Tom Clancys End War

Preview from Jae - Friday, 31 October 2008 @ 8:34am

How many times have we all watched an episode of a quirky sitcom where someone wishes that whatever they say would come true? This then bites them back in the bum because everything they say is taken literally. Hilarity ensues. Check out Buffy 4x09 Something Blue and Angel 5x05 Life of the Party to see tasteful examples of this. Anyway the point I’m getting to is the power of the word is strong. What comes out of your mouth can have life changing impacts. Funnily enough what goes into your mouth just ends up as shit. Which is far from what Tom Clancy’s End War is looking to be. Taking facts and fiction from many of the Tom Clancy editions End War will mark it’s territory into the real time strategy genre. Kind of like what Halo has done by digressing from its FPS popularity. This biggest feature with End War is its voice activated control. My brothers over in Ubisoft Shanghai have been working hard on this title readying it for this shopping season.

In the past week I’ve had to call a dozen large companies to switch over some account details with the likes of Telstra, Optus, Foxtel, Synergy and XXX sexscribe. Many of these hotlines start of with “In just a few words please say the reason for your call.” Well if I could say it in a few words I wouldn’t be ringing you up! I find these systems awkward to use but surprisingly reliable. Technology today has become so advanced that electronics can analyse your speech and convert it into a language that they can understand. I’ve always wondered what would happen if you call up Telstra’s voice system and have an enquiry about elephants or spandex. PM me if you do. Back to the point. End War is a tactics based real time game which has you barking orders, military style, to your troops to conquer the land. In the past RTS genre has suffered on gaming consoles as you can’t react quickly and accurately enough to situations on the battle field.

The first voice operated game I ever got into was Socom on the PS2. It’s usage wasn’t heavy like End War, it worked most of the time. Then I realised I didn’t like Socom so I only ever used the headset again when pretending to be a telephone operator when I played with myself in my room. What I did notice when playing Socom with the microphone was the difficulty in it understanding my commands. In the End War event I attended we had Vinh Dieu Lam, Lead Programmer for the game and no relation to me, do a play through of a preview build. Can’t say he was the best public speaker, which made it a perfect test to see if the voice controls were accurate enough. Vinh mumbled which I thought would be hard for the game to pick up on but oddly enough his commands were well received. Then later on when he had to give complicated 5 step commands the system wouldn’t understand. I’d say the technology has a little further to go. I’d compare this to the Wii’s motion plus. Right now the motion sensing is fine but could be more precise. What End War may need is the equivalent of a motion plus in the ways of voice recognition software. It’s a pity that the game’s prominent feature is mildly flawed by current technology. This of course is just based off the preview. Perhaps clearer speaking players, such as yourselves, would have a better chance of accurate commands.

One thing you’ll want to go back and revise, from your military days, is your alphabet. B is bravo and C is charlie. That’s pretty much all I know. On a level you may have 5, 6, 7 or more towers in which you need to gain control of. Each tower will have a letter by which you refer to it with. So perk up those vocals and give it your best Lima, Sigma or Omega! I hope this thing comes with a manual that will tell me each letter in military speak.

There are three main factions that are fighting for what seems to be a scarcity of petrol. You have the super power America who are ignorant of anyone that doesn’t emphasise the “R” in woRds, Europe and Russia. I know, I know, where’s China? You’d think one of the world’s super nations would be in this affair. Taking place in both Europe and America the battle fields are made up to look like recognisable landscapes of each nation.

Being the first of it’s kind, to accurately get voice recognition working fairly well, End War looks promising for best console RTS. Perhaps we’re only a decade or two away from mind controlled RTS games. A seemingly surreal idea right now which can be the way we play soon. Here’s hoping. In the mean time RTS by voice recognition will have to do. End War is due for release on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 this November.