SOCOM: Special Forces Multiplayer Beta Impressions
The SOCOM series has always been best known for its genre-defining competitive multiplayer, and the upcoming PS3 exclusive, SOCOM: Special Forces, has set itself up to be the ultimate SOCOM experience.
What can be instantly said about SOCOM: Special Forces are its surprisingly solid graphics. Despite the size of the multiplayer matches, there are no issues involving framerate or lagging. As far as the beta is concerned, it’s the ‘Assault and Battery’ map that presents the full extent of the graphics, mixing bright and dense jungle scenery with dark, concrete/urban locations and textures. Audio is used very well in SOCOM: Special Forces as well; gunshots echoing through the air, explosions’ booming in the foreground, soldiers dying and screaming orders from every direction only enhances the authenticity of being inside a battlefield.
Greatest success in SOCOM: Special Forces strive on one thing; strategy. Unlike the majority of other online multiplayer shooters, going in with all guns blazing and getting the most kill streaks before getting wiped out yourself, SOCOM has delivered game modes that encourages you to make absolute use of your weapons, environments, and your teammates. In the beta, there are four different competitive game modes; Suppression (Team Deathmatch), Last Defence (capture the flag style mode), Uplink (collecting enemy Intel), and a brand-new game mode to the franchise, Bomb Squad. These game modes can be played in two different maps that initially came with the beta; ‘Port Authority’, a naval port filled with shipping containers and warehouses, and ‘Assault and Battery’, an abandoned coastal fort. My personal favourite was ‘Assault and Battery’, and it’s not just because of its mix of environments showcasing the games graphics already mentioned. But the map also combines concrete warfare with dense jungles and greenery, which gives excellent opportunity to deploy a mix of strategies; watch towers for snipers, dense jungles and dark corners for people who prefer to scout and go for recon gameplay, and plenty of objects and cover in the environments for intense shoot-outs between soldiers (speaking of cover, SOCOM’s cover system is easy to use, and on so many occasions is life-saving). It’s simple, no one is safe, and only adds to players needing to keep on their toes and thinking before acting.
Please note that other maps will be added to the full-price retail release, including Cesspool, a map that can be located in the games main campaign, and Von Heine Express, a makeshift military base in Southeast Asia, inspired by the classic SOCOM 2 map, Fox Hunt.
Even though the Team Deathmatch mode titled Suppression does not seem to be the most strategic of squad-based game modes, you do have the option to play a game with standard SOCOM settings. Basically, once you are killed, that’s it, no re-spawn, nothing, just the chance to switch between your squad-members cameras and see how better they do compared to you. On many occasions this has still saved lives, as people who have already been gunned down can looked out for their remaining squad-members as commentators through headsets. These alternate standard SOCOM settings are also available on all game modes.
The newest game mode to the SOCOM series is Bomb Squad. In this ‘Hurt Locker-style’ mode, working as part of a team and deploying a certain strategy is key to victory. In Bomb Squad, one of your teammates is allocated as a bomb technician, who is the only one that can defuse three bombs that are scattered around the map. So it is the job of the bomb technician’s fellow teammates to escort them to each bomb and defuse them before the time runs out. Bomb Squad can be pretty intense as either team fight each other off, and it really brings allies together co-operatively, resulting in Bomb Squad being a welcoming addition to SOCOM.
What I appreciate the most about SOCOM: Special Forces, is that it broadens out to a wider audience. With game modes that can have standard SOCOM settings, as well as the option to have less challenging rules, makes the game accessible to hardcore gamers and fans of the franchise, as well as people who are not as experienced in squad-based multiplayer shooters. Controls in the game goes for the same intention; many of the buttons have your bog-standard configurations to most other PS3 shooters; L1 aims/readies your weapon and R1 to shoot, Square to reload, R2 to throw grenades etc.
Instantly playing the game I was not fond of the third-person aiming and shooting, which reminded me of ‘Kane and Lynch’ style inaccuracy, leading to me getting gunned down so many times despite my efforts. This made me feel more like I was ‘spraying-and-praying’ then actually going out of my way in getting a headshot. I then discovered by simply pressing R3 whilst aiming allows you to zoom in and look down the sights of your equipped weapon, just like a FPS, allowing the player to aim at an impressively accurate rate, in comparison to the third-person aiming mode. This is another example in how SOCOM: Special Forces reach out to different gamers who have certain preferences in how to play, whether it’s third-person or first-person mode.
Of course the highlight of SOCOM: Special Forces control configurations is its Playstation Move compatibility. Although it brings a completely new gaming experience, it is not up to scratch with other online shooters such as Killzone 3. Your character can sometimes be difficult to move, and when you have a squad of online gamers baying for your blood, you can’t really make time for mistakes. Despite saying this, the aiming works brilliantly well; picking off a squad of enemies with your sniper is particularly satisfying. If I had to decide though, stick with the Playstation Move for the single-player campaign when the full game is released, unless you want to put the time in to master the controls.
In regards to weapons they are very basic to start off with; Assault Rifles, Shotguns, Sniper Rifles… you get the gist. However the progress you make on particular weapons (i.e. how many enemies you kill with them) allows you to unlock new modifications to that particular weapon, including scope sights, extended ammunition, and new grips for increased accuracy and decreased recoil. This delivers an incentive to make the absolute most of the weapons you have at your disposal. Alongside these modifications, as well as unlocking completely new weapons by simply ranking up, SOCOM: Special Forces delivers an excellent array of weapons that can be mixed and matched to your preferred plan of action, without worrying about what kind of class you are. So even ‘noobing’ it out to start with; playing enough to earn upgrades and new artillery will give you more of an edge in the battlefield every time you progress.
Even before entering the battlefield for a match, you are allowed to customise your load out and the appearance of your character. And this customisation is allowed every time you are killed, allowing you to change your weapons and figure out what is best to use against your enemy.
The ranking system itself is what you pretty much expect from any other online multiplayer shooter. As well as a status bar that shows what rank you are and how many experience points you require to rank up, you can also earn medals for achieving certain feats, and of course results in bonus experience points. These medals are separated into three different tiers. Tier 1 being the more simple achievements, like 3 kill streaks or achieving 10 kills in one match. And, of course, tier 3 are the most advanced challenges, such as 10 melee kills in one match, and (the worst) 25 kills at a 75% accuracy rate with a Sniper Rifle. OUCH!
The verdict: solid graphics, good mix of controls, excellent arrays of weapons and creative competitive game modes mixed with well-constructed maps makes SOCOM: Special Forces a brilliant experience for both new-comers and hardened SOCOM fans alike. My only dislikes is the sometimes annoying controls on the Playstation Move, and no online party system, despite clans in the game being existent.
The beta was released on the 23rd March 2011, exclusively to Playstation Plus users, after a select number of beta testers already had it out in the online battlefield since the 15th.
All members of the Playstation Network can join the multiplayer beta from April 6th. SOCOM: Special Forces will be released on retail on April 22nd 2011.
If you’ve never been interested in SOCOM before, NOW IS THE TIME!
