Universal Combat Review

From the moment you commence your first mission, you are likely to encounter serious issues. Space missions appeared to have worked rather smoothly and without any major problems, whereas land missions treated us to many weird occurrences. One of the lamest things we saw was troops and vehicles going through trees, rocks, buildings, and various structures. In addition to all that, ground missions can become an exasperating undertaking since they suffer from a severely choppy frame-rate (which also tended to be a great nuisance when coupled with multiplayer lag issues). All these occurrences were obviously a result of hasty programming and badly optimized engine code. Installing the latest patch is practically a necessity. Unfortunately, although it fixes a few bugs and AI difficulties, it sure as hell doesn't iron everything out.

The visuals really don't possess any distinguishing features that might be worth mentioning. According to the designing team, the game's engine was completely revamped and prepared for high resolution modes (up to 1600x1200 @ 32 bit color). Also, a greater effort was made to make the environments look genuine, with things like vegetation and cute little animals scattered across planets. Granted, it does look better than the previous game. Still, we see no reason why the developers refused to put more details and textures on certain models and environments. They also appeared to have omitted stuff like reflections and particle effects. Some ship models look nice, but due the aforementioned omissions, they seem puny and hardly worth the likes of today's standards.

At the beginning, I was really taken by some of the game's melodies. There's a variety of impressive tunes that honestly help keep an exciting atmosphere, particularly during epic space battles. The rest of the sound is fairly weak, with almost no ambient noises on planet missions, a very small range of character voicing, and substandard sounds of gunfire, laser fire, and explosions.

We also had trouble getting used to the game's multiplayer mode. There is a solid choice of modes on offer, but nothing that would keep you entangled in some serious MP action.

In short, this game suffers from a bunch of agonizing drawbacks. A dreary atmosphere, blatantly outdated visuals, AI bugs, and many other issues inherited from the game's predecessor, all contribute to an overall disappointing experience. Also, if you happen to be a fan of Battlecruiser Millennium, chances are you'll be bored with facing similar gameplay and practically the same content (same universe map, same ships, etc.).

The franchise is still in jeopardy as a result of the ongoing dispute between Derek Smart and DreamCatcher Interactive regarding the game's lowered price tag. Derek Smart claims that the version of Universal Combat launched this January wasn't intended for the public, since it was, as he put it, incomplete. At any rate, 3000AD has the right to sue for damages should the title flop. Currently, you may buy the game online or at your local retailer for $19.99. Since the developers are likely to loose a great deal in royalties, it would be foolish to expect extensive technical and financial support for the project in the future. This is yet another discouraging aspect about Universal Combat.