Starship Troopers (2005 computer game)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
|
| Developer: | Strangelite |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Empire Interactive |
| Platform/Format: | PC DVD-ROM |
Starship Troopers is a First Person Shooter developed by Strangelite Studios and published by Empire Interactive based upon the film of the same name by Paul Verhoeven. Set five years after the events of the film, players assume the role of 'Marauder Zero Six' as they assault the planet Hesperus which has been invaded by the Arachnids. The game is built with Strangelite's 'SWARM' engine of which not much is known about other than it is DirectX 9 capable. The game features footage from both Starship Troopers films for pre mission briefings and has brief voiceovers from Casper Van Dien.
Contents |
[edit] Singleplayer
Singleplayer in Starship Troopers consists of two modes, one is a timed one while the other is the Campaign mode. The campaign mode brings you to the game as playing the lead of the character. You play as a marauder which means you are one of the highest ranked soldier. The game features a lot of stages where the player can play and you get to fight against a lot of bugs. The game is pretty long and hard due to that there are lots of enemy bugs at once although the bugs have a low graphics at far range even if all the video options are set into its maximum performance.
[edit] Multiplayer
Multiplayer in Starship Troopers consists of three different modes; Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch and Co-op. The most popular mode is Co-op which sees players defending a mechanic from onslaughts of arachnids whilst retrieving parts to repair a dropship to escape in. Promised dedicated server binaries and mod tools were never released and along with the closing of the official English forums player numbers have fallen. Another problem is that the game lacks any administrative commands which makes it impossible to kick a misbehaving player for example. Lastly as the balancing of the weapons favours co-op play this means that deathmatch play isn't very competitive. A player who picks up the rocket launcher is likely to dominate for example.
Patches released for the game mainly focused upon improving bringing the game's multiplayer mode. The latest, version 5.24 released in December 2005, introduced 4 new DM/TDM maps and 3 new co-op maps. The network and lobby functions of Starship Troopers are provided by DemonWare.
[edit] Easter Eggs
When attempting to throw a grenade (which usually appears with a face and, in English, begins a countdown) sometimes it will appear as usual, but begin a countdown that sounds like German but has no logical numerical pattern.
On mission 3 if the player walks into the storage area to the left at the back of the outpost, the player can see and hear a Trooper grieving over the situation, stating he wants to return to Earth, does not want to be a citizen and does not want to die.
[edit] Critical Reaction
The game was shunned by most critics, receiving a score of 3.8 (out of 10) on GameSpot and a 5 (out of 10) from IGN, with both sites stating technical issues, problems with the AI and archaic graphics the reason for the low score.
[edit] Minimum System Requirements
As read from the box :
- Windows XP or Windows 2000 Service Pack 4.
- 2.0Ghz processor.
- 4GB of free hard disk space.
- 512MB RAM.
- DVD-ROM drive 8x.
- 128MB videocard with hardware Vertex & Pixel shaders.
- DirectX 9.0c compatible soundcard.
- 512 Kbps or greater internet for online play or TCP/IP network for LAN play (2 to 32 players).
