A great tactical shooter
You start the game as a lowly sergeant sent to lead a squad hard as nails SWAT members who slowly learn to respect you. The single player missions are interestingly done as each room is loaded with detail since the game is based on room to room and patience instead of run n' gun. Your given a complex but easy to use command interface in which you tell your surprisingly smart AI squadmates to do something. That said the enemy AI is also pretty smart and very unpredicatable. The graphics for the game are still superb. Still loaded with detail 3 years later. Each room is given loads of detail from the table and chair to the coffee cup and magazine at the counter. Bullet shells fly to the ground guns flash and lighting works well in the darker levels.
What's interesting about this game and very unique is the fact your best incapitating or forcing your suspects to surrender. Your given a surrender button in which you shout and your AI shouts for suspects to surrender. Depending on how well armed and equipped or how high there morale is(Morale factor is based on many things from how you entered the room,if you fired the gun, how many men are shouting, if his comrades are dead, if he has been gassed, if he has been shot etc.). It's a really complex but satisfying system. Instead of dishing out loads of lethal bullets you can use pepperballs to gas your opponents or tazer them to surrender themself. Beware sometimes they may fake a surrender and run for it or start firing and killing you at a vulnerable place. The sounds in the game are great. Gun's sound realistic and satisfying. The chaos that ensues in a large gunfight with suspects with shouting and gun's discharging is climatic and gripping. Suspects give clever comments when you arrest them your AI is smart enough to evauluate situtations and give full reports. And the mission briefing sounds like a real police briefing.
That said the equipment and aresnal at your disposal is interesting. Youre giving non lethal weapons that shoot bean bags,blind your enemy , stun them momentarily, electrify, or gas your enemy. There is no runnning and gunnign here. No burst into a room full of suspects and plan to get out alive. You have to use optiwands and carefulyl plan your next move. From blocking doors to planting C4. What's interesting is no mission is ever the same no matter how many times you play it on the same map. The AI may move to different rooms so thinking you can be lazy and go into this room without people is a bad and deadly mistake.
The missions to say the least are great. The objectives are smart and they range from bomb diffusing to hostage rescuing to just bringing order to chaos. There are some story behind the crimes and they're somewhat linked. But most people may overlook that. You can also choose entry points to the area but in multiplayer co-op that's determined by which team your on. The replay factor here is that theres an accurate score counter that counts every shot you make every time you get hit your friends get hit your enemy get hit. That gives you an overall rank and percantage of how well you did. So if you Rambo and kill everyone that shoots you guess what you'll probably get 5% out of 100.
The game SHINES greatly at the multiplayer aspect. Team deathmatches or Barricaded suspects are extremely tactical. Camping usually works only the first time otherwise the opponents will flush you out with a grenade. You really have to leer around corners, jam doors, and stick with your team. Co-op also is great and the objectives are similar to the single player counterpart.The hard thing is that it's a bit difficult to formulate a plan as most people think differently. Usually a teamspeak or ventrilo server with everyone carrying mics help. If you want to you can also use text chat which'll take a while. You'll probably get angry at a teammate for opening the door when your using an optiwand and extremely vulnerable but theres also a quick voice chat and command menu(available to squad leaders only) that help a bit.
All that said the game is superb the best thing to tactical gaming. It's graphics may not be current gen but it's gameplay beats rainbow six and all those tom clancy games by a milestone which is no surprise since Sierra is a genius at all genre's in gaming