The story takes place in the future, where the world is divided into 4
major political groups who fight against each other, you being one of
them. You go from mission to mission, using your mech to battle other
mechs, helicopters, tanks, etc.
Graphics: Very smooth, I was kind of suprised. The polygon detail and
textrure maps of the enemy units and your mechs is pretty cool. I didn't
encounter any noticeable slowdown, even with 2 or 3 enemy mechs on the
screen. There are also trees, buildings, bunkers, fences, and even a few
hills here and there, but for the most part the terrain is flat. The one
mission I played was in a city, you can even jump up on the rooftops for
some sniping :)
My one minor nitpick is that some of the weapon explosions are really
pixelly when seen close up. Unfortunately, one of your main weapons, the
gun, always fires with some barrel flash and explosion right in front of
your face, and it's kind of pixelly. This, as I said, is a nitpick, and I
forgot about it after a while. Also, some of the weapon graphics are just
so so. The explosions of enemy units are cool though--when you blow up an
enemy mech, his torso and arms explode into the air :)
Sound: The soundtrack is pretty good (you can turn it off from the options
screen if you like), and the sounds are loud--what else do you expect from
a mech game? Large explosions, artillery, machine guns, missles...the
sound effects are done well, plus it's in stereo, so if you keep an ear
out you can hear where things are coming from.
Gameplay: Ok, those of you expecting Mechwarrior 2 strategy can leave the
room now. Gungriffon is very arcadish. The ultimate objective of every
mission is just blow everything up ;) You have to be fast, though...there
is a time limit imposed on each mission, so you can't dawdle.
The fighting occurs in a "war zone", a rectangular area. You can't pass
outside the boundaries of the zone, so basically, you can forget
exploration. You have to fight in the rectangular area and can't leave,
but this is good, because it keeps you concentrated on the enemies at
hand.
Before each mission, there is a briefing. At any time during the game, you
can access the briefing and look at the map to see where your targets are.
At the end of each mission, you get an assessment based on enemies killed,
time remaining, and get points taken away for letting friendly units get
killed (at least, I got some support helicopters blown up :)
When you start the mission, you are in the cockpit of your mech. The
instrument screen is very busy. You have a compass, tilt meter (torso
tilting), jump jets left, radar, sights, weapon readouts, and damage
indicators. Some readouts are more useful than others.
When you fight, different colored boxes appear over the units on the
screen so you can tell who's who. Both on you HUD and in the radar, idle
enemy targets are yellow, but ones that are attacking you are in red. I
thought this was a cool idea, so when you're getting hammered, you know
where to look :)
Damage is simplistic. Everything in your mech works until you die. The
damage indicator starts at green, turns yellow, then red, then you die.
Like I said, this is arcade simplicity here.
Weapons are simple too. You have four: your main cannon, machine guns,
rocket pods, and anti-tank missles. All except for the machine gun require
ammo; the machine gun has indefinite ammo, but overheats after a while and
you must wait for it to cool.
To rearm and repair yourself, there are several landing pads in each war
zone where supply helicopters land. Waiting by them replenishes your
mech, but protect the copters!
Control: Bad news--at first the controls are complex. EVERY button on the
Saturn pad is used. The good news--you can CUSTOMIZE them! You can also go
through several pre-set configurations. The controls include things such
as dashing forward and back (another nitpick, your throttle is
fixed--either you're walking forward or gliding. 2 speeds, that's it),
jump jetting, night vision, moving the turret independantly of the body,
selecting and firing weapons, strafing. Another nitpick, while I'm at it:
you can't select the targets in your HUD. None of your weapons home.
The bottom line: If you like fast-paced, arcadish mech games, but still
like the complexity of the controls, you might like Gungriffon. This game
is definitly worth a rental, if not a purchase, in my book.