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The Battlefield series makes its long awaited appearance on current generation consoles. While the title may imply that this is a port of the recent PC game, it is actually a new game in the Battlefield series. The game began life as a multiplayer oriented game that was delayed to add a singleplayer portion. This causes the multiplayer mode to be in-depth and involved, but at the expense of the single player portion.
The game’s story takes place in Kazakhstan where the United States leads a force to keep the peace in the country. The Chinese are a bit wary about the United States’ intrusion and send their own forces to make sure their interests are well represented. The story is advanced by fake news broadcasts. You’ll often see two broadcasts from the same battle, each with wildly differing messages showing you just how manipulative the media can be in a wartime situation.
The game’s story missions are comprised of both American and Chinese missions. During the 20 missions, you’ll fight in oil rigs, fly around investigating, capture and defend bases and destroy enemy ships. The missions reach a comfortable difficulty level and don’t really go on for too long. The missions are essentially singleplayer portions of the multiplayer game. You’ll see enemies spawn in random locations. This is something that you’d be accustomed to in a multiplayer event but it is a bit weird seeing it happen in a singleplayer game. The game lets you switch between any of your units with the press of a button. This lets you participate in all of the roles of the game from shooting enemies to driving tanks or attacking boats. This feature also lets you quickly move to where you want to be with the unit that would be best suited for the task. Speaking of the vehicle controls, they’re a bit difficult to control but you’ll easily manage after a few moments with the game.
The Battlefield series has always shined in multiplayer and in Modern Combat is no different. The game supports 24-player online multiplayer on the PlayStation 2 and Xbox. The multiplayer mode is limited in game types though since only conquest and capture the flag are included. Capture the flag is pretty self explanatory, but conquest is the typical Battlefield mode where you need to capture an area and hold it against opposition fire. The different maps are big enough to adequately hold all of the players and are varied enough to make things interesting in different maps. They lack the charm and breadth of the PC version’s maps, but are compelling in their own way.
The game’s visuals are respectable. The character models and vehicles are all well modeled. The characters move about in a realistic manner and the vehicles also move very authentically. The environments are well varied and detailed. The environments include a number of structures and buildings but not all of these are interactive since you can’t enter all of the buildings. The explosions in the game are pretty volatile though they could have been made better. Specifically, the vehicle explosions are lackluster since they disappear.
The sound package of the game is more than adequate. The sound effects are solid with top-notch weapon and effects aurally showing the hectic nature of the game. The background music of the game also fits in well. The highlight of the audio is the radio chatter that you hear in the game. There is a lot of it and helps make the game more authentic.
Battlefield 2: Modern Combat is a solid translation of the Battlefield series to consoles. It doesn’t quite recreate the experience perfectly but it does it well enough to make it a compelling purchase. The hot swap feature makes the singleplayer mode more fun, and of course, the hectic multiplayer battles are key to the series. -- Adam Nunez, PGNx Media
---- Nov 2, 2005
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