looked and the size variation of the different vehicles. When you are standing, or running, along side of a tank or a jeep the ratio of size to you is right on. My biggest complaint is the different environments. Everything around you look just average and nothing really stands out. The color schemes of the different maps are rather "blah" and never really get interesting at all. The grass looks poor and if you crouch down to make yourself harder to see it looks flat out horrible. The buildings themselves are OK but, pretty flat, and most of the buildings you can't enter the doors. If you are allowed entry to a building they are completely bare and very cramped. Still, the graphics are true enough for what the game is and where it takes place. It just feels as if they made everything look good enough but, never put any real effort to it.
Sound: The basic sounds are all there throughout the game when it comes to the different weapons gunfire and explosions. However, the sound effects are just a little weak and average. The explosions don't jar you back by any means and the gunfire doesn't help set a tone of warfare. Even stray gunfire hitting obstacles around you has more of a "swoosh" sound then hearing bullets ripping into walls or vehicles around you. The vehicles sound pretty good and the gunfire of tanks and the different vehicle weapons are better than your soldiers but, still just lack the "bang" you would expect. The best part of the sound is the constant radio chatter you hear as you are playing your missions (or even online). They are constantly updating your mission and keeping you informed of what is happening around you and elsewhere. This does give you a feel of being in the middle of a war zone and the information giving in these broadcasts are helpful. There just isn't anything that stands out in anyway. If you have a headset then everything is brought to life a little better but, it just could have been so much better. Also, there isn't really any music to speak of. Besides the menu screens, there is no other music inside the game. The music itself is not bad at all and has an action theme to it when it does play. In all, I would just say the sound is average and disappointing as you would expect a game like
Battlefield to be so much better and to have put more effort into it.
Online: You very well may find yourself playing here more than playing the single player campaign mode. The game supports up to 24 players at a time in one match but, only two modes to play. You have the conquest mode, which is what made this series so popular, and a capture the flag mode. The maps are not to very large so there is always action to be found in a short distance. Some may feel a little cramped if there are 24 players playing but, I liked the maps being a little smaller because of just the pure action. There is enough variety in the different maps to keep it interesting for a long time and online supports all of the vehicles and different types of soldiers found in the campaign mode. There is a ranking system and some stats that are kept track of like a kill ratio and different achievements you can be awarded for as you play. The
Battlefield games have always been great to play online and this game is no different. There are still quite a few playing online still as the date of this review.
Replay Value: The replay value of the game will vary on the individual playing. Die hard fans of the game will probably find themselves going back and replaying missions to try and get better rankings to unlock better equipment. Some who just liked the game for what it is may not find themselves putting it back in to often. My only real complaint is, there is no "quick play" mode or anything of that nature. Your only option is to replay each mission of your choosing. At least you can replay all 20 missions in the game. I would have liked to have an option to just put the game in, choose a side to fight on, pick a map, and "get it on". If there was some sort of game type like the multi-player mode (controlling hot spots) then the games replay value would have been so much better. I do find myself putting the game in from time to time mostly to play online. I would be putting it in much more often if I could just sit down for some quick skirmishes and mayhem.
Final Thought: Battlefield Modern Combat is a solid first-person shooter and has made a solid transition to the consoles but, does has some flaws. I do recommend this game to anyone over the age of 13 that enjoys a war time atmosphere in their shooter style games. If you have played other games in this series then you shouldn't be disappointed. You will probably end up like me wanting more from the game but, the game deliverers enough to keep it interesting and makes it worthy play through. Some of the game may have a more arcade feel to it when it comes to the pump-ups of your soldiers as you play or the ranking system but, if you like these options you should really like this game. The online feature is really where the game stands out and is where you probably find yourself most of the time if you have online access on your console.
Thank you for reading and if you have any questions about this game feel free to ask.
Here are some related "Shooter" style game reviews if you are interested in reading them: Star Wars "Battlefront II" James Bond "From Russia With Love" Metal Gear Solid Swat 3 Close Quarters Combat Rainbow Six "Rogue Spear" Rainbow Six "Covert Ops" My Ratings: Story 4/5
Game Play: 4/5
Controls 4/5
Graphics: 3.5/5
Sound: 3/5
Learning Curve: 15min
Replay Value: 3.5/5
Online Mode 4.5/5
Overall Rating: 4/5
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Genre: First-Person Shooter
ESRB Teen
Game Specs Players: 1
Online Play Yes, up to 24 players at once.
