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Game Title: WWII: Soldier
Platform: PlayStation 2
Developer: Atomic Planet Entertainment Ltd
Publisher: Midas Interactive Entertainment
Genre: First Person Shooter
Age Rating: PEGI: 16+
Release Date: 11th November 2005 (EU), 29th February 2012 (PSN)
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Game Score: 1.1/10
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Summery:
WWII: Soldier is one flat out unfinished World War II themed shooter that must be avoided.
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It's obvious that Medal of Honor and Call of duty had helped popularise the World War II FPS genre so it would be no surprise that different developers would try their luck with their own WWII game even Midas Interactive. This company which published a handful a different World War II titles with different companies at a budget price, one of those is WWII: Soldier on the PlayStation 2. WWII: Soldier is possibly if not one of the worst FPS games and possibly one of the worst PlayStation 2 games of all time, how is that possible anyone asks, well this review is about to explain all the necessary reasons .
The gameplay is simply what it is a World War II First Person Shooter that carries so many serious problems. How about the fact that the first 3 stages of the game are stealth based meaning that you must avoid enemy contact as possible or else they raise the alarm ending your game. Whenever you fail a stage it's back to the title and you have to reload your previous save to try again, but get this the designers have the nerve to put a restart mission option on the pause screen. Why couldn't they have this option for whenever you get a game over that would be so helpful?
The Stealth portions themselves are very badly designed, firstly is the AI inwhich is where they are at their worst. Whenever you need to knock them out with a melee attack they can immediately turn to face you and sometimes that is more then enough for them to raise the alarm and kill of the entire progress you made in the level. For the first two missions this may not be an issue because if you are fast enough you can dispatch them before they manage to notice. Also when taking out some of the enemies with the Silent Pistol the enemies are brain dead cause they don't seem to notice that their own allies got shot and will stand in the open and not even notice you behind a tank.
The game's third stage is the worst stealth stage because not only you are not allowed to shoot anyone or else the alarm is raised but the enemy AI seems to be able to see you from far away which is just atrocious. But what's ridiculous is that the third mission can be beaten without completing the objective, yes I swear it's true. In the mission you are supposed to find an enemy officer and then knock him out to steal his uniform so that you can get into the cable car undetected, however I have found out that you can just ignore the officer's uniform and go straight for the cable car and complete the level.
Adding insult to injury is the fourth stage in which you're finally done with the terrible stealth levels and you can actually fight back but let me tell you Stage 4 is the worst designed stage of the entire game because of one major thing, you can beat the stage without any challenge what-so-ever. I say this because the enemies waste all their bullets at the cable itself rather then you, there is no penalties for not even shooting back at any of the enemies because all you do in the stage is just crouch on a and then the mission will end eventually, this is because it is rare that the enemies will even hit you while you're crouched. Its bad design like this that make you question if the developers were even trying when this made this game and it really does show.
When you get to Stage 5 you would hope that the game's shooting mechanics would be handled better then stealth but you would be sadly mistaken. The shooting in the game is terrible, the aiming is very floaty and less responsive and that can make headshots very difficult to do even when the enemies are standing still, needless to say it doesn't work well like in other PS2 shooters like Red Faction or Timesplitters. During combat where you will be firing weapons at your enemies to progress about 90% of the time you will end up spraying bullets all over the place rather then actually hitting your enemies and that is one of the game's major problems and that can get you killed. If you end up with a group of enemies then your best bet is to peek from around corners and take potshots at them and that is cheap because they don't react in any situation to that. The enemies do not come after you, don't use cover and just fell happy to stand out in the open. You do have different weapons from the WWII era like the Ludger, MP40s and Kar98 rifles and of course the Silent Pistol which is what you use during the stealth missions, but the arsenal is very limited. You can use Grenades as well as dual wielding with the pistols but honestly there doesn't seem to be any reason why you would want to bother with that. Trying to use weapons is already a chore enough with the aforementioned floaty aiming controls but it is also a pain to try to use burst fire with the MP40 due to the delay on pressing the fire again for another shot and also the way that the enemies fire their pistols and rifles is very unrealistic, considering that their weapons seem to be set to rapid fire.
On Stage 5 you must rescue your general from enemy soldiers and when you do his AI is about as bad as the enemies. He stands around waiting to get shot and also fires his weapon in a unrealistic way. On Stages 6 and 7 which are the last stages of the game the general will end up getting himself killed which will cause you to fail and restart the stage and there doesn't seem to be any indication of either you or the general actually dying, all that happens is that if you or the general take too many hits the game is over with no death animation which is bound to make the final stages really aggravating. For all I know is that the last remaining levels can only be beaten by luck if anything.
Too say the least for a 2005 released PlayStation 2 game WWII: Soldier looks very sub par, looking like a game that was made for the Dreamcast. The snow effects are dull, character and weapons models look shallow and infact almost PS1 quality and the explosion effects look really weak. The music track doesn't have anything worth relistening too, the guns sound like pops and bangs instead of actual gun sounds and there's no voice acting aside from grants and screams which all sound horrible. The game is full with bugs and glitches like falling through the world, the general moves without even showing any animation, there is also frame rate drops and lastly game crashes which does show that the designers were just being downright lazy.
Look all I have to say is that the gameplay of WWII: Soldier is abysmal and it is just no excuse as to how the game was released in an unfinished state. The game ultimately has no redeeming quality and features. There are only seven levels in which the instruction manual points out. The game looks like something that was made for the Dreamcast, stealth missions are badly designed, the controls are bad, AI is atrocious. The game suffers from bugs and glitches, Stage 4 can be beaten just by crouching and not doing anything and to top it all the game only has 7 very shorts stages. The game is very short but it is very hard for all the problems that the game throws at you which is the main thing that extends the gameplay. It's hard to believe that this game even exists on the PlayStation Network Store under the PlayStation 2 Classics range, even then I strongly advice against downloading this game and nether should you ever purchase a physical copy. It's a World War II shooter that must be avoided at all costs as it is an unfinished, uninspired and completely horrendous excuse of a game that either it was designed by people who didn't know what they were doing or maybe it must have been designed by Adolf Hitler himself.
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The Bad Points:
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Sub par graphics and sound
Badly designed stealth missions
Terrible aiming controls
Loads of bugs and glitches
Atrocious AI programming
Only 7 short levels
Level 4 can be beaten just by crouching
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Reviewed by: Anthony Hayball (AQWBlaZer91)
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