The PS1 Army Men: World War subseries always needs to have some sort of gimmick. With the first game, it was "You're not Sarge anymore! Now you're a random Green soldier!" With Land Sea Air, it was "You're a random Green soldier BUT WITH MORE VEHICLE MISSIONS!" With Final Front, it was "You're a random Green soldier with vehicle combat INCLUDING SUBMARINES!" Here with Team Assault, it's "You're a specific commando who isn't Sarge, and there's vehicle and submarine combat, but now there's TWO OF YOU!" Team Assault follows a team of Green soldiers on a mission that starts with their escape from a Tan POW camp and culminates in the infiltration and destruction of a Tan ballistic missile base. For each mission, you must pick two soldiers from your pool of six. Each of these soldiers have two skills and unique stats. Squirrel, for example, is my favorite and has the Sniper and Communications skills, so he can use radio equipment (required for some missions) and sniper rifles. He's also not very stealthy but has by far the fastest movement speed. I liked pairing him with is Tyke who is super slow, not stealthy at all, but has a ton of hit points and the Heavy Weapons and Linguistics skills meaning that he can use bazookas and mortars as well as Tan disguises. The mixing and matching of soldiers gives your strategy some real depth and variation. It does feel a bit clunky and obnoxious to have to switch between your two soldiers and move them independently, but you get used to it, and once you do, it's not so bad. Visuals and sound are overall on par with the previous World War games on PlayStation, but the gameplay and controls feel tighter here than in the previous entries. The auto-aim feature felt a lot more polished and a lot smoother, and that definitely helps mitigate some of the more frustrating aspects of combat in the previous games. It's not perfect - you'll still routinely shoot to the left of an enemy, then to the right, then back to the left, and THEN actually shoot him - but it's a huge step up. I thought World War was a pretty good length as it is, and I thought Land Sea Air was too long given how brutally difficult it is, but with Team Assault, I actually found myself wishing there were more there. The game consists of 16 missions, and even with dying and restarting, it took me under three hours to clear. Army Men: World War - Team Assault is, in my opinion, the best of the four World War subseries games on Playstation. Honestly, the only thing keeping me from scoring it higher is the lack of friendly AI for the soldier you're not controlling; they'll fire at the enemy if they come close enough, but otherwise, they just stand there. It would have been nice for them to follow you and shoot at enemies you come across instead of standing still wherever you left them. On the one hand, that does let you strategize a bit by leaving a sniper on a high elevation position to provide overwatch, but that's mitigated by the fact that you then have to switch back and walk them all the way to wherever you got with the other soldier as well as the fact that what AI the ally soldier does have isn't good enough to provide any truly effective cover fire. Still, though, I had a blast with this game, and I definitely recommend it any Army Men fan or PlayStation enthusiast check it out. It's not an amazing game or a hidden gem or anything, but it's fun plastic-on-plastic violence. My Rating - C |
I'm a teacher.And I like to play video games. I like to collect video games. I like to talk about video games, and I like to write about video games. During the day, I teach high school history; during the night, I spend my spare time gaming. Then I write about it. Archives
May 2024
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