It’s been along
while since we were able to relive some of the most intense battles that
occurred during the 1993 dramatic events in Somalia that involved the US Special
Operations soldiers. While it made for a decent PC first-person shooter, the PS2
got a rather stripped down version with an excellent online multiplayer mode
that pit up to 32 players in a number of massive playing maps. Now, Delta
Force Black Hawk Down: Team Sabre follows the 75th Ranger
Regiment, the British Special Air Service as well as the heroes of Delta Force
find themselves on new and still dangerous territory.
While the
Black Hawk Down title brings to mind the campaign that was inspired by the
book (and later became a great movie), Team Sabre does not take place in
Mogadishu. Rather, this game focuses its attention on the lush jungle areas of
Colombia and key areas in Iran. Like the first game on the PS2, this one
contains no story per se but rather connecting mission campaigns. The first half
of the game, for example, follows you and your squad into Colombia to restore
peace and to bring drug cartel leader Antonio Paulo to justice. The other half
focuses on an armed group of rebel fighters that managed to take control of an
oil terminal on Kharq Island as well as a few production facilities to the north
as well.
The game starts
off with the essentials: a mission briefing, a weapons loadout screen, the
ability to upgrade your skills and mission start. Skill points are earned during
each mission and can be spent after the mission briefing in order to improve
your aim, endurance and the ability to move more quickly out on the field.
Thankfully you will be outfitted with a number of great weapons that range from
primary, secondary and explosives whether it’s a satchel charge or live demo
kit. While you’re given limited ammunition, you can always ask a teammate for an
extra clip and you’ll sometimes come across enemy ammo caches.
While you could
issue orders in the first game of the Delta Force series on the PS2,
Team Sabre’s squad commands are a lot deeper and allow your team to
participate more throughout the mission. The Movement commands, for example,
offer more than just pointing to where you want your team to move but rather to
move to flanking positions on their own as well as regroup. The Firing commands
allow your team to go “weapons ready” as well as offering suppressing fire or
hold fire when civilians are around. Finally, there’s the Assist commands that
consists of need ammo, heal team and heal me commands. Sadly, for the most part
your squad will comply but oftentimes your team never really carries out the
orders. No matter how many times I’ve successfully called for suppressing fire,
my squad almost always shoots off a single burst and stops or sometimes doesn’t
even fire at all.
Oh, it gets
worst from here. Regardless of the missions and locale, the action itself is
repetitive and rather dull. The game doesn’t stray far from the move a little up
the path, shoot enemies, and move a little bit further off the path and shoot
even more enemies formula. There are mission objective (such as blow up boats or
communications antennas) but they’re not as creative or fun. To make matters
worst, the enemy AI goes from brilliant sharpshooters to dumb thugs who seem
happy to rush toward their demise. There are a number of times when I simply
walked up to a crouching enemy and took my time to put a bullet in them.
There is no
doubt in my mind that gamers will surely give up on the single-player campaign
mode and opt for the online multiplayer mode that, once again, allows up to 32
players on screen at once. The game offers up to seven multiplayer game modes
like Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, Sabotage, Team King of the
Hill and the fun Renegade and Team Renegade. There are even specialty roles like
machine gunner, sniper, assault specialists as well as medic. If online isn’t
your thing, for players can play a co-op game (split-screen) that takes you
through six new campaign missions.
Graphically
speaking, Team Sabre is a complete mess. Now normally I would forgive a
game’s weak graphics (especially if the game is good) but in the case of this
game the awful graphics play a role in hindering your progress as well as get
you killed. It’s often hard to pick out an enemy in the environment, especially
in the Colombian campaign. Many times you’ll confuse a mercenary for heavy
foliage and other times they do seem to blend into the environment but not
because they’re camouflage experts but rather because of some horrible clipping
issues. The textures are also really bland in this game, giving the environments
and character a PSOne look.
The sound
doesn’t fair any better either. For instance, the soundtrack isn’t very moving
and it feels as though it has been recycled from the first game. As for the
sound effects, they lack the right punch even if you’re playing the game on a
good sound system. Don’t even expect to hear environmental noise either. You
won’t hear any birds in the jungles of Colombia or a wind passing through a
building in Iran. Yes there’s voice acting and yes it’s not bad at all. Still,
wouldn’t it make sense for the Colombians to speak Spanish or the Iranian
mercenaries speak Persian?
In the end,
Delta Force Black Hawk Down: Team Sabre is a first-person shooter plagued
with way too many problems to make this game one fans of the genre will
seriously consider buying. This is too bad, really, since the online multiplayer
is actually downright fun to play but with a rather dull single-player mode with
nothing special to add, this is one game you should consider renting instead or
skipping altogether.
|
|
Gameplay: 5.0
As far as the
single-player campaign mode is concerned, Team Sabre delivers a
straightforward and repetitive shooter with squad tactic elements. The problem
is that the game is filled with AI problems and your squad doesn’t know how to
carry out the orders you issue on the field except for feeding you extra ammo
clips and med packs.
Graphics: 4.0
Not being able
to tell a distant mercenary apart from a pillar or a shrub will give you an idea
how awful the game’s visuals are and if it wasn’t for the shooting reticule that
changes when you pass it over a teammate you would most likely end up shooting
your allies as well. Really, this is not a very pretty game at all.
Sound: 4.0
The game’s
running soundtrack is nothing we haven’t heard before in military-themed
shooters but the real bad news here is that the sound effects are slightly
muffled and explosions lack that, well, explosive sound. At least the voice
acting isn’t bad at all.
Difficulty:
Easy/Medium
Unfortunately,
the brainless enemies you encounter throughout the game won’t provide much of a
real challenge. When you do die it’s more out of the fact that you couldn’t make
out an enemy from a shrub. The mission objectives aren’t real hard to figure out
either.
Concept: 5.0
Hunting a drug
cartel leader and disposing of his many clone-like mercenaries isn’t anything
new and Team Sabre doesn’t really do anything to set itself apart from
similar first-person shooters. There are plenty of mission objectives in the
single-player mode but it’s the online multiplayer mode that does not
disappoint.
Multiplayer:
8.0
Online is
where this game really shines and with huge maps and up to 32 players on screen
at once there is a lot to love about these deathmatches. There’s also some
split-screen fun to be had offline with up to four players total and I’m not
talking about simple Capture the Flag matches but rather a six-mission campaign
mode that has co-op written all over it.
Overall: 5.0
Despite an
exciting multiplayer mode, Team Sabre never rises above its various flaws
and its simplistic single-player level design that offers no real challenge. If
anything, this is a backwards step for the Delta Force Black Hawk Down
series that wasn’t so hot on the consoles when it was released a long while
back. Rent this one for its solid online multiplayer mode instead.
