I really wanted to love this game. Seriously, I did. America's Army is such a great example of persuasive gaming and I hoped the Navy released something as interesting as their colleagues from the Army. I guess they did not. I say I "guess" because I could not endure more than 18 minutes playing this game. You think reviewing games for a living is a great thing? Think again. It is definitively not if the game in question is Navy Training Excercise: Strike and Retrieve.

18 minutes is not enough to review a game, I know that. But the thing was going so slow on my one-year-old quite decent game machine that I tried the usual suspects to no avail (checking DirectX, graphics card driver, etc). Nothing I did could solve the choppy graphics and sound. I previously praised Food Force's use of voiceovers but on this game you have a trainer that keeps asking if you are enjoying the joy-ride (!). Trust me, there was nothing joyful about it.

Anyway, let's get to the facts. The game is certainly ambitious and it the graphics are good (quite beautiful jellyfish. It may have made a great Cousteau game if Ecco the Dolphin for Dreamcast wasn't so gorgeous). The gameplay of the first level is almost non-existent (I really tried hard to get to the second level but after 18 minutes of pressing the Forward "W" key and shooting the occasional sub, I was getting desperately bored). You control a sub through some sort of underwater canyon and you must reach a drone plane in order to recover some piece of technology. Your enemies are other subs and some abyss monters and lava. The gameplay is pretty much like Descent and the theme is quite unrealistic, closer to sci-fi than to experiencing the "real" US Navy experience. That is what I find more interesting: that the Navy decided to use fantasy in order to recruit adepts. It sort of makes sense, given the fact that they are not perceived in engaging into face to face combat. In any case, it's a 200 meg download and you need to register even though they do not ask for any personal data. I love the fact that they FAQ includes this question: "Will the Navy know whether or not I'm a good player?" The answer, btw, is no.

Once again, I wanted to love this game or, at least, enjoy it. Sadly, I haven't. I will probably play again, just because I need to play it since I research serious games but it is not going to be easy. Seriously, I do not want to complain too much (ok, maybe it's a bit too late for that). I am sympathetic with the developers, I know it's a pain to create serious games that are supposed to look and work like AAA games with a fraction of the budget.
In any case, I am not joining the US Navy anytime soon and this videogame has not provided me with any good reasons to do it.

Update: Ok, I couldn't really believe that this game was that bad, so I gave it a second try. I just did it out of respect for you, faithful WaterCooler Guys and Girls. I thought that you could have thought that since I am not American, I may be a bit biased against the Navy or any other excuse like that. You may have thought that I lost my shit, since I never write harsh reviews. Well, I completed the "joyride" (I am never getting those 13 minutes 56 seconds back) and found the drone plane. This leads to some logic puzzle that I couldn't figure out (obviously I am not Navy material). The worst thing is that I could not quit the game at that point (my Esc key would not respond). Hey, Human Rights Watch, I am being held by the US Navy without a trial, please help me! If you still do not believe me, just waste 200 megs of your hard drive and give it a try. You have been warned.

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