
	Platform Playstation 2 Genre Action Publisher SCEA Developer Zipper Interactive ESRB M (Mature) Released October 12, 2005

- Superb online play - Weapons customization feature - Varied single player campaign - Vehicles!!! - Tons of online features - Excellent audio

- Terrible friendly AI - Some online bugs that need to be fixed - Visuals aren’t much of an upgrade - No co-operative play - Old SOCOM II maps are nowhere to be found

Review: SOCOM II (PS2) Review: SOCOM (PS2) Review: Syphon Filter: The Omega Strain (PS2)
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SOCOM III: U.S. Navy Seals

Score: 8.8 / 10

With the success of the first two SOCOM games for the PS2, it would make sense that Sony would release a third addition of the game. Combined, the first two games of the series have sold over million copies worldwide. SOCOM certainly has a large fan base and even more importantly, is one the key reasons why Sony’s network adapter became successful.

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It’s been almost two years since SOCOM II was released on the PS2. When it first hit the shelves, SOCOM II received critical praise for an excellent amount of game modes and community options. Unfortunately as time passed, the SOCOM II experience was hindered by dreadful online lag, increased stat padding (basically cheating), and a number of glitches. Some of these problems were severe enough to cause some players to migrate back to SOCOM I.

If you’ve played the first two games in the series then SOCOM III (S3) may feel a bit awkward at first. The default controls have been tweaked slightly, but there are still a number of different controller configurations to choose from. This time around, there is an actual training mission that familiarizes you with everything that will help you survive both online and offline.

There are a number of additions to the third installment of the series. Perhaps the biggest is the large scale environments. The environments are massive compared to SOCOM II. Some of the maps go as far as being six times as large as the SOCOM II maps. In order to move the player around the large maps quickly, vehicles have been added. The vehicles include humvees, technicals, cargo trucks, boats and tanks. Vehicles appear both, in the online and offline game.

The vehicle controls are quite simplistic and easy to use. Each of the vehicles can hold three or four players. The vehicles act as a good troop transport and can also provide vital fire support for your team as well. While the vehicles are quite useful, they aren’t by any means invincible. There are several weapons that can destroy vehicles quite easily. The new M2 mines can be laid on any solid surface and automatically detonate when a vehicle drives over them. The best feature of the M2 mines is that they are almost invisible to a driver of a vehicle. The M2 mines come in handy during the online play but are rather useless in the single player campaign.

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One of the best features is weapons customization. You can customize each of the game’s weapons with a maximum of two attachments. The attachments include: grenade launchers, scopes, pistol grips, bipods and laser sights. Your accuracy will be affected by the way you customize your weapon. Not only is your accuracy, effected, but the running speed of your character can change as well.

The single player campaign consists of fourteen missions

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spread across three countries and regions: Morocco, Poland and South Asia . The levels feature a good mixture of indoor and outdoor combat and this time around there is less emphasis placed on urban combat. The single player game also seems more action-packed than in previous games, placing less emphasis on stealth.

To deal with the large size of the single player maps, the developers have implemented a useful checkpoint system. There are usually two to four checkpoints scattered around each map. When you reach a checkpoint in a level, your ammo and health gets replenished. Both of these features are welcome additions.

If there is one complaint you can levy against the single player campaign, it’s the horrendous friendly AI. In each mission you’ll be accompanied by three other Navy Seals. You can give commands to your Seals, but the level of intelligence they operate at is extremely horrid. Your Seals are extremely useless for killing enemies and sometimes take too long to listen to orders. There were also many instances where my soldiers wouldn’t even respond to my commands. The only time where your Seals seem effective is manning the turret on a vehicle. It’s strange to see the friendly AI being so stupid, considering the previous SOCOM games featured some decent AI. Meanwhile, the enemy AI is quite good. The enemies move to cover, fire around corners and interact well with other enemies.

There is some interaction between the offline and online play. There are a number of unlockable weapon attachments, characters and weapons. To unlock these extras you must complete the single player campaign on different difficulty levels. The extras are worth the effort of continuously playing the single player campaign multiple times.

The real meat of the game lies in the online play. The online play now supports up to 32 players online across twelve maps. SOCOM III contains the five modes found in the previous game as well as two new modes of play: Convoy and Control. Convoy puts the Terrorists in charge of protecting a lightly armored convoy through enemy territory, while the Seals attempt to destroy the convoy. Control is a variation of King of Hill where both teams attempt to take over more spawn points than the other team. Both of these modes are excellent and require a hefty amount of teamwork. The online play is quite smooth and lag is barely noticeable. This is a big break from SOCOM II, which was infested with lag.

There are also a number of new online extras. There is a completely new community feature which contains a personal email account, in-game message boards, polls/surveys and a slew of other features. While there have been significant strides in building up the online play, a number of problems still hamper the game. There are a number of gameplay issues that must be addressed quickly. The most irritating problems include frequent disconnects, login issues, faulty stat recording and in-game chat problems. Some days the servers are good, other days they are simply bad. Hopefully a patch will be released soon to deal with these problems.

S3’s graphics aren’t a major improvement over its predecessor. The draw distances, character models and vehicles look quite good, but some of the environments seem to be lacking in detail. The frame rate, both online and offline stutters quite a bit during heavier fire fights as well. One of the strongest points of S3 is the game’s audio. The character voices and the music sound extremely well done. This is no surprise considering SOCOM II featured extremely good audio.

If you were a fan of SOCOM II, then SOCOM III: U.S. Navy Seals won’t disappoint. It offers a much more compelling online and offline experience. And while S3 still has some noticeable problems, it’s easily the best military shooter on the PS2.

- Siddharth Masand

(November 15, 2005)


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