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Of all the new features in Conflict: Denied Ops, the most significant may be deemed by some as a backwards step. Turning its back on its third-person roots, the military squad shooter has leapt into first-person, and in doing so has joined a genre plagued by identikit releases struggling to innovate.
The game’s topical setting gives it a distinction of a kind, but it is refreshing to learn that Conflict: Denied Ops makes no attempts to lay claim to some dubiously revolutionary new gimmick. Instead it seems to have focussed on refining quality over designing novelties, and the result is a game that in its early stages is filled with promise.
Of course, realising that potential is down to developer Pivotal, who has a great deal more work to do on its combat romp, that visits politically sensitive locations from Africa to Russia. Aping its topic’s presence on 24-hour news channels, from the outset Denied Ops is presented in a definite television news style. The cutscenes, which are already looking impressive, are characterised by the kind of close-up, handheld camerawork decades of wars have made us all too familiar with, and the result brings a realism and context to the game the developer is happy to court.
Denied Ops, however, has no pretensions of being a simulation. It has made a clear effort to move away from the intense depth of early squad-based shooters like SOCOM and Special Ops, which aimed their targeting reticules squarely at the hardcore gaming community. Instead, the fifth game in the Conflict series is defined by accessibility, which is particularly evident when you consider the size of your squad.
Just two troops feels like a bad joke you would tell a field commander expecting a platoon of reinforcements, but in the virtual safety of a game world it actually appears to keep things moving, and quickly at that. Similarly, swaying far from the sombre confines of reality, the primary weapon has infinite ammunitions, upping the pace and negating a need for tedious backtracking whilst filling the game with a hail of bullets more typical to a Jerry Bruckheimer movie. Regenerative health also continues to assert its dominance on the FPS here, but it is there that Denied Ops’ flirtations with the fantastical end.
Along with the rather dismally lethal setting, there is a focus on real-world weaponry that is either in the field today or under significant development and at a prototype stage. For example, the currently used Land Warrior is included, which takes the form of a tiny video camera mounted inside the gun barrel, allowing soldiers not only to take the perfect aim, but also lets them to use their gun barrel as a periscope to peer round corners.
Interchangeable stocks also feature, allowing you to change the function of your weapon without the need to carry two entire guns and, as with so many military games, it is the armaments that are the stars of Denied Ops rather than the protagonists. Your two grunts take the form of Graves, a sniper, and Lang, a heavy weapons expert, and changing between the two takes a simple tap of a facia button on the fly, which triggers the in-game camera into hurtling through the air to linger on its new subject.
A basic ‘point-and-place’ command system is in place to allow you to position your team mate, who will then use cover and engage with enemies under the steam of his own AI, drawing fire if needed. A context-sensitive command button on the right bumper also allows you to issue commands to do various basic tasks such as opening doors to allow you to spray fire into a room from a distance, and in certain instances you can even order your battle-hardened buddy to tackle simple mission goals while you provide cover. A similar system is in place for the included military vehicles, in instances when they require a driver and a gunner.
Even based on what is evidently very early code, technically the game still impresses. While there is some work to be done on the fine details of many of Denied Ops’ animated elements, the textures and the enormous amount of bump-mapping make the scenery and pock-marked buildings look very nice. Of course there is a long way to go before Conflict can enjoy anything like the glorious detail seen in the likes of Gears of War, but as a primer and undercoat, the visuals look splendid for now.
What is more impressive though, is the so-called ‘puncture technology’. Dependent on the distance and substance of a surface you fire at, holes only a little wider than a bullet can be pierced through walls, allowing you to custom place sniping positions that will not be visible to the enemy. With the promise of level-design elements that specifically encourage or require such a technique, it could make for an exciting, if understated evolution to the series and genre, and it doesn’t take much of an imagination to take a guess at its potential in a multiplayer setting.
For now Eidos remains tight lipped about online and multiplayer specifics, but it is inevitable and necessary that any game within the genre contains substantial competitive multiplayer combat, and a drop-in, drop-out co-op feature for the main campaign has been confirmed.
Conflict Denied Ops is looking violent, bloody, and filled with action. Foes taken by the searing edge of an explosion’s fireball will set alight and screech a blood curdling death cry whilst bullets spray walls with blood. The choice of topical setting may even attract a touch of controversy, but overall Denied Ops seems set to succeed, thanks largely to some huge cinematic set pieces that will make for great trailers, and Pivotal’s clear pick-up-and-play approach to design that has assured accessibility. There’s plenty of competition out there, but it is at least worth keeping your sights on Denied Ops, even if only from a reserved distance, round a corner making use of a Land Warrior.
