Gamertell

Title: Frontlines: Fuel of War
Price: $59. 99 (Xbox 360) $49.99 (PC)
System(s): Xbox 360, PC
Release Date: February 25, 2008
Publisher: THQ
Developer: Kaos Studios
ESRB Rating: “T” for Teen
Pros: Interesting story and theme, good online multiplayer, large open-ended levels.
Cons: Short single-player game, lack of diversity in weapons and vehicles, numerous glitches and bugs, poor AI and only one multiplayer mode.
Overall Score: 7/10

Before the launch of Frontlines: Fuel of War, it seemed to be a take-no-prisoners, no-hold-bars, hardcore science fiction shooter that looked as if it had the makings to equal, if not surpass, the popular Battlefield series. Unfortunately, right out of the box, Frontlines is little more then a Battlefield clone, both on and offline.

That isn’t to say Frontlines doesn’t have any redeeming qualities. First, Frontlines does attempt to give players a solid single-player campaign albeit set in yet another “the world has gone to Hell in a hand basket”  setting we’ve seen and played a million times. Frontlines does manage to paint a pretty frightening not-to-distant future, where the world’s oil supplies are nearly depleted. Add global warming to the equation and you will understand how screwed the planet is.

To make things worse, the Western Coalition (the United States and the European Union) and the Red Star Alliance (Russia and China) have decided to start World War III instead of joining forces to solve mankind’s problems. It is actually kind of funny that, as the world runs low on energy, the last two superpowers on the planet would launch a large scale war using weapons that will eat up more oil then all the car’s on either continents could in a decade. But it makes for good fiction.

Unfortunately for the single player campaign, don’t expect to see it winning any awards. There are only seven missions and, while they are long and broken into two or three pieces, it still only amounts to little more than a six- to eight-hour game. Definitely not enough time for any real story to be explored even with the frequent cinematics before and after any mission.

Like 2007’s disappointing Metal of Honor: Airborne, one of Frontlines selling points was suppose to be the large open-ended levels that allow the player to attack any objectives as they deem fit, and the advancing frontline which moves with every objective the player completes. Well, the levels are large, and the player is free to attack most objective anyway they want. Still, though, most objectives in this game are presented in a linear path. You are free to attack them from any angle but this isn’t the vast open world that Kaos Studios was promising.

When it comes to the vehicle segments, all objects are linear no matter what. As for the advancing frontlines, either Kaos over hyped this feature, or just forgot to add it. Sure, online the front lines do advance as each team captures control points, which we seen done in a number of past titles, but Kaos had promised that this feature would be the defining theme for the entire game, which it is not.

Variety is also lacking in Frontlines. I know this is suppose to be a game set some twenty years from now, but all the weapons lack any kind of originality or diversity. The usual suspects are here: assault rifle, shotgun, machine gun, and sniper rifle along with rocket launchers. Most have secondary firing options, but this adds no real advantage during game play. Vehicles are even worse, as there is only a small handful for gamers to control, and only in one level will you have the option to fly a helicopter gun ship.

Another gimmick of Frontlines is the use of unmanned vehicles. While they sort of play a role in the single player game, unmanned vehicles aren’t really that useful online and even during the single player campaign, you’ll only use them on occasion.

Online play is of course the main focus of Frontlines. There the maps are more diverse and are quite large. With up to 32 players through Xbox Live [CORRECTION: up to 50 players (updated March 5, 2008)] , this game should really sing. However, with a horrible aiming system for all the weapons, over-powering vehicles and extremely difficult servers to connect too, online play is little more then a generic Battlefield clone…and even then, only half as fun.

Overall, Frontlines: Fuel of War seems to have had all the makings for a hit. What we get in the end is a title that was over hyped, promised too much and delivers only on a handful of key its features. It is a rental at best.

Site [Frontlines: Fuel of War] Site [Kaos Studios]