Gamers need to learn to take turns.
Driving, shooting or just sorting falling blocks into patterns, videogames have evolved into a treadmill of tasks. Racing against the clock keeps the tension up, sure. But it also tends to cover up the heart of what makes a game fun.
“Field Commander” rumbles onto the PSP bringing the system’s first turn-
based military strategy game. Along with its futuristic land/sea/air combat, 3-D graphics and multiplayer action, the game delivers an assault on the idea that war happens in real time.
Real battles share the nasty habit of happening all at once. Soldiers on one side start shooting, then all decorum breaks down as everyone tries to kill everyone. No one gets to yell, “Time out!”
Even though no real war has ever played out on a regulated checkerboard grid or with the clear rules of a chess match, we still see turn-based games as the essence of military science. We just like the idea of gentlemen settling their bloody differences with practiced ease and the graceful intelligence of a well-crafted checkmate.
So it shouldn’t raise so much as a brigadier’s bushy eyebrow that in the age of powerful real-time computer processing we still enjoy playing at war on a game board with two sides, thoughtfully considering moves and leisurely taking turns.
“Field Commander” could have easily worked as a real-time strategy game, with the spoils going to the smartest and the quickest player. The basic idea is there. You build up bases, control cities as supply centers, send units out over the map and attempt to create favorable mismatches between your units and the other guy’s.
The 3-D engine packed inside the game provides ample visual scenery to support the routine narrative about freedom forces facing down a global terrorist army. And with loads of audio and special effects, the game could have provided a sort of near-future version of the real-time challenges made famous in games such as “Command,” “Conquer” and “Starcraft.”
Instead, “Field Commander” returns to the wartime deceit of the turn and comes out all the better because of it.
It might not be realistic to spend 10 minutes considering your combat options, surveying a battlefield packed with lethal menace. If you commanded an army on the ground in Iraq, you wouldn’t have the luxury of checking out the position and relative strength of your opponent’s units in detail. Realism aside, this turn-taking presents war as a giant, moving sudoku puzzle with death and explosions.
That’s why “Field Commander” succeeds. Instead of simply feeding a blood lust for imaginary destruction, the game lets players exercise that other critical part of the human psyche: the desire to solve problems. Giving us time to think about what we are doing turns out to provide a rousing source of gleeful fun.
