An Unstoppable Flood
As the song says, pardon me while I burst… into discussion. Or whatever.
I spent some time this weekend holed up in shower-less squallor as the rank stench of geek wafted ’round the apartment. My wife was spared only by her hasty retreat into lands untold with aspirations of “fixing” her “hair” into some complex structure of waves and flow which my mind could neither comprehend nor even process into appropriate visual imagery. The corrent response to such stimuli, I have learned, is: “It looks very nice, honey.” Venturing far beyond the script leads only to heartache and, should your other of significance be the type, possibly physical aching as well.
The aspiration of the stench-wallowing was a day of co-operative XBox Live play with one Doctor of Macintoshology in the latest chapter of our previously conquered Full Spectrum Warrior, in this case mysteriously titled Ten Hammers. I certainly didn’t see any hammer power-ups or collectible items, much less ten of them, but then again our progress in the game was—I’m being careful with my words here—limited.
Ten Hammers’ is very much like the first Full Spectrum Warrior: You have a fire squad of four soldiers called Alpha Squadron, whom to pass orders to and with appropriate realism they carry them out. Move here, set up a fire zone over there, suppress the enemy behind that car, toss a grenade into this vicinity, and so on. In the single-player mode you get a second team (wait for it: “Bravo”) which you control to try and outflank opponents or bail the other team(s) out of trouble. The minor enhancements of Ten Hammers are welcome, especially the ability to use Riflemen and Team Leaders to target enemies behind light cover with a sort of “aim and fire” order which sometimes prevents having to execute flanking maneuvers.
Still, the best part of FSW was the co-op, by far. The game was only so-so except that in this age of woefully lacking co-op gaming it was very welcome to be able to complete the entire game with one player acting as Alpha Squad and the other issuing orders (I hesitate to use the word “control”) to Bravo. And while there were quibbles to be made, for the most part it was an enjoyable experience. Far more enjoyable than, say, wading through the flood of ignoramuses packing the Halo 2 servers.
So we (Dr. Mac and I) greeted the arrival of Ten Hammers with a sort of contented sadness: Would that other games allowed such co-operative fun, but at least we could take advantage where it was offered.
It is for that false sense of happy expectation and misguided faith put in a franchise we had successfully gambled on in the past which raised our hopes only to squash them like one might a particularly repulsive insect that I curse the names of Pandemic and THQ.
In truth there is very little difference between what was available in FSW and Ten Hammers’ offerings. Many people have pointed to the versus mode in Ten Hammers as a welcome addition. Fine. Compete as you might with your cursing ten-year old opponents and your team killers and what not. My threshold for such tomfoolery has been met for this gaming generation/cycle and I will not be swayed. There is no multiplayer joy for me to have when facing Dr. Mac in versus battles where our amused banter falls on the apathetic ears of our collective pets, lounging in nap-time at our respective feet since the voice chat feature of Live works only on a teammate basis for most games. No, I come to share the experience and work through loss and victory together rather than revel in it at a friend’s expense.
What does differ is that levels available in co-operative mode are “unlocked” via completion in single-player mode. Which means that at least one of us (Dr. Mac or myself) needed to play the level solo and then we could host the co-op game with that particular mission. And the interface to access this is less than friendly to boot. Still, quibbling again. The concern for poor UI design is storied in video games and computerized entertainment. If it is simply unable to be cracked as by an ill-prepared theif versus a state-of-the-art safe, you move on. We managed to muddle through and execute the game start. What we found there was the real showstopper.
As you play through the levels in single-player mode, you reach various locations where the medical truck moves up to your current position or you clear out enough real estate behind you that the game notes significant progress has been made and auto-saves from that spot so that new and unexpected enounters just up ahead don’t grind you into needless frustration by sending you back to before you had achieved a modicum of victory; rather you start from that very spot and try until you reach the next checkpoint. This, as far as my gaming experience (it is considerable—belie’ dat) has shown is standard operating procedure. To be perfectly lucid: This was the way it was with the original Full Spectrum Warrior. Even in co-op, as you moved from one insurgent-infested location to a point of relative calm you were saved from having to repeat, ad infinitum, past victories/defeats.
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