SOCOM: Confrontation - Day 1 Impressions

Well, it's official - the season of gaming officially began yesterday (at least for me) with the release of SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Confrontation for the PS3.  This game continues a franchise dating back to who knows when for Sony, and continues to ramp up the game to current-generation levels.  The game is a over-the-shoulder FPS (guess that's an oxymoron...well, has first-person view through the scope ) pitting a team of military professionals against mercenaries in an all out war right in your own living room.

The Good

The game is simply gorgeous.  The level design and detail exude time and dedication needed to create them, both in their scope (some of the levels are BIG) and the level of detail all over the place.  Textures are crisp, and colors pop off the screen.  Dynamic lighting is great, and there are different times of day to fight in which makes a big difference in your overall gameplay - or at least it did for me.  Fighting at night is much more challenging as shadows creep into areas that were visible before, and ambushs all the more prevalent.  Finally, the physics of the game are spot on with nice ragdoll characters to shoot and blow up.  One special moment last night that stands out was me catching someone climbing up a ladder with a grenade launcher round.  As he died, the foot of the character got caught in one of the rungs of the ladder, and he proceeded to dangle upside down for a few minutes of the game.  Oh how I wish the in-game screenshot capability was in (more on that in a second).

The sound for the game matches the graphics step by step.  Weapons fire sound authentic, and distance is accurately modeled in the game.  Hell, I was even able to tell elevation based on the sound effects that came during the firefight.  Explosions via the M203 grenade launcher or claymores had a good punch to them, and did equal amounts of damage to the unfortunate few I caught with the blasts.  Then there is the chat - my oh my do I love the chat.  The game employs a mix of open mic and push-to-talk that works perfectly!  You always have your mic open (unless its muted, of course) for proximity chat.  That means that friends or foe, if they are near you and you're blabbing into the mic, they'll hear you.  Does this matter?  HELL YA!  Yesterday I was able to locate a Timmie who was hiding while yelling at his mom that his homework was done and he wasn't hungry (guess it was dinner time).  A frag made him reconsider his meal options. 

Finally, and the main reason I bought the game, was the new BT headset it came bundled with.  For $60, not only do you get a pretty solid title, but you also get an updated BT headset designed especially for the PS3.  It has some neat features both at release and to be built into future games, so for those without a wireless option, this was a no-brainer.  The unit was a little uncomfortable from the start, but after a while it started to break in (or I just got too engaged in the gameplay).  Sound was great, with little to no static from my teammates.  Two thumbs up for the little piece of hardware.

The Bad

Only a few items of note here.  First and foremost, the launch of the game was paired with a firmware update to the console.  That is never a good thing, and yesterday wasn't much of an exception.  Granted, I was still able to play prior to the update, but having that looming over head - and more importantly some important features for the game tied to it - was a bad decision.  Lag wasn't all that bad, but still noticable while navigating through the menu screens.  Once I got into game, it was gone, but it makes me a little wary what things will be like when the masses out there get their games tonight.

The Ugly

Here we get to a rant, so brace yourself.  I am so sick and fucking tired of developers over-promising on their games.  Nothing, and I mean nothing, turns me off more than getting a game thinking it will have X, Y, or Z in it, and then to only find out that those pieces will become available with a patch in the who-knows-how-distant future.  SOCOM falls prey to this as well, missing critical features like follow-a-friend into a game, to the vast majority of the clan support (calendar, tournaments, etc).  Additionally, the stats were broken last night, not recording most of my games ... and coincentally the onces I did better than normal in.  Go figure.  All in all, the game should have been pushed a week or two to get those items in the game upon release, but I understand with the season we are in, that would have been financial suicide for the title.

So final verdict - I'm glad I got it, and would get it again today if I didn't yesterday.  I see some good times for the 2old2resist clan in the near future, and hopefully long term.