Frontlines: Fuel of War Multiplayer Preview

January 9, 2008 - The last time we got our hands on THQ's forthcoming Frontlines: Fuel of War the game was looking understandably rough. It was still a few months out from release, which definitely showed in some technical shortcomings and unpolished gameplay. Just recently we got an updated build of what can best be described as a spiritual successor to DICE's Battlefield series into our office to take two new multiplayer maps for a spin. What we found is a game that has clearly gone through a bit of a growth spurt and is nearly ready to be unleashed to the eager public.

Frontlines, not unlike Battlefield before it, is centered around a single multiplayer mode. The objective is all about capture points and advancing your team's position and thus their "frontline" until the enemy has no room to maneuver, breathe or -- most importantly -- construct an effective fighting force. How you do this is entirely up to you. You can go the old fashioned route of selecting from any of the six character classes, pairing that up with a predefined role such as ground support or EMP tech (my personal favorite being air support) and then taking to the battle either on foot or in one of the many vehicular offerings.



While Frontlines may not offer the same perpetual character progression that seems to be the fad of the current crop of multiplayer-centric titles, it does allow players to unlock new armaments and abilities within one standalone contest. Even though you can't carry your accomplishments over to the next environment, you still have something to work towards. Since I'm a fan of the air support abilities I started with a precision air strike then moved to a cluster bomb and finally an aerial gun attack (Red Star Alliance gets a more destructive fuel air bomb). How quickly these offensive options unlock is dependent on your military proficiency in-game (i.e. taking over control points and gunning down fools).

Mountain Top was the first map to see action. As you might guess from looking at the name, the entire environment is surrounded by rock faces, making you feel like you're more in the plateau of mountain peaks than on top of an actual mountain, but that's neither here nor there. Situated across the board are plenty of shanties, hangars and other structures that supply cover for a time. Some pieces of cover can be blown away, but like most games some must remain to give at least some safe haven. It's clear that Mountain Top wasn't designed with vehicular combat in mind as there are fewer than a handful of tanks available and the map is populated with small winding roads rather than large, open fields to stomp through.


Cluster bomb time.

As I said earlier my role of choice is air support since I enjoy bringing the pain from above to unknowing enemies. Mountain Top afforded me some excellent vantage points as certain parts of the environment look down on others. It allowed me to find a reasonably safe perch and launch cluster bombs while the enemy began gathering their forces to make a run at capturing one of the all-important points.




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