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Videogame industry's fascination with the WW2 theme seems to be never-ending, as it seems like every month we are presented with yet another slew of WW2 themed first person shooters, strategy and simulation games. Some of them are good, while others are just a lame attempt to make some cash on the popular theme. Developed by Polish based In Images on top of (Polish based as well) Reality Pump's 3d engine, World War 2: Panzer Claws (US name of Frontline Attack: War over Europe) is one of Eidos Interactive's latest attempts to capture the money cow of WW2 RTS games. With their country being one of the bloodiest battlefields on the East Front, did In Images manage to capture the WW2 atmosphere in Panzer Claws?
Gameplay:
The game offers you to take control over all three major sides of the European conflict in the game: German Wermacht, Red Army or the Allies. Each side features two complete campaigns (making a total of six campaigns for the three of them, for those that don't know how to count) based on real events from 1941 to 1944, ranging from Operation Barbarossa, to Battle of Kursk, to Battle of France. So yes, basically there are a lot of levels in there. And since on average it takes an hour or two to finish one map... I've personally spent almost 100 hours on the game just to finish all singleplayer campaigns. But there is also a skirmish mode in the game that features another 18 maps, 5 gameplay modes and the ability to play with up to 7 opponents, with possibility of having allied AI players in the game. In short the singleplayer side of the game alone makes up for a lot of replayability
When it comes to the gameplay itself, the game is a fully featured (tactical) 3D RTS. You have the ability to look at the battlefield from any angle and at pretty much any zoom level. There are also around ten different game speeds in there, and most probably you'll be changing them a lot, mostly to slow down on the events in battle and speed up while you're building up forces. The units you command in battles are based on authentic WW2 vehicles, aircrafts and guns; and are modeled in the game after their real life counterparts. And there are really a lot of them in there – approximately twenty five vehicles for each side in the game (Surprisingly the manual even features information on all famous vehicles for all three sides that one could play with in the game – a short history of the vehicle, its battle capabilities, some dates and stats... Which is a really nice touch. At least war history buffs like myself should appreciate it.). And of course different infantry units and buildings. The infantry is able to occupy buildings and use them for cover. The game also features air and rocket strikes and air reconnaissance which are performed by 'outside' units (although they could get shot down as well). And different formations are available to arrange your units in. All of which makes the battles intensely tactical. After all units have different defense capabilities; hit points, attack ranges, as well as different damage ratios against: infantry, vehicles and buildings. That mostly means that you'll have to balance out your battle groups carefully, so they could work and support each other like a real army. That's also probably the reason why I usually turn the game speed down to the lowest and micro-manage the battles.
The realism of the game is pretty surprising. Tank or vehicle crews can be killed before their machine is destroyed, and then you can use your own infantrymen to capture the damaged vehicle, repair it, and use it against its former owner. The ammo for each vehicle isn't endless. If your vehicle is out of ammo a supply vehicle will come and resupply the machine, but while it's making its way from the ammunition depot to you, you are a sitting duck (Fortunately there's also an option to call for a supply vehicle while you still have ammo). In addition to capturing regular buildings, a-la StarCraft you can also capture or build pillboxes and bunkers, and get up to 12 infantrymen to defend them. Turning off vehicles' lights at night will make them less visible to the enemy, while decreasing your view range as well. By camouflaging the units you make them unable to move, but also make it harder for enemy vehicles to detect and target them (-50% of the normal identification range). Different vehicles have different endurance to being hit from different sides according to the thickness of their armor (all meticulously researched by In Images). Infantry can be run over by vehicles. Paratroopers can be dropped in the middle of the enemy's territory – or their plane could get shot down by his anti-air forces. Bridges can be constructed and minefields can be laid. Your units can also gain experience by destroying a certain number of enemy units, which gives them certain battle bonuses. At some stage you start noticing that Panzer Claws is actually as complex as a wargame – because there are so many factors that one would have to consider while playing it. I am pretty sure that at one stage the developers played a lot of Close Combat, as some of the resemblances between the two games are quite striking. Basically all in all Panzer Claws almost seems like a more fast-paced and grander scale 3D remake of the Close Combat series.
Own unit AI deserves a separate paragraph on itself – the pathfinding is excellent; units standing in 'stay in the area' mode will move aside from their original position, make way for their comrades that were given a command to go to a different place, and assume back their original place when they're gone. There's also a 'hunt' mode, in which they'll locate and exterminate the enemy themselves. The enemy AI is pretty smart alone, giving your units a run for their money (For example if you'll attack a single enemy unit from distance while your unit is not in enemy unit's view range, it will immediately search the area for the attacker.); and the actual battle coordination of enemy AI controlled battle groups is most efficient; computer-controlled units fight in a very organized way, supporting each other and usually concentrating their fire on one target. Although, the AI does have some predictability on the command level, especially in the way it attacks your base in groups without adapting to the situation (most of the attacks will keep being the same, wave after wave). But then again ingenuity of such level could probably only be expected from a real human opponent.
It should also be noted that the game features a rather thorough tutorial that will guide you through all basic concepts of the game (as if a sixty page manual wasn't enough), although some advanced elements of gameplay can only be fully understood by playing the game yourself for a while, and reading the lengthy manual in detail. There's also a level editor coming together with the game, which allows you to edit existing levels and create new ones.
Graphics:
After the bleak and rather 1999'ish looking intro movie I didn't expect much from the game's graphics. And although I was slightly wrong, the keyword is 'slightly'. Yes, Panzer Claws features a fully 3D engine allowing angle rotation and zoom changes, but... The view is mostly rather bleak, with not enough colors or polygons being portrayed on the screen. While the explosions, vehicle lamp lights at nights and sun reflections on rivers do look eye-pleasing, the units suffer a severe lack of polygons – upon close zoom the infantrymen appear to be made out of maybe maximum 20 polygons, and the vehicles have no visible identification marks and washed out textures. The latter could be said about buildings and terrain as well.
You can usually distinguish between different units on the battlefield without clicking on them, but only usually. There are animations for every unit and some buildings in the game, but they still look rather basic. The 3D world does feel like a real battlefield, but it looks somewhat plain as nothing moves there except for the water, and there's not much depth to the picture. Although the forests can be destroyed by your units' fire or air strikes, which is a nice touch. Basically the graphics engine gets the trick done when it comes to letting you efficiently play the game, but leaves you without any eye candy that we like to see in 3D strategy games nowadays. Although the engine is very robust; it pauses on alt+tab back to Windows and can stay in idle mode in background without taking any CPU power (as checked in task manager) and without crashing. While playing the game extensively before writing this review, it spent a couple of times “waiting” for me all night long while I was sleeping.
Sound:
The sound is adequate to the game. The music is nicely done and doesn't annoy you too much. The unit voiceovers have accents according to their nationality, and sound OK. There's some variety to them as well. The sound effects are well done, although they might be slightly lacking in variety. The audio is 3D positional and unit / explosion sounds come from the edge of the screen where the unit is located or the explosion has happened. Once again nothing truly special or noteworthy here, but it wasn't supposed to be .extraordinary anyway.
Multiplayer:
The multiplayer mode offers the same maps, game modes and number of players as the Skirmish mode, with the exception that here you can play with real human opponents. Panzer Claws offers local LAN games, direct TCP/IP Internet games, and matchmaking service through EarthNet (registration required, although the service is free). There's little lag when playing over the Internet, and I've noticed no disconnection issues during the numerous times I've played the game online. The gameplay is pretty much as balanced out in multiplayer as in single player, and unless you somehow manage to win (or lose) the game in the first 20 minutes (and your opponent is as skilled as you are) the battles take tendency to last an hour or over that. So chances are if you finished the whole singleplayer mode of the game, got tired of playing skirmishes with computer AI and making new maps, the multiplayer portion will be able to entertain you for another couple of weeks.
Conclusion:
World War 2: Panzer Claws is an interesting hybrid of economic real-time strategy and tactical wargaming. While most of its features have been seen in other games, In Images has still done a great job assembling them all in one game. The end result is a product with deep and well-balanced gameplay, almost limitless replayability, adequate sound and mediocre graphics. If you're willing to overlook the last part, you'll be in for a treat. In Images has created a solid WW2 RTS game, and it's great that Eidos was able to recognize superior gameplay underneath a mediocre facade. I would clearly recommend Panzer Claws to the 'thinking gamer' or any WW2 buff. And I congratulate In Images on a well-done first game. Watch out for those guys, they're going to go far.
