Maybe the military could use more money after all. Review

Maybe the military could use more money after all.

Staring blankly at the white canvas on my monitor, I attempt to begin yet another

game review. Having been cranking these things out for almost 5 years now, game

reviewing has become almost second nature. Just sit down, grab a drink and whittle

away the day blabbing on and on about graphics and gameplay.

But every so often, I get slammed in the face with a seemingly incurable case

of writer’s block. I suddenly find myself at a loss for words. My vocabulary

sinks to grade school slang. I know that I have plenty to say about a game,

but I have no idea how to say it.

Folks, this is one of those times. Army Men: World War – Final Front,

a game with more names than hours of gameplay, has led me down the path of inarticulate

bluntness. I keep trying to come up with a brilliant, witty way to tell you

what I think about this game, but I just can’t escape the binds of the block.

So rather than crack open the thesaurus for some fancy, ill-fitting jargon,

I’m just going to come right out with it.

THIS GAME SUCKS. Also, IF YOU BUY THIS GAME, YOU

ARE AN IDIOT.

No thought-provoking analogies or colorful witticisms necessary, people. But if you insist on actually reading this thing, I’ll at least do you a favor and try, damned hard as it is, to tell you why this game should be taken out to the rifle range and executed. And no, it shouldn’t get a last request, unless that last request is to be eaten by wild dogs or something.

The pain begins when you turn on the game. After a scintillating intro movie

that feebly attempts to capture the grit of an old black and white war film,

you’re treated to what has to be the lamest menu screen I’ve seen since Cannonball

Blitz on the Apple II. The font looks like it was done by a first-grader

using finger paints….a first-grader with horribly misshapen fingers.

The game itself is a third-person action disaster. You play the green army men, and once again you have to rid the world of the evil tan army men. Then, if there is any justice in the world, mom will come along and rid the world of the green army men, too. A man can dream.

The

single player game is a linear affair pitting you, the green guy, in dumpy mission

after dumpy mission against the tans. The complexity ranges from “Go shoot all

the tans” to “Go shoot all the tans, then get in a tank. Then shoot all the

tans.” Someone shoot me.

The graphics in Army Men: World War – Final Front are so bad it’s almost

worth seeing. There’s more pop-up here than a whack-a-mole table. The textures

are grainy and feature pixels the size of small children and the army men themselves

move with alarming stiffness. Don’t trust those screenshots, because you really

have to see things moving to get the full retarded effect. The PSX never looked

so old.

In classic Army Men fashion, the gameplay blows. You run around shooting at

guys who have the intelligence of a slab of cardboard. In fact, they pretty

much function as cardboard cut-outs, just standing in one place following a

ducking/standing up pattern that must have been programmed in all of 10 minutes.

To vary the thrill, you can occasionally control vehicles like tanks and submarines. So now you get to shoot at tan pieces of cardboard with a bigger gun. Please, slow down the fun train, because I’m getting sick!

The multi-player attempts to add depth by throwing in 4 play modes. The only

interesting one is Capture the Flag, which lets you place allied soldiers on

the map to defend your flag. It admittedly ups the complexity, but considering

that the fun factor is already in the toilet, that ain’t saying much.

But I am. In fact, I’ve said far too much already. I have no idea why or how

3DO keeps releasing these crummy Army Men games. They’ve become the laughingstock

of the gaming community…and we’re not laughing with you, guys, we’re

laughing at you. Please let this truly be the final affront.