If you had mentioned titles like X-Com or Jagged Alliance 1 and 2 to me a few months ago, it would’ve conjured up fond memories of addictive, turn-based tactical action with a variety of weapons, enemies, characters, and attractive graphics (for the time those titles were popular) to top it all off. Mention those games to me now followed by a rant about how “nobody makes games like that anymore”, and I’ll drag you down to the nearest gaming retail store and point you to Silent Storm. Recently released to American customers (though it has been out for UK/German customers for some time now), Nival Interactive’s hot new strategy title shows that turn-based action doesn’t have to involve juggling a bunch of numbers and watching events play out with cheesy graphics completely beyond your direct control. In fact, Silent Storm may very well be one of the most graphically impressive titles I’ve ever seen for this particular genre. Mixing a heavy slant on tactics, some hardcore, brutal action, and even a few RPG elements, Silent Storm is a surprising breath of fresh air in a wave of mediocre and “standard” titles gamers have to put up with today.

The game, unfortunately, isn’t very strong on story, and I actually had to dig around quite a bit to discover exactly what the hell it’s all about, so don’t jump me if I got a few facts wrong. What I’ve garnered is that it takes place in some kind of “alternate history” storyline where the Allied and Axis forces are still fighting fiercely against each other long after World War 2 should have ended, and eventually the focus began to shift from larger armies to smaller specialized task forces. As new technologies and weapons are developed, the need to go deep behind enemy lines into impossible danger to obtain intelligence data is incredibly vast. The player takes command of a squad called “S2” under the employ of either Allied or Axis forces and embarks on a series of missions to uncover a terrible plot that threatens to overthrow the world as we know it. Uh, or something.

Yes, that’s right; players can choose to work for the two major factions in the game. When starting a new game, players are given a choice of three difficulty levels and the option of joining either the Allies or the Axis. While the difficulty levels only affect some basic game mechanics (as well as dictating what kind of save availability a player has available during the game - thank god the developers made this configurable for the end user rather than forcing a potentially crippling limited save system available), the two faction choices will give the player quite a different experience based on what he chooses. While the overall gameplay and storyline feel the same (the story revolves around a third party causing the entire ruckus, rather than a simple “Axis VS Allies” campaign), the dialogue and specific missions vary enough to make playing through from both sides a worthwhile experience. Plus, both factions have their share of unique characters up for grabs – you just can’t go wrong with Klaus. More on secondary characters in a moment.

Since this is a partial RPG, character creation plays a big factor. Fortunately, Nival Interactive hasn’t skimped on personalization options. Creating a character is a several-stage process where players select what gender, nationality, and class they want to be (there are six available; Soldier, Medic, Sniper, Engineer, Grenadier, and Scout), as well as define their basic attributes (Strength, affecting hit points and throwable weapon range, among other things, Dexterity, which affects accuracy with ranged weapons and overall speed, and Intelligence, which affects skill growth) and exact appearance of their character. They can even make their avatar into a British mafia trench coat type with huge goggles, long, flowing womanly hair, and an aged face full of scars and bruises – the system is just that flexible, which is really cool. Alternatively, players not wanting to bother with the insanely easy (and yet rewarding) personalization system can just opt to select a pre-made soldier and start playing. My first character, for the record, was a hardened Soldier-class whose turn-ons included ridiculous black-colored top hats, .50-caliber machineguns, and long walks on the beach in the morning. Once a character has been set up, the singleplayer campaign begins.

This is where things begin to diverge, as the opening missions for the player are different depending on if he’s playing for Allied or Axis forces. In either case, players begin the game solo with a small selection of weapons and tools to utilize and must complete the given objectives before moving on (this could either be a last-minute interception against an unknown enemy attack, or an attempted escape from an ambush). When the player finally breaks his way out of the mission zone, his next stop should be the headquarters building. Once he arrives there, he is given a basic introduction to all of the available facilities as he tours the base (with constant reminders to “Have a good war!” if the player is working for the Axis). The headquarters area contains an armory where players can stock up on implements of destruction (more are unlocked as the campaign progresses), a medical facility for healing critical wounds impacted on characters, and a central office, where players receive their initial orders to get them started in the campaign – and, most importantly, can browse personnel dossiers to recruit operatives to their cause. There is also a fourth area which is used for storage of “Panzerkleins” – huge, slightly unrealistic (just a little) walking battle armor, but this is locked until late in the game. More on Panzerkleins later.

As just mentioned, players are capable of hiring secondary characters to support their battles. A maximum of up to five other characters can be added to the active roster (for a total of six), but this by no means required to complete the game – in fact, some players may find it easier to play with a smaller group of more specialized commandos (because of the increased experience to compensate, which is divvied between existing characters). Whilst browsing from the available soldiers, players can easy check what class they are, their specific stats, background, medals (if any), and what equipment they begin with. Interestingly enough, it is entirely possible to swap out a secondary character for another, then go back and grab the first one again with all his stats and existing inventory in the same condition. If some extra equipment is desired, it is also possible to go through several characters on the roster, “strip” their equipment, and then give all this neat free loot to the player’s party – but that’s only for the desperate.

So essentially, you’ve gotten your posse kitted out, have received your initial orders, and are now ready to venture out into the world. What’s next? Exiting the headquarters are deposits the player at the campaign map, where he initially selects which sector he wants his party to travel to. Upon clicking in, he’s then treated to a zoomed map view of the area, showing his party’s current location, areas of interest (“mission zones”) on the map, and random encounters. Traveling to an area is as easy as clicking on a spot and waiting for the icon to march over (there’s no form of “active time”, so players can take as much time puttering around as they wish), then clicking directly on their location icon to venture into the relevant zone (though random encounters trigger a “zone entry” automatically upon contact). Alternatively, if the player clicks on his location icon in the middle of nowhere, he enters a kind of “camp zone”, where he can watch his party chill out for a bit and manage their inventory and skills. Otherwise, it’s right into the action!

As mentioned, Silent Storm is indeed a turn-based title, but when there is no danger nearby, the game operates in real time mode. In real-time mode, players are free to roam their characters around the terrain, exploring buildings, gathering items, and getting their party into position. Once a shot has been fired, however, the game automatically switches into turn-based mode, and the action begins. One brief complaint – the game doesn’t automatically switch itself into turn-based mode as soon as an enemy pops into visual range, which can sometimes cause an important party member to get massacred because some jerk ran around a corner and got a shot off before you could do anything. It’s possible to modify this with an easy-to-add tweak (set “game_tbs_on_enemy_spot” to “1.00” in config.cfg), but I found myself annoyed that this wasn’t enabled by default.

Anyways, once the game has switched into turn-based mode, all of the game’s RPG and tactical elements come into play. To understand this, players must comprehend that each character in his party has a number of attributes which affect his combat capabilities (as mentioned briefly earlier). Aside from the Strength, Intelligence, and Dexterity ratings, characters also have Action Points, Vitality, and Evasion stats, all of which affect combat in one manner or another. Action Points (or “APs”) obviously determine how many actions a character can perform in a single turn. Vitality equates to health, and Evasion is how effective a character is at dodging a hail of bullets whizzing past his head (a character with high Evasion would be the “Neo” of WW2). On top of that, there are also numerous skills that increase as a character utilizes specific abilities. “Hide” determines a character’s chances of not being detected when using the “Hide” action and trying to sneak up on someone. “Snipe” dictates how effective a character can use a rifle to hit a distant target. “Throwing” affects grenades and other tools which can be tossed (such as throwing knives, and yes, even the occasional shuriken – I’m serious). Adding even more to the complexity of the RPG aspect to the game are skill trees. Every time a character levels up by gaining sufficient experience, he can select a new skill out of this “tree”, which will enhance his combat capabilities. These skills are passive and always in effect, and cover basics such as improved handling of sub-machineguns, or the ability to devastate entire buildings with a single dinky frag grenade.

All of these elements come together to determine how a character handles in battle. While any character can effectively use any weapon (limitations only apply to specific items, such as high-powered demolition charges or advanced medical kits), a sniper who’s been using a Kar98 for a long time will completely suck using pistols or machineguns. Alternatively, a scout used to sneaking up behind enemies and beating them senseless with an oversized bat will be depressingly terrible at using sniper rifles. They can certainly do it, it’s just not recommended, as penalties for accuracy and AP usage will be incurred on account of their terrible skill. This CAN be turned around if a player works hard enough at it and practices a character’s skills constantly enough, but it will certainly take a lot of time and effort. On the other side of the spectrum, characters using weapons they’ve been specially trained to use will have a much better time in combat, and the effects will be obvious when you witness a grenadier hurling a small, round object halfway across the map, ending its trajectory in a torrent of explosive misery for the receiving party.