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Categories: Review
Tags: fps, frontlines, xbox 360
Frontlines: Fuel of Wars
Developer: Kaos Studios
Publisher: THQ
Platform: Xbox 360
Released: Feb. 25, 2008Frontlines is set in 2024 — a bleak future where oil is scarce and the last remaining wells are a source of global conflict. Food riots, blackouts, and rampant disease are now part of the American experience. Players, however, are far from America. Frontlines follows the Stray Dogs’ (the Western Coalition 125th Combined Arms Strike Force) fight against Red Star forces from Afghanistan into the heart of Russia. Which is part of Frontlines’ problem.
For all its “ripped from the headlines” story, Frontlines is the same old Red vs Blue, with Red being a Sino-Russian alliance and Blue, a joint American-British coalition. In an oil scarce world, Kaos could have drastically reshaped the look of warfare, but oil-hungry tanks, helicopters, drones and armored four-wheelers populate the landscape. The story, conveyed in cutscenes by an embedded journalist, explains that all the oil is going to the war effort — the end result being an elaborate back-story which merely serves to explain why the West is at war with the East.
In the single-player campaign (a short 7 missions), players assume the role of one of the Stray Dogs — an anonymous character who doesn’t have any dialogue. Each mission revolves around capturing and holding checkpoints, in other words advancing the frontline of Western Coalition controlled territory. In addition to holding checkpoints, players will also have to destroy specific military targets: like taking down a Red Star tank factory or placing bombs on AA guns.
While other Western Coalition forces are around, the lion’s share of the work falls on the player’s shoulders. Capturing a checkpoint often involves taking on Red Star forces single-handedly and suddenly — when the checkpoint is taken — Western Coalition forces appear while Red Star forces retreat. In terms of gameplay, you’re advancing the frontline, but population density of WC and Red Star forces almost seems morale-based.
Western Coalition forces are well-armed having every weapon you’d expect to see in a modern war game and players can also jump into vehicles — assaulting Red Star forces from the safety of an unwieldy tank or reigning down fire from a helicopter. You cannot lift weapons from the dead, but there are plenty of pick-ups along the way and running out of ammo was never an issue for me.
What was an issue is the effectiveness of said weapons. Frontlines carries a Teen-rating, so I expected bloodless combat, but I was surprised at the lack of locational damage. If I have the crosshair of a sniper rifle trained on someone’s head, there’s only one thing I expect when I pull the trigger — and it isn’t them running for cover after taking a headshot. It’s utterly amazing how bullet absorbent Red Star forces are.
Frontlines’ single-player campaign isn’t terrible, it just seems out of place in a Call of Duty 4 world. If you die, you have limited “redeployments” which means you respawn a few hundred yards behind where you died. There’s no sense of coordination, either between WC or Red Star forces — it feels like a bunch of people doing their own thing while shooting at the other side. In other words, the single-player campaign feels like a warm-up for multiplayer.
Frontlines has one multiplayer mode: Frontlines. But with a wide array of maps and support for 32 players, this is more than enough. Multiplayer splits players into the Red vs Blue teams, with players picking classes before launching (or respawning). Classes include typical heavy gunners and snipers, but are keyed into roles. Need to take down a helicopter or focus on ground units? Want to send in the drones or disrupt the enemy with EMPs?
If Frontlines has one major problem it’s that it isn’t a AAA title in a genre full of AAA titles. At every level: gameplay, story, sound, and graphics, Frontlines is servicable. But is that enough? Maybe to warrant a rental.
Silvercube:
Now that’s what I call a good review :)
You say how long the game is, say what it’s flaws are, and even have a little “family-friendly” moment there.
good job!
Terry:
Thanks!