The first things you'll notice about this game are the excellent graphics. This is the best looking game in the turn based combat genre.
I highlight combat here, though the game has RPG elements its all about turn based combat.
The makers of this game tried to add some flavor to the combat by adding a homebase where you can walk around and also they make it so your group travels to regions and has to travel around on a map, where there may be random encounters, before they reach their main objective.
This portion of the game is weak, it doesnt make you feel anymore involved in the game takes up time and personally the homebase and its stupid dialogue and cartoonish nature detracted from the game for me.
So in that regard Silent Storm failed where other games in the genre have succeeded. X-Com made you feel that you were commanding some grand defense against the aliens, Jagged Alliance 2 made freeing Arulco and capturing terrority important and rewarding. Unfortunately Silent Storm doesnt create the feeling that your missions are important.
Speaking of Jagged Alliance 2 and X-Com, if you're familar with that game Silent Storm basically used the combat system from Jagged Alliance 2(which in turn borrowed liberally from X-Com).
Dont get me wrong this isnt a bad thing at all, why reinvent the wheel if things work well?
So what we're left to discuss is the combat. If you love turn based combat, this will blow you away, the graphics help to pull you into the game, and the varied effects are good. The AI is definitely superior to JA2 and X-Com which is very good news as in those games enemies would often act incredibly retarded.
Enemies in this game are darn smart, often aware of the fact that they can poke their nose out take a shot then hide where you cant see them.
Almost too smart, like when you raid an Allied base, theres a holy heck firefight going on outside and the people who are in a good position to get you once you go inside the base maintain their positions.
Thats good but this level of difficulty also adds frustration to the game. On Normal difficulty theres no saving when you're in the mission.
I dont care how good you play, how cautious you are, an enemy is going to be able to shoot at you without you even seeing him, some enemy is going to be in an awkward position and is going to unload a clip at you at short range.
These things happen in X-Com and Ja2, but if you played a smart strategy in these two games it seemed like it happened much more rarely. In Silent Storm even if you play tactically very well, the way the levels are designed you're going to die, and get frustrated A LOT.
Theres a fine line between a great hard challenge and tedious frustration and unfortunately Silent Storm often crosses it.
In that sense the levels feel over designed if you know what I mean. I personally dont care for levels that feel like they're designed to add a level of difficulty to the game rather than designed to be accurate.
Would an Allied wharehouse have snipers stationed on the roof? Yes. Would an Allied base have snipers on the second floor of the base looking inside the base? No of course not.
Some of the dialogues are good, but often they dont make much sense or are a bit cheesy and you'll definitely get tired of some of them after a while. However the game is definitely better with them than without them.
That covers it all, let me end by saying if you absolutely loved the combat and tension in X-Com and JA2 you will love this game. If you're a FPS junkie and always got bored with turn based games, this isnt going to be the game to win you over to turn-based combat games.
This game could have been great the graphics certainly help out a game that is lacking in some areas. However as it stands its a pretty good turn based game. You're guaranteed to swear at this game at least once if you buy it!
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