Pacific Storm
by Jason Lobo
Dec. 26, 2006
 First
Impressions
I was excited to get a review copy of Pacific Storm from Buka
Entertainment, a Russian based software company. The game concept is
absolutely a dream come true, the mixing of several game genres into one
massive game. I was curious how Pacific Storm would stack up to such
classics as the Great Naval Battles series, Pacific Fighters, and War in the
Pacific. With these games as my measuring stick, I started to play PS. I
installed the game and I was very impressed with the opening movie. Nothing
gets me more excited to play a game than a good intro movie, and Buka hits
the magazine with their intro. PS has an in-depth tutorial mode covering all
aspects of the different modes of the game and a very comprehensive manual.
The tutorial is a must! It helps explain the complicated camera movement
system, which took some practice.
Air sim: B-
 First
of all, this is not a hard-core flight-sim. There are damage bars, unlimited
ammo (which is re-loadable), and red/green triangles to track all the planes
in the sky. Buka made it clear that this is an "arcade-style" flight-sim, so
on that note, I cut them some slack. I liked the airplane selection. You can
fly a plethora of US and Japanese planes, from lowly scouts, such as the
OS2U Kingfisher, to the most massive bombers, B-29 Superfortress. Other
planes in the vast air arsenal include - Japanese: The classic Zero, the
Ki-43 Hayabusa, the exotic J7W Shinden, G4M Betty, D3A Val, B5N Kate, and
three types of scout planes. United States: Nine types of fighters, P-38,
P-39, P-40, and the P-80. Bombers include Dauntless, TBF Avenger, A-20,
B-25, B-17, and massive B-29. I tested the Pearl Harbor scenario, the Leyte
Gulf scenario, and the bombing of Nagasaki.
At Pearl Harbor, I was totally blown away at the level of
detail of the Pearl Harbor map. Buka spared no details here, there were
plenty of buildings, fuel tanks, and various other structures. The first
neat feature in the flight sim mode is that you can jump into any plane (on
your side) and fly from third person or from first person. The key layout
was very easy to use. You can easily move between pilot and gunner positions
of the plane using the numeric keypad. I jumped into a B5N Kate and dove at
the nearest battleship. As I closed, a torrent of flak came my way. I
watched my damage bar drop rapidly, the next think I knew, my
 plane
exploded and was spiraling towards the earth. Next plane! I jumped into
another Kate and headed towards Battleship Row. I dove down, lined up my
target, torpedoes away! I switched to third person and watched the torpedo
strike the battleship. I exited out of the plane, which was shot down five
seconds later, and switched to a Val dive-bomber. In third person, in the
bomber, there is a bomb reticule that shows when to drop the bomb load. I
found the air-sim AI to be fairly aggressive. The defending fighters pounced
on my incoming bombers and, in turn, my fighter escort valiantly fought off
the incoming fighters.
The Nagasaki mission is a very tough and surprising
mission. It's a good thing the Japanese didn't have any of these weapons at
their disposal during the actual mission, history might be different. In
this scenario, you face the highest point of the Japanese tech tree. You
start out with several waves of attacks before the B-29s arrive. In your
strike fighters, you must take out multiple flak sites, which are fiercely
defended by air cover. I quickly realized I was in a hornet's nest of top
line Japanese fighters. The next part of the mission was to eliminate
several surface to air missile sites. I turned my Hellcat to fly to the
target area, only to have it suddenly explode. There weren't any fighters
around, and there wasn't any flak -- SAMS! To say the least, I did not get very
close to the SAM sites. Enter the flight of B-29s. There are only three
Superfortresses and none can be lost. If the SAM sites didn't get taken out,
the mission ends really quickly. I never was able to drop "The Bomb."
Tactical: C-
 True
to Subsim form, the first vessels I went looking for were the subs. Pacific
Storm has an impressive armada of ships to choose from. The Japanese Fleet
consists of: the Zuikaku and Akagi aircraft carrier classes, the Nagato and
Yamato battleship classes, three heavy and light cruiser classes, such as
Mogami, three destroyer class, such as the Kagero, the B3 (I-58) class
submarine, and two types of merchant ships. Some of the featured ships in
the US Fleet are: The Lexington and Essex class aircraft carriers, the
Colorado and Iowa class battleships, three types of cruisers, such as the
Baltimore class, three types of destroyers, such as the Fletcher, the Gato
class submarine, and two types of supply ships. When you start a game, the
historical names of the ships will randomly be assigned. On one mission, I
sailed the legendary USS Barb and the next time I played, it was the
Cavalla.
I quickly created a small Japanese convoy, consisting of
two tankers and a destroyer in the Battle Planner. The Battle Planner was
very easy to use. I was very impressed with the choice and quality of the
maps. I picked my subs for my wolfpack; the Gato and the Cavalla then headed
out to sea. In the tactical mode, the game is more like an RTS game than a
sim. Point and click. You do have a limited first person control over the
secondary weapons (anti-aircraft guns), but you have no control over the
main weapon platforms of the ship. I was really disappointed that I could
not actually control the ship and main guns of the ships. Perhaps Buka's
goal was to have this aspect of the game to be an RTS and not a sim.
 I
clicked on the map and the sub automatically turned and sailed to that spot.
The subs also auto engaged the enemy, which they quickly destroyed. I let
one of the destroyers attack me. At periscope depth the destroyer made quick
work of my sub but at maximum depth, my sub slipped away. You only have 6
torpedoes to shoot until you need to reload. The reload time was horribly
slow (the game ended before I loaded a single torpedo), so choose your
targets wisely.
While the graphics are fairly good, I found the gameplay
options very limited and the AI seemed kind of iffy at times. I was somewhat
disappointed with this. I was surprised that the merchant ships made no
attempt to evade me, but sailed straight at me. The destroyers seemed to
know where I was, and fired at me until I went deep. The sub has three basic
settings: Surfaced, periscope depth, and maximum depth. To sum up the
attack, I clicked on the map, my sub sailed that way, and then I clicked on
a target, the sub attacked, scenario over. I was disappointed with the
narrow focus on this aspect of the gameplay but I don't think the designers
had subs in mind as a main feature when they designed the game.
Even within the team vs. team battle mode, there is actually a lot of
variation. Some games will be big fleet showdowns of a hundred players;
others will prohibit the use of torpedoes or exclude carriers, or will be
only for the capital ships. Some of the most rewarding and flexible play is
actually found in small but dynamic Destroyer vs. Destroyer skirmishes of
perhaps a dozen players.
I then played the Leyte Gulf engagement and experienced
PS in all of its glory. I started play with the US Task Force. I quickly
launched my scout planes and every carrier plane my computer processor could
handle. Hordes of Japanese fighters, dive bombers and torpedo planes were
boring in on my battle group. I selected one of my fighters and searched out
my first target. I started a head on pass with a Japanese fighter. We fired
at each other at the same time. My damage bar dropped to half and my
controls ceased to respond. I left that plane and found one of my scout
planes, which had reached the Japanese task force by now. My first scout
plane was taken out by the flak, so I jumped into the second. In third
person mode, you have a bombsite aiding you in your bombing run. I lined up
on the lead destroyer and let him have it. Missed! Two large splashes aft of
the destroyer! Back to flight school with me.
Enter the Yamato. with its cruiser entourage. They opened
fire on my task force, rapidly sending my lead destroyers to the bottom. I
quickly switched to my torpedo planes, which had reached the Japanese task
force. I jump into one plane, tracers and flak are whizzing all around the
canopy. WHACK, WHACK, WHACK, the torpedo bomber burst into flames and
spiraled into the ocean. I chose another torpedo bomber, lined up on a
destroyer... torpedoes away. Scratch one destroyer.
 There
are no reloads of your main ordinance, so I picked another bomber with a
torpedo. This time, I used the Japanese strategy, kamikaze. I picked
a target, and dived towards another destroyer. It hit me with its flak, but
too late. Ka-Boom! That evened the score for ship loses. Then I went after
the Yamato. My remaining destroyers launched a torpedo salvo against the
Yamato and the remainder of my torpedo bombers homed in on the mighty
battleship. Four torpedoes strike her. A torpedo found her magazine and
produced a fatal hit. Down went the Yamato.
Strategic: A
The campaign mode in Pacific Storm is where the propeller hits the water.
There are two types of campaign modes, one that starts pre-1941 and the
other starts at the beginning of the war. In the pre-war mode, you have
until late 1941 to have your country ready for war. I elected to play as the
Japanese and start in the pre-war mode. This is a free for all land grab. I
quickly captured Wake, Borneo, ant the Western Aleutians. One vital aspect
to the game is to maintain your supply lines. As in the real world, your
ships only have a limited sailing distance, so you need to build refueling
points (and defend them). Building a base is more than just capturing a
point on the map. In Pacific Storm, you need to build barracks, warehouses,
fuel storage facilities, base defenses, and an airfield.
 To
build all of that stuff, you need people, and a lot of them. You initially
need engineers to start the building process, but you also need to send
pilots, sailors, workers, and hero characters (such as Yamamoto) to maintain
the base. You need to advance your technologies, build your economy (which
is vast in this game), build and fortify bases. The technology tree is your
standard weapon evolution and improvement. Some of the more surprising
weapons in the tech tree are missile ranges, sonar jamming, and super
weapons- vis-a-vis nuclear bombs and biological bombs. This is where the
game takes a complicated turn. Fortunately, you can automate most of your
supply convoys.
In order to keep your government performing at top
efficiency, you have certain tasks to perform, and whether it's building a
bunker or invading an island, you need to move fast to keep on top of
everything. You can create an assortment of ammunition, such as the various
types of torpedoes.
 Once
you have your economy and forces strong enough, it's time to declare war.
Attack one of the enemy fortifications and it's game on. You will quickly
apply all of the skills learned in the flight-sim and tactical modes. When
you come in contact with the enemy, you can take command of the battle or
allow the computer to decide the battle. As much as I love PS campaign mode
concept, after about an hour, I found myself totally overwhelmed with things
to manage. I wish they made some smaller campaign modes, such as the
Guadalcanal campaign. I think this would have been a good learning campaign,
and easier to manage. One good side to the campaign mode is the time
compression. You can make the game go as fast or as slow as you like, which
is nice when you have task forces sailing very long distances. PS has a wide
range of upgrades in their technology tree. From lowly concrete bunkers to
nuclear and biological weapons.
For those of you who'd rather mod Pacific Storm than play
it, this looks like this is a great fit for you. It seems to me that Buka is
very accommodating to modders. I had no problems with multiplayer.
Multiplayer was pretty straight forward and easy to use. I had no problems
connecting on my LAN. The basic multiplayer modes are instant air action,
where you start out on your carrier or island. You are both fairly close to
each other, so you don't spend hours looking for each other. You can also
engage in surface action. One of the plus sides is that you can add AI
players and play in co-operative mode.
 I
was disappointed with the game sounds and gunfire graphics. I really felt
like they decided to cut corners there and let the "community" come up with
their own sounds. While I really enjoyed the game music, I felt some of the
music fit a spy-hunter type game and not a World War Two game. Another
downside was I had several program crashes. The biggest disappointment I
found with the game was the lack of greater control over the surface ships.
I would have really graded the tactical mode higher if you could exercise
greater control over the ship than just the anti-aircraft guns and the
direction it sails.
Overall Grade: B
Pacific Storm is a very enjoyable game, despite its initial learning curve
and occasional game crashes. I feel the game hits the bulls-eye with the
wide range of planes you can fly, the quick mission generator, and the vast
scope of the tactical campaign mode. There is such a wide range of
possibilities of gameplay; I think an interested player will be able to
wring a lot of repeat play from Pacific Storm.
Rating:
81
| Realism |
Historical Accuracy |
Graphics |
Sound/
Music |
Game
play |
Repeat
Play |
Stability
/Bugs |
Multi-
play |
Mission
Editor |
| 14/20 |
8/10 |
8/10 |
5/10 |
17/20 |
10/10 |
5/10 |
4/5 |
5/5 |
| BONUS: +5 website &
mod support |
Publisher:
Buka Entertainment/ CDV
Software Entertainment
Developer:
Lesta Studio
| |
SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS: Intel Pentium 4 2400 MHz or similar.
Active memory: 768 Мb Video: 3D speed-increase unit (GeForce
FX5600 or Radeon 9600), 128Мb HDD capacity: 1500Мb Remote
control units: keyboard, mouse, joystick Operating system:
Windows 2000, XP DirectX: 9.0b and higher; Sound: any DirectX
compatible sound card; Joystick |
 |
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