It’s a submarine simulator! No wait,
it’s an airplane game! No, no, no it’s a strategic battleship game!
Astonishingly, Battlestations:Midway is all three of these. Not only does it
avoid the “just another WWII game” label, but it incorporates three totally
different simulator genres successfully, and all stout enough to be their own
game. Aside from being very short, this game will leave you impressed,
entertained and quite frankly amazed at how well these different play mechanics
fit together.
Battlestations puts you in the role
of Henry Walker, a low-ranking fighter who shows up oh-so-conveniently on the
day of the attack on Pearl Harbor. The game begins with Henry driving a puny PT
boat that is suddenly called upon to defend against swarms of Japanese war
planes. If you successfully survive the first wave of attacks, you are next
thrust into the hot seat of a depth-charge boat and challenged with blowing an
ever-advancing submarine out of the water. Finally, the last part of the mission
puts you in charge of an aircraft to take part in some fanatical criss-cross
dogfights as bullets rip through the sky as thick as sand. Welcome to only the
first level of Battlestations:Midway.
Strap yourself in for quite a ride
after installing this surprisingly short, but remarkable game. Battlestations is
broken down into 11 missions that exponentially grow in depth, complexity as
well as difficulty. Each does a very good job at keeping the pace up and the
monotony down by forcing you into a variety of vehicles and situations. (It also
doesn’t hurt that almost all of them involve blowing stuff up). And you
certainly aren’t short-handed on the job, because with each new situation you
are provided with a new tool of the trade. These arsenals include many
satisfying mobile methods of destruction including airplanes, battleships, and
submarines; and each throw in small peculiarities and control differences to
keep things challenging.
Progressing through the game will
reward you with more units to control which introduces us to the strategic part
of the game. Advancing in ranks will force you to spend less time steering
individual vehicles and more time navigating groups on the map. What will your
move be? Charge them head-on or distract and sneak around the back with subs? Or
will you send planes at them head on with subs and ships close-behind for a
brute-force attack? These are the wide open choices you have to make in the heat
of the battle. But Battlestations also lets you combine different types of ships
with certain airplanes each offering a variety of weapons. All of these will
make or break your success and ultimately lead to an interesting game of Risk on
the open sea.
As for the story, it is presented
through cutscenes with the usual horrible voice acting and lip-syncing but since
that is the only “major” gripe I can think of, I’m going to have to let it go.
As your character progresses from manning wussy PT boats all the way up to giant
battleships, he gains control of more than one vessel at a time, eventually
commanding an entire fleet that climaxes at the Battle of Midway. Sadly, all of
this takes place in about 6-7 hours …ouch. Midway provides one of the shortest
game experiences I know of, but luckily picks up some points in multi-play. Nine
maps are provided and up to eight players can play at once one a team-based
system posing the U.S. against the Japanese. Each player is given control from
as little one vehicle all the way up to fleets. This was probably the most fun
part of the game because of the short single-player campaign. There are some
serious LAN potential with your friends in this one.
My final two cents again this game
will be about the graphics. I decided to place this last on the review because
even though the graphics are mediocre, the gameplay isn’t. They aren’t bad by
any means, but they don’t pop out with all the flash and pizzazz that some other
current games have to offer. But in the end they do satisfy and for a mere
$39.99, Battlestations:Midway goes out of its way to provide an
experience worth every penny.
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Gameplay:
9.0
Awesome gameplay, huge amount of variety; too bad it’s really short.
Graphics:
7.5
Nothing spectacular but gets the job done.
Sound:
7.8
Great music but
mediocre sound effects.
Difficulty: Medium
The later missions will give you a run for your money; it’s just too bad there
aren’t many.
Concept:
9.0
Great concept and even more impressively executed. The freedom of various
vehicles each having tight controls is rare.
Multiplayer:
9.0
Probably the best part of the game: Intense, unique, fun and strategic; will
fulfill hours of fun.
Overall: 8.2
Battlestations: Midway is more than “just another WWII game;” it meets other
wanna-be WWII simulators ‘Midway,’ and then takes another step forward.
