Field Commander

Reviewed by Leland Bonaparte
July 12, 2006

Developer: Sony Online Entertainment Publisher: Sony Online Entertainment Website: Click Here Consoles Available: PSP Number of Players: 1 to 2 multiplayer infrastructure ESRB Rating: Teen

Every now and then there comes a game that makes you forget about the ones you already own. Not since Red Alert: Command and Conquer has a military game been this enjoyable. The highly anticipated Advance War killer aspirer, Field Commander, is ready to take control and accomplish the mission.

Grunt ambush. Courtesy SOE. Click to enlarge.

One of the first things that you notice is the beautiful graphics. The attention to detail is one of the focal points of the game. Battlefields are very detailed and units are easy to see. Units on the ground blend in with their surrounding quite easily. Special effects during battle scenes complement the game-play. The enemy AI will keep you on your toes.

This has to be one of the easiest games to control, but at times it has its hesitation moments. When highlighting certain units it might take a second or two for something to happen. Advance Wars really makes life easy with the stylus. The stylus is well suited for strategy games. The story mode was better than I thought and the voice over was also a surprise.

Now here is where I was a little disappointed with the game. Trying to get online to play the game caused me all kinds of problems. I really thought that this would be one of the best features of the game. With no friend list and having to hope that your friend is online makes it kind of hard to play. Once you find a game, and if you are about to win, many times the opponent will just quit. In the heat of battle one can just leave.

Field Commander online play is one of the things that set it apart from Advance Wars. Being able to play online is what gamers want. A game that might give Field Commander some trouble is Panzer Tactics. It's like Advance Wars but with online play. Maybe the next Field Commander will have a WWII theme to it (hint, hint).

I've played Advance Wars on the DS and I really tried to compare the two. If you really had to give an edge to one of them, then Field Commander would be on top. At $39.99 it's one of the better games for the PSP. There are not many good games out there for this platform, but you can't go wrong with this one. There are a couple of things that could have made this better. Instead of rewarding players at the end of each mission, download some content rewards. This can really enhance the wi-fi feature. Of course more units would have been nice, different types of tanks, planes and special-forces units. The limited online features could use a little work .

Screenshots (Click image to enlarge):