Starsiege
- January 01, 2000 00:00 AM PST
The best robot game falls a little short.
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Part of the answer lies in the paucity of stellar mech offerings (Mechwarrior 2 is pretty much it). The rest of the answer resides in Starsiege itself.
The game boasts the best graphics engine, the best multiplayer support, and the largest choice of configurable mechs yet produced. And it's wrapped up in a detailed and well- thought-out futuristic world that, furthermore, is laid out in the best documentation I've seen in years.
Yet something's missing. It's like putting together a scale-model airplane: The finished product somehow isn't as impressive as the hundreds of detailed parts with which you started.
You play as Duster, a Martian colonist joining the underground rebellion against the empire. Soon enough, you find yourself in an uneasy alliance with the Imperials as you defend Earth against the Cybrids--robots who achieved sentience and turned on their human masters. (The game also includes a more difficult campaign where you play as the Cybrids.)
The game's 40 missions find you and your computer-controlled squadmates performing a variety of tasks, such as escorting supply trucks, destroying radar facilities to mask invading forces, executing search-and-destroy missions, and so forth. This solo gameplay is the weakest aspect of Starsiege. While the missions are varied, you'll spend a lot of time plodding to zero points, where each battle that occurs is similar to the one before. And the enemy AI is mediocre: It charges at you while trying to avoid fire, but does a lousy job of trying to get behind you.
That familiar voice you hear during the mission briefings is Mark Hamill, but the voice acting is so woodenly unconvincing that it might as well be Dorothy Hamill. While Dynamix obviously invested a lot into fleshing out the Starsiege world, the story didn't grab me.
First-person shooter fans will be familiar with the control scheme: You use the mouse to aim and the keyboard to move. It's completely configurable using a joystick, rudder, or just about any other device combo, but you can't get around using a pointing device to aim. This makes the game unlike previous rotation-based mech games, and I enjoyed this aspect of play, but it makes using a joystick difficult--you either have to aim with the hat or use the mouse to aim in your other hand.
The beauty of the game is in sinking into the preposterous world of giant robots. Once you suspend disbelief and stop mumbling about how silly they are, you can enjoy being 50 tons of steel death. If you approach Starsiege as a sim and not an action game, you'll enjoy the slow-turning arcs of the Hercs and appreciate the intricate controls and piloting necessary for success.
The wide variety of Hercs and the configurable loadouts make Starsiege an interesting game. There are 30 different vehicles, including tanks, and each can be redesigned to make it perform uniquely. A similar range of weapon types--ammo doublers, cloaking devices, turbo-accelerators--are available as well, and tinkering is a lot of fun.
Multiplayer is Starsiege's strong point: There's nothing like turning another player's Herc into a pile of spare parts in a game of War, Capture the Flag, or football.
Still, a few problems crop up here as well. While the network code is first-rate and Internet play generally smooth, multiplayer is unbalanced because not all Hercs are created equal. If this was a game like Cyberstrike, where you command squadrons, the imbalances would make sense: light Hercs for scouting, heavier Hercs for lugging about the serious ordnance, and so on. However, in multiplayer Starsiege, you command only the Herc you pilot, so players gravitate towards the big bruisers or the lightweight Hercs. And few others see use. On top of that, the best game--War--only comes with one map.
Overall, Starsiege is a superior effort that every mech fan should consider. But the relative lack of fun in the single-player game and the imbalances in the multiplayer game are enough to knock it down from great to merely good. It may be the best, but it isn't quite good enough.
