SOCOM U.S. Navy SEALs Combined Assault

Review - The complete package?

It is hard to quantify how important the SOCOM series has been for the PlayStation brand, particularly in relation to the PlayStation 2's online capabilities. Although others had ventured beyond the realms of a single console into internet play before it (most notably Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3), with its multiplayer battles SOCOM U.S. Navy SEALs was the first to really set the benchmark for any that followed it, despite the abundance of cheating players. After four years and two further sequels we arrive at SOCOM U.S. Navy SEALs Combined Assault, almost definitely the last in the series to appear on Sony's last-generation platform. As a farewell we get nothing close to the progressive steps realised in earlier iterations, but a title that gives more of the same, and just perhaps is beginning to show its age.

For starters, the main campaign mode isn't quite as compelling as you might have hoped, particularly if you've followed the series all the way up to SOCOM 3 - a title that successfully managed to blend continuous immersive team play with a cohesive single player narrative. The plotline isn't as engaging either: set a couple of years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the former Adjikistani Socialist Republic has finally gained its independence. However, the newly appointed president, Ismail Karim is suspected to be up to no good, an inkling that rings true after US Navy SEALs are sent to the region to inspect reports that one of their helicopters has been gunned down. This investigation leads to further distressing signs within the republic, including concentration camps and kidnappings. You know then that it's time to get your hands dirty.

Unlike previous entries in the series, Combined Assault allows you to pick and choose the order in which you take up missions. Although the sense of freedom this allows is gratifying, it's probably also the reason why the single player campaign ends up feeling rather disjointed as a whole, a bit like filling in a jigsaw puzzle by starting in the middle and working your way outwards, instead of - as everybody knows - starting with the corner and edges and solving the puzzle that way. Compounding this sense of irregularity are the levels themselves. Although expansive in size and leaving you free to explore them as you wish, it's always pretty obvious from your tactical map how each would best be approached. All that said, you can't really croak at 18 missions that take you through wildly varying environments from the beachy coast to mountain peaks, and for the most part, both the level structure and the missions they contain are well designed as you sneak and shoot your way across them.

Some of the in-mission elements are a little rusty mind you, certainly enough to blip your enjoyment of the game. Whether it's the dodgy AI of your team (getting caught behind simple obstacle, misinterpreting orders, or losing them completely) or the foolish enemy AI that really shows its age in close combat - often running towards you in a manner that harks back to GoldenEye on the Nintendo 64 - very nearly ten years ago! Sometimes they actually appear to be clever in the way they pick you off, but cumulatively the impression is that they just got lucky with their positioning.

Of course, though, much of the appeal of SOCOM is its online multiplayer mode, in which, thankfully AI is less of a problem. Combined Assault offers a number of different options for human participants, including the generic "diffuse the bomb" and "rescue the hostage" missions across the maps on offer. In addition there's the chance to play through the single player campaign with up to three other connected players. It's certainly a lot more enjoyable than having to handle it with a gaggle of incompetent computer-controlled troops, but since many of the missions are built around one person being capable of doing the lion's share of work, your real-life virtual companions (you know what we mean) might feel a little left out.

There's no such isolation in the classic multiplayer modes on offer, though, with room for up to 32 players to battle it out competitively across 7 game modes and 22 maps. Best of all, Combined Assault is compatible with SOCOM 3, meaning that owners of either game can instantly fight it out against one another. There's leaderboards, clan-building and friends lists, so even if you've bled the offline game to death, there's plenty of longevity on offer afterwards.

Visually, Combined Assault isn't as impressive as its immediate predecessor, perhaps because we're now jaded by the glitz of next-generation offerings. Either way, collision detection issues and a lack of detail in the environment close-up are sure signs that the PlayStation 2 is largely losing its competitive streak when it comes to blowing us all away with its graphical power. That said, the frame rate rarely drops despite the expansive environment and the character models are all particularly well drawn. In contrast, sound is an area where Sony's ageing console can still compete, and as has been a staple in the series thus far, SOCOM still manages to pull of the whiz bang of life in combat superbly, particularly if aided with surround sound. Mmm.

So, more a SOCOM 3.5 rather than a full-blown sequel, Combined Assault both improves on what the franchise has always done well in its execution of multiplayer action, but highlights the shortcomings with the single player mode as a result. It's hard to recommend Combined Assault on the basis of the single player campaign alone, but for more of the same compressive, console-based online multiplayer action, you'd be hard pressed to find much better on the PlayStation 2.

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