The game has recently been released on the PC, and it appears everything is intact. This version of the game is just as visually and audibly polished as its predecessor, but the seemingly direct port keeps with it all the shortcomings that kept it from being a superb game the first time out. Though I’ll grant that there is not much that could be done in the three and a half months since the Xbox release, it still would have been nice to see some minor game play improvements. Unfortunately for those like myself who would love to see a game like this succeed, the only improvement this new version has is the keyboard and mouse.

For those unfamiliar with the Xbox version, Full Spectrum Warrior is not an action game, per se. There is action, and it is very intense in both appearance and sound. The difference is that you are not directly in control of it. The game gives you command over two fire teams (alpha and bravo). Each fire team consists of a fire team leader, rifleman, automatic rifleman and grenadier. Your job is to order them about in a tactical fashion, and in turn influence the action. You will do things like have one fire team suppress a terrorist while the other fire team maneuvers into a better position to take him out. You can use smoke grenades and fragmentation grenades to provide cover or take out an insurgent who happens to be within throwing range. Everything else is as expected. Go here, kill these bad guys; repeat.

Where this game falls short is its tactical simplicity. You can move two ways, normal move and bounding over watch move. Bounding over watch is defined as two soldiers moving forward cautiously with guns raised while the other two “over watch” or cover them from behind. Once the first two soldiers are in place, they provide cover for the other two. You can shoot (not referring to grenades) in basically two ways. You can provide suppressive fire or you can engage any targets in a sector you define. As a minor bonus, you can give the individual team members different sectors but this is rarely necessary. When you add to that, the use of a few types of grenades you don’t have much along the lines of options.

This makes absolute sense when you are training fire teams (which is incidentally what this game was designed to do). You want to teach them the one or two correct ways to do something and to have them learn it by rote. You don’t want team leaders experimenting with strategies when lives are on the line. Strategy gamers are more demanding however. They must be able to compete against one another and have tactics that are all their own. They want lots and lots of options.

The fact that most encounters in FSW have one solution makes the game more of a realistic military puzzle game than a real time strategy game. This effect is compounded by the fact that the enemies always pop in the same spots. It rarely takes more than two times to get past an area and once you get the gist of the game mechanics you blow through the levels. As you progress through the game, the amount of challenge doesn’t increase much at all. There is very little replay value because the solutions are so simple it’s almost impossible to forget how you solved a particular engagement.

So, if you have an Xbox and are interested in the simplified Army fire team simulator that is Full Spectrum Warrior, go out and rent it. If you don’t have an Xbox, and are interested in the PC version, realize that this title is more a glimpse into how a real Army fire team moves and engages enemy forces than it is a challenging real-time strategy game. Do not confuse this as a detractor. Full Spectrum Warrior is an excellent implementation of its requirements. After all, it’s a version of what the Army uses to train our troops. As such it has merit. So if you are interested in how our military works on the ground and believe that satisfying your curiosity is worth the expenditure then go for it.