There are somewhat negligible attempts to bring a sense of freshness to the genre, however – at least, storywise. Whereas the usual formula for a WWII narrative glorifies the American side of the conflict for the umpteenth time, Fields of Thunder places the lesser known underdogs of Russia versus Germany front and centre, during the Battle of Kursk, naturally. Never heard of that particular battle? Probably for good reason, if the cookie cutter setting is anything to go by – which would have seemed purposefully ripped straight out of the vague recesses of history’s books if not for Nival Interactive’s patriotic roots. Nevertheless, as a major battle fought predominately with traditional weapons and a whole heap of tanks, little differentiates the actual reasoning behind this WWII scenario from any other. Indeed, there’s only so far a developer can take a historically accurate WWII videogame without throwing in ubiquitous appearances of aliens, zombies, ninja, pirates or an apocalyptic combination of all of the above, to fictionally spice the proceedings up a bit.
Historical accuracy is but both an admirable yet questionable fallacy of Fields of Thunder. While the game goes to such lengths as providing an encyclopaedia of information for the terms, events, locations, dates, vehicles and equipment behind the contents of every mission and its orders, players will no doubt eventually wonder if that same attention to detail could have been put to better use on pushing the game past the past – mechanically speaking.
Historical recreationists will find plenty to obsess over.
A distinct sense of déjà vu permeates most corners of the modes available for play in Fields of Thunder. With 20 missions spread evenly across two campaigns up for grabs, along with the obligatory online multiplayer mode, there’s seemingly nothing for a wallet to complain about. The problem however, with this apparently gratuitous offering, is that the gameplay mechanics and content are virtually carbon copies of Nival Interactive’s own 2005 Blitzkrieg 2 and its subsequent Fall of the Reich expansion pack. In fact, if it weren’t for the premiere franchise titling of Frontline, most players would just as well assume the subtitle ‘Fields of Thunder’ was an overly elaborate typo concocted by the box printing factory.
Stark similarities to Blitzkrieg 2 should not be much of a surprise considering Fields of Thunder also runs on the Blitzkrieg engine. As such, players should expect all the Blitzkrieg traditions of limited reinforcements, friendly artificial intelligence that needs constant babysitting to get anything done and done right, and most of all, the unforgiving difficulty level that will have most masochists rethink their choice of lifestyle fetish. Sure, Fields of Thunder will provide hours of unrelenting and unfair joy, not to mention plenty of arbitrary medal awards – but perhaps the same might not be said about the ratio of fists to monitors within the first few minutes of frustrating playtime.
Where's a feces flinging giant cow when you need it?
There’s a distinct difference between a game being difficult for entirely relevant reasons, such as cleverly laid out campaign objectives and fairly engaging battles; versus a game going completely out of its way to test both a player’s persistence, patience and ultimate willpower of holding back their tears of constant failure. Fields of Thunder favours the latter category – with the game’s virtually one way and one way only of successfully completing the environmental puzzles and troop challenges placed in the player’s path, there’s only so many times one can see their wide selection of ground tanks and air force eliminated and their scrawny number of troops obliterated before the uninstallation shortcut is seeked out. Indeed, in a game, a WWII RTS at that, that is meant to embrace the historical notion of taking chances and jumping headlong into the unknown to an uncertain fate, the manner in which every sense of challenge in Fields of Thunder boils down to trial and error through regular saving and reloading nullifies any and all player immersion.
Those who grow sick of having their grieving behinds handed to them by baselessly diabolic artificial intelligence and level design can always opt to unleash their pent up anger on their fellow stressed out man. Up to eight players can duke it out across 10 multiplayer missions in Fields of Thunder, and while the mind-bending difficulty of the single-player campaign is fortunately nowhere to be seen, the capture the flag flavour of the proceedings, the only mode of multiplayer play on offer, upholds the same ‘been there, done that’ design philosophy as the rest of the game. Keeping in mind the evolutionary likes of Company of Heroes, Command & Conquer 3 and Supreme Commander have already seen release to much higher multiplayer acclaim and player numbers, the dated Frontline recruitment papers are subsequently even harder to swallow.
Richard Wagner's Ride of The Valkyries incoming!
Keeping the player company throughout the ordeals of inevitable buyer’s remorse are the superficial merits of Fields of Thunder’s presentation. Reminiscent in both user interface, battered vehicles, environmental objects and infantry design to Nival Interactive’s own pedigree, both those familiar and new to the run of the mill of WWII RTS games will instantly recognise what does what – and how generically uninspiring it all looks. The audio benefits from the same haphazard by-the-numbers attention, providing an orchestral soundtrack that would fit right in with any typical low budget WWII television drama. Sound effects on the other hand, while borderline acceptable, suffer from the lack of ‘oomph’ in their explosive resonance and stand out appeal, their lasting effects instead as forgettable as the contents of the usual stock sound development CD.
Becoming forgettable is exactly what Frontline should have avoided from the very beginning. Were Fields of Thunder not yet another RTS game in an oversaturated WWII market it would lose the very, and only, thing it does well with its panache for historical accuracy. But by sticking to the tried and true in every other facet possible in the dated game design of its ilk, Nival Interactive have provided yet another reason for gamers to whine about the startlingly lack of originality in the industry. Evidently going by the competition of today’s PC real-time strategy food chain, Frontline: Fields of Thunder takes up its comfortable throne at the lowest rusting rung of the ladder.
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