Freedom Force VS The Third Reich provides that same great Freedom Force feeling, but that's also its downfall.
For those of you who don’t know Freedom Force Vs. The Third Reich
developed by Irrational Games is an RPG where you control up to four
heroes and perform various super hero missions. The game is very simple and you can probably learn the controls of the game quickly if you’ve ever played an RPG. The controls are basically selecting your hero and clicking where you want him or her to move or attack. You can also opposite click to bring up a menu allowing for a few more options, such as if you’re hero can fly you can choose the “fly to” option from the menu. As you complete missions you can level up your heroes like any other RPG.
Freedom Force had a great story and this game is no different. In this game you’re forced to recover Time Master, a powerful being who can control time itself who you defeated at the end of the last game, who has been taken from stasis. Once you recover Time Master you soon find that he’s been taken again only to be used to help the Nazis of World War Two win the war. This means that you have to travel back into time to stop the fiend who stole Time Master. It’s a pretty ridiculous story, but its load of fun and can be quite funny. Part of the reason why the game is so funny is because of the hilarious voice acting. It’s meant to be that campy 50’s comic style and many of the characters had me laughing.
A really cool thing about the game is that as you complete missions you gain prestige, and with this prestige you can use it to buy heroes while playing through the campaign. The game offers a number of pre-made heroes you can purchase, some from the previous game and some brand new, but the best use of this prestige is to create your own hero and recruit him to your team. There’s a great mod community out there with hundreds of skins ranging from the Marvel and DC universes, to custom created heroes. This really allows you to create any kind of hero you want.
Unfortunately, Freedom Force VS. The Third Reich features some problems. The first problem is that the A.I. of your team mates and your enemies can be often quite stupid. Sometimes I’d be attacking an enemy from an enemy and they would just pace back and forth, or sometimes my heroes would be taking damage and they would just stand there and not fight back. Another problem I have with the game is that the game’s graphics really haven’t changed since the first game which came out three years ago. It would have been nice if they at least tried to put new textures in or something but it seems that they used the exact same textures from the first game. Although the game does add some lighting effects it still seems to look the same as the original. My biggest problem with the game is that it doesn’t do anything different from the first game. It plays, looks, and feels the exact same way as the first game. There’s nothing added outside of a few powers and heroes.
Freedom Force VS. The Third Reich is a pretty good game. It provides the same feel as the first game, which is a good thing and a bad thing. If you were a fan of the original game I’d say it’s worth picking up, but for those who haven’t had a chance to play the first one I’d suggest picking that one up first.