Set in a future where the demand for oil far exceeds the supply, Frontlines follows the conflict between the Red Star Alliance and the Western Coalition as they fight for the last reserves in the Caspian Basin. As a member of the Stray Dogs, of the Western Coalition, your job is to push back the Red Star Alliance and take control of what little oil is left.

Frontlines paints one of those futures plagued by pessimism, and resorts to the old, anti-Communist scenarios. In the game, China and Russia have aligned themselves to form the Red Star Alliance, while the classic team of Europe (the EU) and the United States reunites once again. Although the what-if setup is bleak and caters to bygone sentiments, the story is nonetheless intriguing and well developed. By reading up on a timeline supplied in the extras, the years leading up to 2024 show just how and why the superpowers divvied up as they did; a combination of tapped oil reserves, natural disasters, and global recessions set up the game.

While the story is compelling, it will really only get noticed if you take the time to read through the timeline or game manual; otherwise, you’re likely to miss nuanced information that explains things like how all of the vehicles operate when there’s an oil shortage, and why you’re shooting Russians and Chinese in the future.

Once you make it past the narrative, Frontlines is a fairly straightforward first-person shooter that has a lot of promise, but misses the mark technically. Through a short 8 mission campaign, you’ll have to capture strategic points and download intel. The gameplay is just as the title suggests and does a great job planting you in a war-zone where you’re sent to the ‘frontlines’ to push back the enemy.

In an inventively-deceiving manner, the otherwise completely linear game presents itself as a more open-world game. Each level is fairly large and offers a variety of gadgets, weaponry and vehicles to decide how and from where you attack your objectives. You have your choice of standard class-types (sniper, assault, anti-vehicle, etc.), but Frontlines introduces drones to the battlefield. By using remote-controlled helicopters, mini-tanks, planes and cars, you’re able to sit back and attack your enemy without taking any fire.

It’s really the small things in Frontlines that make and break the single player experience. Drones are showered across each level, and with minimal effort to find them, they’re a fun element that other 360 shooters don’t offer. Also, although the game does little to deviate from the standard FPS formula, the ability to see where Alliance and Coalition territory is via the mini-map, gives the feeling that you’re actually fending-off the enemy.

With that said, there are a fair number of technical problems that really ruin the experience. About half way through the game framerate issues and texture pop-ins begin to plague gameplay; it almost feels as if the latter half of the game missed a fair amount of polishing. Also, while the game looks okay, there isn’t much draw distance for the levels and little-to-no variance in character modeling as just about every character looks the same, but wears different head gear.

Other general absurdities fill up gameplay as well. Throughout levels, random objects like chairs, chalkboards and even gun turrets float in mid-air—in our play-through, a Red Star assault was held back with help from a teammate in a turret floating in the middle of the village. Also, on occasion, dead character models resort to pre-rendered states as their features lose depth and become blocky.

For a game that plays on believable future conditions, the overall ‘realism’ factor is lacking. Dead enemies and downed vehicles disappear shortly after being killed and destroyed, and the overall A.I. is ridiculous. While Red Star enemies will find you no matter where you go and how silent you are, your Coalition teammates will run into the middle of firefight, fail to shoot and effectively kill enemies, and will leave you wondering how they made it into any army.

Unfortunately, there isn’t any local multiplayer, so you’re stuck with lacking A.I. However, Frontlines continues with minor innovations online. With up to 32 players playing in a game, the battle over frontlines continues. The same premise that makes up the single player game extends online to the sole game mode. Although there aren’t different types of games to choose from, there’s enough variance in online options and gameplay that keeps frontline battles intense and exciting.

Players can choose the same standard classes, but also decide to specialize in one of four different ‘roles.’ Each role has different perks associated with it: drones, air support, ground support and EMP technology. By accumulating kills and capturing objectives, you gain additional equipment.

Also transferring over to the online games are vehicles. With the possibility to have so many people in a single game at once, this is a game where vehicles don’t feel forced. One of the more fun abilities is to make your way past the enemy in a gunship with a few other players, and parachute behind enemy lines.

In the effort to continue to try new things, small tweaks to in-game chat functions make their way online. Instead of having open communications with 15 other players yelling over the microphone, you’re able to form a group of four with your own chat ability. However, while squad-based communications might have seemed good on paper, they don’t necessarily translate well in implementation. Games with random people suffer with little or no communication; but in the end, the ability to partner-up in small groups, in the big games, is really a nice touch.

With a story that takes questionable political liberties and plays on real-life issues, Frontlines is ultimately a game that takes a few chances to try to change things up—albeit with fairly safe departures. It still retains the now clichéd band of rough-and-ready military compatriots, complete with rousing speeches and typical archetypes, but the game plays out just different enough to make it enjoyable. Technical problems mar an otherwise okay experience that is familiar but fun. Everything sounds as it should—along with a standard soundtrack—but framerate issues and standard graphics and textures hurt the game from distinguishing itself. There is fun to be had in Frontlines, it’s just unfortunate that it wasn’t a little more fleshed out.

Gameplay: 6.5
Graphics: 7.5
Audio: 7.0
Lasting Appeal: 7.0
Overall:  7.0
 

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