The "What are you playing?" topic.

[Hooahguy]

After a few days of playing the demo of World in Conflict, I am confident that I know enough about the game to post a review.

World in Conflict was just as I expected. Not like Company of Heroes, but still has that fast-paced combat that needs to be micromanaged for you to win. The game is fast-paced and at times frantic. The single player campaign is also excellent. There is quite nothing like calling down close fire support around your position of weak-armored APCs while Russian tanks close in and pray the shells don’t accidentally hit your vehicles/men as well (the Pine Valley mission).

Something I love, in fact, it's the thing I love the most about WiC is that the entire repetitive process of base building is eliminated. Combat starts within two minutes of the game starting.
What I love so much is the game doesn’t revolve around destroying the enemy base. While CoH had the fierce combat of WiC, you still had to destroy the enemy base in the end, which was annoying because it wasn’t really realistic. But then again, neither is a heavy tank being dropped from a plane (the sheer weight would probably cause extensive damage) but I do suppose that’s hypothetically possible. And I love it how flanking is just as important in this game just as one would expect. Its jsut not apparent that it is.
Also, I love the huge size of the maps. It allows for lots of movement. In CoH, it was smaller, more infantry based maps, that were perfect for the game by the way, and besides, WiC has to be large enough for choppers and carpet-bombing. Carpet-bombing in CoH just wouldn’t work, for it would destroy almost half the map, even on a 4v4 map. Also, what I miss from CoH is the cover system. In WiC there’s no real cover system for infantry, besides buildings and trees, but I guess the map is too large for you to micromanage something as small as infantry cover.

The aspect of the game that no one class can dominate the battlefield has its ups and downs.
An up is that it forces teamwork and therefore provides a better MP experience. But only if teamwork is used. If not, it just gets annoying.
This is a negative, as well as the fact that if you are playing with bots you can’t really communicate with them, so you really are on your own. Nothing like trying to provide air support when your idiot bot ally keeps targeting the APCs instead of the AA rocket launchers that are shooting your choppers down. It’s very frustrating, but I'm sure it’s also very rewarding when you do use the built in VOIP and other means to coordinate tactics with each other and win the match.

The Tactical Aid, or TA feature is very fun to use. With TA, you get to call down arty barrages, AT strikes, and even tactical nukes if you forget about it for too long and let them accumulate. By the way, nukes are way awesome, but not necessarily a match winner.

As stated before, I love it how every class is reliant on other classes. Air needs armor to get rid of AA units; armor needs air to get rid of enemy arty and support to get rid of enemy aircraft. Support needs armor and air to keep away enemy units so they can provide fire support without being harassed. And infantry— well, infantry needs everyone to look after them. Better to just go with armor, but infantry do make great ambushing units. But they can rarely hold themselves in battle, and more often than not, they are literally run over by my more than eager tanks.

Blobbing, as in CoH, just doesn’t work most times, but it does work in some cases in CoH, if the opposing player doesn’t have the full means to demolish the blob before they get to the base. At least in WiC any blobs are sure to find themselves devastated by heavy choppers, and if the enemy has enough TA points, they will face planes, arty falling all around them, and if they are (un)lucky, a fuel air /daisy cutter bomb, depending on the side you are on, right on top of them. And if they are REALLY (un)lucky, a nuke will be launched, or at very least a carpet-bombing mission.
Basically, it really is not worth it, even if you had the reinforcement points to get a blob. Most people only have 6-8 units at a time, and that’s if they are really lucky. I usually command at most 5. More than that is too hard to micromanage and I usually end up losing many of my tanks if I do command more than 4-5 at a time.

Another thing: within each class, every unit has to rely on (a few key) others. For instance, heavy tanks are shredded by infantry AT squads, so they need medium tanks to fire White Phosphorous shells into the midst of infantry, and mediums need to be protected by heavy tanks from other tanks, though they can stand their own in battle quite well.
But the only shame is that there are no real unique units in the game, only unique skins (and a few unique TA’s, like the fuel air bomb), but underneath every faction is the same, which I guess levels the playing field for multiplayer.

I know this is a long review so I’ll wrap up. The NUMBER ONE aspect I love about this game, besides the absence of base building, so it's technically the NUMBER TWO thing I love, is that in most RTS games, when you launch an AA missile against an aircraft the target is pretty much dead. But in WiC, you can actually drop flares and evade. You aren’t resigned to the fact that once that missile launches, that chopper may as well be dead. This aspect makes WiC so realistic and very hard not to love, as well as very cool to watch.
I also learned the concept of smoke as a ruse and how to use it properly for tanks. TIP: when using smoke, don’t leave the cover of smoke right after you apply it. That’s just dumb.

As of now, I love this game.
But considering I've already spent about 10-15 hours playing the demo, which only includes one map, Seaside, and I'm nowhere near bored of it yet, plus the numerous fan-made maps and mods, I'm not too worried about getting bored of this game. But Im still a horrible n00b when it comes to this game. Oh well, I guess I will learn.

And now, for a little AAR I made about a recent match I had, to reward you for actually reading this long review:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The game was 6v6, with everyone else a bot (didn't have internet connection to play with real foes, so this is the next best thing). I chose armor, which is my favorite because I actually know how to use it really well, at least compared to the other classes. The map is Seaside, by the way, because it’s the only map available on the demo.
Sorry for the low graphics I had to play on the lowest settings for it to work on my desktop, which wasn’t made to play games like this.

I started out with two Abrams (heavy tanks) and two Patton tanks (medium). I sent them towards the supermarket, which they quickly secured. Then I sent them to take the town center, which is the central part of the map, and whoever holds it usually wins.


After taking the town center, I began to move my tanks to the TV station, which was to the northeast of the town center. A few Soviet choppers came. I blew smoke and retreated, but not before they took out a Patton tank and dealt some more damage to the other tanks. On the way back, an artillery shell landed close by, which was lucky because a direct hit means another tank down the drain.


After getting another Abrams, I took my tanks back down to the city, and retook the town center which was lost when the choppers came earlier.


Then some commies took the super market, which I had to retake. But in the process, I lost a Patton tank to a precision barrage, which damaged a few other tanks as well.


I sent back my damaged Abrams to be repaired, but in the process, a random artillery shell landed nearby, creating a gorgeous explosion, and missed my tank by inches.


I saw that the beach was undefended, so I told my three Abram tanks, one of which was newly repaired (the one that had the near miss) and the other two were brand new reinforcements, to take the beach while my remaining Patton tank was repaired.


As luck would have it, just as my tanks got to the beach, the Soviets exploded a fuel air bomb right over their heads, destroying them instantly.


As you can imagine, this was a huge blow. I just lost tanks worth 3,600 reinforcement points to one blast. It took me a few minutes to get together a new force of two Abrams and a Patton.


They took the beach, but there was an air strike as well as numerous choppers and tanks that wiped out my three tanks, another devastating blow. (The Patton indicated in the distance was soon taken out by a Russian heavy tank and a well-placed artillery round.)


But then I launched a huge artillery barrage on the TV station, earning me enough points for three Abrams tanks. Now, I only had about 3 minutes remaining and we were still behind so I had to work fast. This is where the glory of WiC comes in, and where the battles become frantic. I told my tanks to retake the beach.


En route to the beach, they had a near miss with an air strike. Clearly, fate wanted us to take that beach.


They took the beach, and moved inland. By this time, I had made another Patton tank, which was en route to assist them.
My tank squadron moved quickly to take the town square.


After taking the town center, I noticed we were about tied and only a minute and a half remaining. So I sent my tanks to take the TV station, thinking it was undefended. I was wrong. There were many AT defenses in the area, so I pulled back.


Since all my Abram tanks were heavily damaged, I had them fall back for repairs, while my two Patton tanks came forward to mop up, and then the timer ran out, much to my relief.


It really was an amazing match, won by quick maneuvering and luck.