Front Mission 4

by Square Enix

Product Features

• A mech(wanzer) pilot named Elsa fights off an attack from unknown invaders in Germany, while a young soldier named Darill retrieves a mysterious cargo whose plane crashed in South America. These two fateful events will set the stage for intense futuristic
• Squad-based tactical fighting as you lead teams of wanzers in strategic combat
• Outstanding new graphics - Spectacular visuals will leave you dumbfounded -- it's practically cinematic
• New tactical features like the Link System bring a new dimension of multiplayer strategy to your game

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B00025ETC8
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 7.5 x 0.8 inches ; 2.4 ounces
• Media: Video Game
• Release Date: June 15, 2004
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #14,560 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
  • #34 in Video Games > PlayStation 2 > Strategy
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Game Informer Review

Considering the pedigree of the series, the publisher, and how much I enjoyed Front Mission 3 on PSone, Front Mission 4 is a disappointment on just about every level. It's a shame too, as the opening movie features wanzers (this series' version of the classic mech) battling it out in a ballet of death that got my strategy RPG juices flowing.

Unfortunately, the game isn't as exciting as its opening cinema. The story follows the tale of two wanzer pilots – Elsa and Darril. The game opens with Elsa as she investigates an attack on several German bases, then it shifts to Darril and his team in South America. Not a bad tale, but nothing you haven't heard before.

The same can be said for the gameplay as well. Front Mission 4 is a fairly basic strategy game from beginning to end. There are some nice touches however, including the ability to vastly customize your mechs, and a brand new Link System lets the player sync wanzers together so that you can unleash multiple attacks in a single round of combat.

Overall, the game moves fairly slow and the combat is not nearly as deep as it could have been. Combine the mediocre gameplay with the sub-par graphics and campy story, and you can begin to see why Front Mission 4 is a bit of a disappointment. If you love giant robots, there is a good twenty hours of gameplay here, so this game isn't without its merits.

Concept:
Watch floating heads tell a story while you wage strategic battle with giant robots

Graphics:
For a company like Square Enix, the graphics are surprisingly low-budget

Sound:
From the voice acting to the battle music, no word fits better than "adequate"

Playability:
Considering how deep strategy games have become, this is disappointedly shallow

Entertainment:
The story, battles, and overall production values fall far short of expectations

Replay:
Moderately Low

Rated: 7.25 out of 10
Editor: Andy McNamara
Issue: June 2004

2nd Opinion:
Even for being a turn-based tactical RPG, Front Mission 4 starts off awfully slow. Barring the intense opening cinema, the first three or so hours alternate between painful and lame. After that, FM 4 quickly becomes an engaging tactical RPG, though the graphics will never wow you and most everything that happens outside of combat is tedious and boring. Except for character development, that is – the new Link system adds an extra layer of strategy and keeps gameplay fresh. The nice RPG elements and challenging battles make FM 4 worth any strategy gamer's time.

Rated: 7.75 out of 10
Editor: Adam Biessener


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Product Description

Front Mission 4 offers the spectacular visuals and advanced tactical warfare you crave. It's 2096, and two young soldiers will decide the future of the world. Fight for the future in gigantic walking tanks!

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Engaging, July 14, 2004

By 

Keith Doyle (Panama City, FL United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Front Mission 4 (Video Game)

As a major fan of Front Mission 3 for the PlayStation I was excited upon hearing the news that Square-Enix was making a sequel to my favorite single-player tactical-strategy game. The only thing missing from Front Mission 3's excellence was great graphics. With the arrival of Front Mission 4 on the PlayStation2 I thought the rough-graphics problem would be solved and I'd have the perfect game.

Unfortunately life has a way of playing dirty tricks. Oh sure, the graphics are much improved over FM3 with greater detail and far smoother animation. But the colors are downright bland! Also, many areas in the game appear overly dark, making it a challenge to view the screen easily unless the lights are off. I suspect the developers were going for realism here.

The length of the game disappointed me as well. For the amount of time spent working on your characters' skills and statistics the number of actual plot-developing missions is minuscule. There are only 29 stages in all! By comparison, FM3 contained a staggering 128 stages played out through two scenarios! Admittedly, FM4's stages are bigger and take longer to complete, and there are simulator battles to play. But FM3 had simulator battles, too!

Now that the bad is out of the way let me let you what was good about FM4:

Graphics - already touched on this. MUCH better than FM3 except for the colors & lack of lighting.

Sound - the most refined part of FM4. Heavy, realistic, perfect. Great use of bass!

Music - very appropriate for the events onscreen. High quality.

Speech - the main characters now speak in select cut scenes and the voice-overs are extremely well done. The accents and voice tones are very accurate to their respective nationalities. No bad acting here!

Battle System - more involved than in the last game. The Link system adds a fun new level of strategy to the gameplay. New specialized backpacks increase combat options.

Customization - a slight increase in variety of weapons and parts. Better colorization options but the blandness + darkness at times makes it almost moot.

Control - takes some getting used to, but adequate. In a tactical, non-twitch game like this it's not a detriment.

Battle Maps - daytime shifting and weather effects add new depth to missions. Battlefields are significantly larger than in FM3.

Character Skills - no more randomness in acquiring new battle skills to help towards victory! Instead characters buy skills they want as they become available! The challenge is getting the funds needed to afford them.

And finally, FM4's greatest improvement over FM3...the chaotic E-mail/virtual net system is gone!

I'd have to say FM4 doesn't match the gaming experience FM3 gave. Don't get me wrong...it's a fantastic game for as long as it lasts. The plot is solid. Just don't expect as huge a jump in quality as I did or you'll be disappointed.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fun game for turn based strat fans, June 24, 2004

By 

Andrew Hamada (Seattle, WA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Front Mission 4 (Video Game)

For those who've never played a Front Mission game before: Enormous mechs. Tons of weapons, armor and computer options. Turn based strategy. The Front Mission series alone incorporates all three, and thus has a collection of players devoted to it. If you don't like all three, however, the chances are slim that you will fully enjoy this game. The game has much more serious involvement than your average turn-based strat game: even by the end, you will continually be discovering new ways to customize and operate your wanzers. There's no way to jump into the game and immediately be good at it: "trial and error" is a phrase you will get used to, and very quickly at that.

For those who've played previous Front Mission games: The game, while remaining fundamentally the same, has changed in enough ways to mark it as an entirely different approach to the same ideas. The most obvious change is the Link system: it introduces a new variable when deciding where, when and how to use your wanzers and forces you to take the enemy's linking abilities into consideration when choosing your defensive tactics. With enough AP and the right positioning/turn order, a single wanzer can attack upwards of 6 times in a single turn (the highest I've seen is 9, with a shotgun). The other marked change is in the way characters progress: no more gaining proficiency with a weapon through repeated use. Instead, you purchase upgrades to your computer system through a pre-planned route, which may be expanded upon by purchasing computer upgrades in a store. If you stick to the pre-planned route, you will find your characters locked into a set path based on the skills they receive: lots of shotgun abilities and evasion skills obviously points toward a lightweight, evasive wanzer armed with shotguns. The benefits and detriments are obvious: the game starts you with a fairly balanced team that works well, but also makes it annoyingly tedious to change the fighting style of ANY of your wanzers. Expect to repeat simulations like crazy in order to fully customize your team.

OVERALL RATINGS:
Graphics: 6/10. The FMV is nice, but the in game graphics are reminiscent of very early PS2. Character portraits, while animated, are still portraits. Animation is, however, smooth, and almost all the cutscenes are accomplished with excellent use of the in-game engine.

Sound: 8/10. The voice-overs aren't spectacular, but are more than acceptable for a video game and help to fill out the characters' personalities. The music is very well done, although there wasn't nearly enough variation. The actual sound effects are fantastic: metal against metal, etc. is very accurate sounding.

Controls/Interface: 5/10. The controls are great and mostly intuitive, but the interface itself is a mixed bag. The combat interface is pretty intuitive, although at times your eyes will get confused as to which part of the display you should be looking at. Combat between similar looking wanzers gets confusing, especially when linked teammates are all fighting (whose bullets are those?). The non-combat menus are what get really annoying. My biggest problem is the seperation of the purchasing screens from the organization screens and the load times between: you can de-equip and purchase/replace equipment for all your wanzers at the same time, but you can't equip a weapon/part/item you already have from within the same screen. You can set skills, purchase new ones and upgrade computers from the same screen, but if you want to purchase a new skill set, you have to go to the computer store, and at the computer store, you can only see a bare-minimum of information about the pilot you're buying skills for. ANNOYING!

Gameplay: 9/10. Although a beginner could pick up the game and survive the battles, in order to truly progress and make the money necessary to customize your wanzers and pilots, you have to utilize an enormous level of strategy which makes playing the game fun. A dozen different elements make your choices in each phase of combat exciting. There's no way to effectively summarize the gameplay other than to play it, so rent it if you're unsure.

Storyline: 6/10. I've come to expect a level of quality from Square Enix that this game doesn't match up with. While better than the filler that generally occupies turn-based strat games, the story had so much more potential than was actually realized.

Replay value: 5/10. My save file said 36 hours when I beat the game, although at least 3 hours of that was the game sitting around while I ran errands or ate. I did, however, plow through the game with a minimum of grinding (so I didn't do a lot of customization, etc.), so those dedicated to creating the ultimate wanzer team will find they have plenty of time to do so. The catch, however, is that you can restart the game with your old team once you beat it: those who already took the time to maximize their teams will find little to do on a second playing, while people like me still have places to go, so the net gaming time is probably about the same. FM4 is the kind of game you won't want to replay for a month, but will seem fresh and exciting again after that month has passed.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Turn based -a la- F. F. Tactics, July 7, 2004

By 

Just-a-gamer (planet Earth) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Front Mission 4 (Video Game)

Front Mission 4 is a brave attempt to rescue Turn Based combat. I'm crazy about it since many games today are real time and my personal favorite is turn based.

Well, if you liked FF Tactics, you'll enjoy FM4. I'ts an RPG which follows two story lines and of course, all the battles are designed for you to equip and tune up your robots. They are not luxuries, they're a must if you want to survive.

PROS: if you like turn based ... HEY ! ... here's one at it's best!.
Long battles makes a lot of time to develop your strategy.
Immersive, wait until you learn how to use the link system ! you'll learn what "UNLEASHING POWER" means!
Sci-Fi, Mechs, Explosions, Story, what else do you want?

CONS: Mixed graphics, everything is amazing but when you try to read gray text over gray background... you have to squint... BR> Some battle situations may end up with a lot of time wasted on moving your units.
A single enemy unit needs several turns to be destroyed.

As in real life, some times you need things to go faster, but you can't do that.

Some times, one hour(+) each battle, is just what you need...

If you are an Action-oriented gamer, try this one, you might lear that strategy is FUN.

PS: If you think this game gets too difficult is probably because you are not going to train on the simulators and/or you are not equiping your units well... take your time ! ENJOY!