Army Men

3DO?s Army Men is a refreshing blast from the past for anyone who ever spent time staging epic battles between little green and tan plastic soldiers.

3DO?s Army Men is a refreshing blast from the past for anyone who ever spent time staging epic battles between little green and tan plastic soldiers?especially those of us who felt the need to introduce such Weapons of Mass Destruction as BB guns, magnifying glasses, and firecrackers into the conflict.

Offered as a real-time strategy/action title, Army Men never makes the mistake of taking itself too seriously?which is good, because the basic premise of the game is sandlot simple. Through a top-down, map-based screen familiar to most combat-strategy gamers, you control a single character called Sarge as he soldiers his way through a number of commando missions against waves of enemy Tan forces. Along the way, he gets the chance to use a variety of different weapons ranging from a standard rifle to bazookas, mortars, grenades, and even flamethrowers. Every so often Sarge is given the opportunity to motor around in a jeep, half-track, or tank. Sometimes he even leads a small platoon of soldiers into the fray. Unfortunately, he has little control over how well these bumbling recruits will fight or perform their assigned tasks.

In addition to a comprehensive Boot Camp training module, Army Men offers three campaigns for a total of 28 pre-scripted missions over desert, alpine, and swamp terrains. The landscape is littered with a variety of conventional power-ups as well as unconventional ones, like mine detectors and air support. Using them effectively is one of the keys to success?it?s not uncommon for Sarge to be outgunned by a 50-to-1 ratio.

The graphics are quite detailed and attractive for an unaccelerated game, but you can?t zoom the maps to any greater level of detail than the default 640-by-480. Elevation changes are represented by subtle ridge lines that Sarge is unable to cross, which forces you to send him and his squad on long, circuitous routes. This Chutes & Ladders approach wouldn?t be too bad if the enemy AI wasn?t allowed to ambush you from hidey-holes located outside the map borders. Many of my well-planned and executed missions failed because of this unfair advantage (and I?m sure Sarge had a few choice words for the programmers when I had to restart missions from the beginning because you can only save after successful missions).

Positional advantages aside, the enemy soldiers? AI is almost as bad as your own platoon-mates?. I often encountered Tan riflemen running right by me and still not clueing in to my presence; and friendly-fire casualties are pretty common because your guys have a nasty habit of shooting first and aiming later.

I don?t expect Army Men?s substandard AI or limited number of pre-scripted missions will sway hardcore RTS players toward the game in any great numbers. However, despite its lack of sophistication and depth, the game is still a wonderfully entertaining and addictive RTS/action hybrid. With HEAT.net and Mplayer support (as well as LAN and serial/ modem), Army Men could easily develop a huge online following. It?s campy, it?s retro, and hey, what kid between 8 and 80 can resist the opportunity to blow up scores of those little plastic soldiers with high-powered weapons or melt them into little puddles of colored goo with a flamethrower?

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