Full Spectrum Warrior

Monday, January 5th, 2004 at 5:00 PM

Tactical combat is evolving, urban warfare has just taken a step up. Your the squad leader, 8 men are under your control, and alpha company is pinned down, what do you do? Pandemic Studios developed a light infantry training sim for the US Army; that training sim has gone into creating the foundation of Full Spectrum Warrior. Currently being developed for the Xbox console and PC platform, Full Spectrum Warrior casts you as the squad leader and places you in modern day Zekistan battling the forces of terrorists and the local military in an attempt to help the local rebels over throw the leader. The battles in FSW are sure to be intense as your team manuevers through Urban locations with numerous forces battling; The United Nations, The Coalition, The Al Afad Regime, Ethnic Zekistan fighters and the terrorist network fighters that have moved in.

Taking from the actual tactical make up of a squad, your team is made up of an automatic rifleman armed with a M249 SAW, a grandier with a M4 rifle with 203 granade-launcher mounted below, your standard rifleman with his M4 assault rifle, and the squad leader armed with an M4 assault rifle and equipped with a radio and GPS (Global Positioning Satellite) system. Your team is entirely intact and the soldiers you start the game with are the ones you play the entire scenario out as; Unlike other strategical shooters such as Rainbow Six, Pandemic studios hopes to create a better bond between your soldiers and yourself. You can currently visit the official Full Spectrum Warrior homepage and view the soldiers profiles as well as letters they have sent back home to family from the frontline in Tazikhstan.

um Warrior Screenshot

What is most impressive about Full Spectrum Warrior is the artificial intelligence system that has been created. After witnessing bad AI first hand I was eager to learn more about what Pandemic Studios is doing to fix the problems that plague many shooters. It is reported that the soldiers you control will act as the real would in the field, this includes moving in correct formations when moving in view of multiple locations, such as crossing streets one at a time with men taking lookout as each soldier crosses safely. Soldiers will also position themselves in stack formation, allowing themselves to fire on a target with maximum firepower; by positioning themselves behind cover but with one man low and another higher along the ledge, the ability to target multiple locations or increase firepower on one is a great tactical advantage.

Not only will soldiers move according to their real life counter parts, they will also react and target enemies as them. The AI has been nicely tweaked to allow soldiers to understand when they are being fired on, as well as to best assess the location of the target and return fire. Other soldiers if in range and not covering other locations will also focus their fire on eliminating the threat at hand. In a title such as Full Spectrum Warrior it is expected for soldiers to act as a team, if you are going to be able to guide them as team leader, the amazing AI Pandemic Studios has developed for this to happen is showing amazing promise. Soldiers will act, move and respond as real world soldiers are trained to do in similar situations; not only will the respond as real soldiers, but they are expected to follow the same rules as them as well.

um Warrior Screenshot

As it was originally designed as a Light Infanctry Training Simulation, Full Spectrum Warrior has the soldiers under your command following the Rules of Engagement when encountering enemy opposition. This means your soldiers must be sensitive to the cultures and religions of the people they are fighting around; for instance if an enemy soldiers enters into a building of religious significance such as a mosque, your soldiers cannot enter firing and must consider an alternate means to handle them. The Rules of Engagement also extend to how your soldiers secure enemies that have been killed or injured; your soldiers are to completly surround the target with one covering the downed enemy, one securing the body and removing any weaponry they may have on them and your other soldiers with their guns aimed covering open windows, alley ways and other points of defense.

With many games hitting the market promising a realistic combat experience it is nice to see a team actually developing a game with just that. Full Spectrum Warrior promises to be the first in what could be its own genre of games, Pandemic Studios is breaking the mold with Full Spectrum Warrior and bringing the gamers the results. FSW looks to be intense, realistic and most importantly tactical; with a full story developing now on the website players can get familiar with the indept plot, their soldiers profiles as well as personal aspects of their lives by reading letters they have sent home to loved ones. It wasn’t enough for Pandemic to develop a hit game by mechanics alone, but they are completing the process by adding what many shooters lack, a good story to motivate the player. Keep an eye out for more information on Full Spectrum Warrior as it develops, it promises to be the blockbuster hit of 2004.