Question on Soldner

[imported_chrisbtx]

I've been looking for reviews for Soldner: Secret Wars for a few days now to no avail. My BB has 4 copies of the game in stock (finally) today also. I wanna get the game from the previews I've read, but have seen some forum posts saying the demo sucked. Since I haven't been able to get any info or reviews on the final product yet, I was hoping some of my fellow ATers might have already purchased or played the final release of the game (not the beta demo) and would give some insight/opinions as to how they thought the game was. This thread will most likely determine whether or not I get the game.

Thanks for any help!

 

[duragezic]

I'm kind of wondering too. Haven't heard much at all about this game. I haven't heard about the demo either. I've been meaning to try the demo deven just I haven't heard any good things about it so it's further down on my large list of games to try since I've gotten my new comp.

 

[imported_chrisbtx]

Bump...

 

[CubicZirconia]

1up Review

First paragraph:

Playing Soldner is listening to a politician promise the world to every segment of his constituency, and ending up pissing off every last one of them in the process. This game attempts to combine the best aspects of serious tactical shooters like Flashpoint with the run-and-gun action of the Battlefield series, but does neither very well.

The last line:

Soldner is frustration in a box.

IGN Review

First Paragraph

Despite what I have been telling the other editors all week, Söldner is not German for "bug" or "incomplete" or "disappointment." It is, as far as the native speakers tell me, the German word for "mercenary." It's also the title of a new multiplayer-focused, military action game in the tradition of Operation Flashpoint and Joint Operations. It is also a buggy, incomplete, disappointment.

Last Line

After ten minutes of playing, we were already asking the publisher where the second patch was.

 

[BuckNaked]

Bummer.... Early previews had me looking forward to this...

 

[imported_chrisbtx]

Originally posted by: Buck_Naked
Bummer.... Early previews had me looking forward to this...

Yeah... funny how when I finally post this the review from IGN shows up....

 

[Schadenfreude]

reviews

 

[duragezic]

Ok well that made it easy for me, I'm avoiding this one!

 

[Saist]

Actually, the game is very good. http://www.gamenikki.com would have a review up for it except for the fact that I've been too dopey on medications to write anything decent.

My quick opinion of the game:

Soldners greatest strength is it's defomable geometry and multiplayer capabilities. In my own experience:

One of the missions called for resuing a hostage. The hostage was in the middle of a building... The 5 opfor were able to get and hold onto some tanks, but we were not. What we ended up doing was this. We could afford two Light Helicopters. So we grabbed the helicopters, and one buzzed real low to the hostage and our guy got inside, presumably to get the hostage... the tank guys just rounded around outside knowing that our inside man didn't have a prayer of getting the hostage out. But our guy... he didn't get the hostage. He had a bomb kit. He went to the top floor, and blew the ceiling off...

The other chopper (carrying me) swooped down and landed... inside the building. Protected from the tanks below. the other chopper landed on the remaing top roof and out jumped Cory, the other gunner. Now all 3 of us (Me, Cory, and the bomber) ran back down the stairs, grabbed the hostage, killed 2 of the opfor (who had attempted running inside to gun us down), grabbed the hostage, the bomber got the hostage into the chopper which took off, and then Cory and I caught the other chopper out.


Now... as far as I know, you can't do that in any other game out there, and that quickly became typical of the other maps we played.

Now, keeping in mind that Soldners dev team has even more amazing tricks up their sleeves and intend to extend the gameplay ideas...


*************


Now Soldner's single player is an excerise in futility for the most part. Bot control is limited, so while the opposing bots are very intelligent, you will often find yourself outgunned or outplanned in the single player missions.

Because of the confusing method of buying and equiping your team in the single player mode, it's another major turn off.

however, as mentioned, Soldner's dev team is still doing work on the title... I expect the friendly bot code to be overhauled, as well as the team management system.

Right now, if your into titles like Planetside, BF1942, or games of that type, Soldner will do more than float your boat. It will floor you.

If your into titles like Unreal and Quake, you'll want to hold off for Soldner to either get overhauled, or forget it.

 

[Pocatello]

Another promising game released too early

 

[imported_chrisbtx]

Originally posted by: Saist
Right now, if your into titles like Planetside, BF1942, or games of that type, Soldner will do more than float your boat. It will floor you.

If your into titles like Unreal and Quake, you'll want to hold off for Soldner to either get overhauled, or forget it.

I have read some other cool war stories from this game in other forums already... that's what made me wanna get it before I started this thread. Then the reviews came out. Like Pocatello said, it's just "Another promising game released too early."

Frankly, I don't care about the graphics as long as they are decent (I've heard complaints that it's about a year behind). Anyone who still plays Counter-Strike better not say otherwise, because graphics obviously still don't make the overall game to y'all!

I feel like I'm going to hold off on the game for at least a month and see what the next couple of patches do for the game and how they satisfy the gaming community before I decide whether or not to take the dive and purchase this game. Thanks everyone for the help!

 

[Saist]

Really depends on how you grade the graphics...

Soldner is an extremely realistic game, and the weather affects do play a large role in the game, but there are a few cavets I will note.

Soldner is heavily optimized for Nvidia cards. You'll get noticably smoother framerate with Nvidia offerings than you will with ATi or S3 offerings.

Soldner also performs like molasses under WinXp 64-bit with ATi. The game struggled to maintain 30 frames a second with all details at 640*480 under Xp64 in adverse weather conditions. Confusingly, the game ran a little bit better in higher resolution. 1024*768 averaged about 5 frames more than 640*480. So maps that had only bright sun, ran fine, but any rain or snow, and performance dove to the ground.

Hooking up a GF-FX 5700 and GF4-4200 resulted in no such performance loss under Xp64. I was unable to test the DeltaChrome card as Xp64 will not boot with it at all.

As the complaints about it being a year behind? I don't think that's right. Graphically, I'd place the game alongside UT2k4 in most cases. It certainly looks better than BF1942 and Planetside, but most of the eye candy is in the shadows and enviroment affects. I will say Far Cry does look better, but then again, Far Cry is built on DX9 for it's best rendering path... Soldner seems to be DX8.1

Yeah, I'll agree that the game could use some more dev time, and I'll also agree to holding off on a purchase.

Unless your going in with a bunch of people at the same time and are planning on extensive multiplayer battles, Soldner isn't a real hot choice.