EndWar

Reagan's Star Wars on steroids.

Occasionally a game rolls around that is designed to showcase a new piece of technology.  Endwar shows off the revolutionary Overlord voice-recognition software.  The player uses voice commands to control ground troops.

Endwar: Bringing hands-free technology to games.

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Recommended Age Minimum Age Available On... 12 8 PS3, Xbox 360, PC, Overall Fun Length Frustration   Violence Sexuality Substances Gambling 6 3 4   5 0 0 0 Mods Religion Anti-Law Community Sports Magic Miscellaneous 0 0 0 3 0 0 2

1.     Gameplay

• Overall Fun - 6

Have you ever seen any science fiction movies where a human commander is able to give commands to his robot troops simply through voice commands?  Have you ever wanted to do that?  Here’s your opportunity.  Tom Clancy’s EndWar is a real-time strategy game that is built around the idea that the player should not have to use their hands in order to control the troops.  Instead of requiring a keyboard or a controller, the player gets to speak simple commands and the designated units obey those commands.

Systems like this have been attempted in the past but they’ve almost all fallen completely flat.  It’s extremely difficult to design a voice-recognition system that can quickly obey specific commands, but that same system is made even more complicated by the fact that there are a multitude of languages spoken around the world and within those languages a multitude of accents.

The new “Overlord” voice-recognition technology that is used in EndWar takes all of that into account.  Not only does it support different languages (English, French, Italian, etc.) but it also supports different accents.  This means that a gamer from the deep South will have the same gameplay experience as a player from the Midwest or West Coast.

The detail the developers put into random aspects of this game is surprising.

After playing this game extensively I can testify to the fact that the voice recognition technology is superb.  After I calibrated the volume on my microphone I hardly ever ran into any problems.  The only times I really had issues were when I was causing a problem.  If I slurred my speech or gave an incorrect command, sometimes the computer would say “Unable to comply”, but these were normally rare occurrences.

While the voice recognition technology was great, players will have to use the mouse or controller for some basic tasks.  Designating that a unit move to or attack a “target” meant that the target had to be designated using the cursor.  Normal enemy troops had a designated number (i.e. “Hostile 1”), but sometimes random map-based troops would not have such a number, which would mean that the player would be required to manually designate when a unit should attack that specific target.

Fortunately, all of the more powerful enemies have a designated number.

The only major problem I had with the game was the fact that the entire thing was barely a “game”.  I associate games, especially ones with a single-player campaign, as having some sort of storyline that the player has to accomplish via specific smaller goals and benchmarks.  EndWar had a basic storyline but it might as well have not been included at all.  The player picks one of three sides and goes out to conquer the other two.  That’s the entire story in a nutshell.

EndWar is an excellent showcase for a new piece of technology.  It clearly demonstrates how voice-recognition can and should be included into more games.  Unfortunately, I consider this barely a “game” at best.  If you manage to find it for less than $20, by all means pick it up.  Otherwise, rent it or borrow it from a friend.  It’s definitely worth trying.

• Length - 3

The single-player campaign consists of a large number of missions with different scenarios but in the end they all feel exactly the same.  You’ll go forward and either capture a majority of the “control points” or defeat the enemy’s army.  That’s it.  The only reason this game gets long is when the “WMDs” come into play.  That is explained in more detail in the “Frustration Factor” section below.

There are a number of online game modes including a sort of internet-based campaign.  However, I found the online gameplay even more boring than the single-player campaign.  I tried a few matches but the overall feel was so slow that I switched back to the single-player campaign and haven’t had a desire to try the online mode again.

• Frustration Factor - 4

I was surprised at how few problems I ran into with this game.  The voice recognition software runs almost flawlessly as long as the volume was at the correct level and I was speaking clearly.  So in terms of the smoothness of the technology, this game is nearly flawless.

However, the way that the matches are set up can be unbelievably frustrating.  Most matches will pit two players against each other.  Each player has to capture a majority of the “control nodes” and hold those nodes for about 5 minutes.  After that 5 minute period is up, the majority-controlling player wins.  If either player loses all of their troops and all of the “resources” used to call in more troops, that player loses and the other player is victorious.

There’s a catch though.  If one player captures the majority of the nodes, the other player has the opportunity to use a “WMD”, which is basically a nuclear strike.  This means that the winning player has to spread his troops out so that when he captures the one node that would push him into “majority” territory, the enemy player cannot call down the WMD and wipe out the winning player’s entire army.  This happened to me on more than one occasion and it’s unbelievably frustrating.  Suddenly I was going from steamrolling the enemy to barely clinging to life even against a supposedly easy opponent.

Well, there goes most of my army. Again.

The WMD element is an excellent way to keep the match balanced but it should have been done in some other way.

2.     Parental Notices

• Violence - 5

This game is an extremely slow tactical game.  Players will line up their units then send them off to battle in oversimplified, non-graphic violence.

It's the violence of a good chess game, but with some added explosions.

Even when players have ground forces fight against anything, only a small amount of blood is ever shown and no gore ever occurs.  Dead units will disappear quickly.

Finding the blood in this picture is like finding Waldo in a crowd.

Most of the combat is vehicle against vehicle, so explosions will happen.  However, the energy that normally comes from combat is completely lacking in the voices of the units.  This is an absurdly mild game overall almost to a fault.

• Sexuality - 0

Sexuality is not a factor in this game.

• Substances - 0

Substances are not a factor in this game.

• Gambling - 0

Gambling is not a factor in this game.

3.     Other Factors

• Mods - 0

There are no modding tools for this game.

• Religion - 0

In the campaign one of the news flashes mentions that the Pope has called for an end to the violence.  Other than that, religion is not a factor in this game.

• Anti-Law - 0

The Russians pay terrorists to attack the United States, European Union, and themselves.  While this would normally be illegal under international laws that are enforced by the United Nations, for some reason the UN doesn’t seem to exist in this game.  Therefore, anti-law is not a factor in this game.

• Online Community - 3

The online community for this game is filled with veterans who really love EndWar and the way that the game plays or new players just testing the waters.  I never played with a pre-designated party, but teamwork is absolutely essential in beating an opponent.  If a player has competent teammates who understand the “rock-paper-scissors” type gameplay, that team will usually win.  Since the community had to focus their voices on giving commands and not on trash-talking, the overall feel was a fairly nice change of pace.

• Extreme Sports - 0

Extreme sports are not a factor in this game.

• Magic - 0

Magic is not a factor in this game.

• Miscellaneous - 2

Weapons of Mass Destruction

The premise of the game is that the oil fields of the Middle East were destroyed by nuclear warfare.  As a result, Russia becomes the world’s largest exporter of oil.

Why would anyone nuke the desert?

The player also has the opportunity to use “WMDs” during almost every match.  The actual weapon is some sort of satellite-based kinetic missile.

Terrorism

The entire war starts because terrorists attack key installations for the three largest superpowers.  The European target was a major oil refinery that, if destroyed, would have had a huge impact on the economy of the world.  The United States target was the launch station of the Space Shuttle in Florida.

NASA is still doing things? Definitely a fantasy world.

The terrorists strike the United States again by hacking into a European anti-missile space satellite.  The satellite destroys the space shuttle as it takes off, killing every astronaut on board.  The United States takes these actions as a declaration of war and use it as justification to attack the Europeans.

Fortunately, the younger generation will not understand this reference at all.