You'll hear the phrase I chose for this review title a lot in this game. The partner AI is rather buggy - in fact, that's the only thing that keeps the game from being as fun as it could be. It is fun developing and implementing tactics, movement plans and combat strategies in this game, and the single-player campaign for both the core game and expansion is extremely well-designed in terms of the various locales you visit, but the partner AI drags it down a notch.
In short, your four SWAT team members are idiots. From running in front of you s you are firing at a suspect to merely dropping a flashbang at their feet and blinding the entire team or badgering you about standing in a position they feel they need to be in because they can't do their job standing eight inches to the left. Their aim is spot-on, though, and they rarely miss when they start opening up on the targets. it's only when it comes to executing given commands that they give you problems. Unfortunately, you have to give them commands a lot because they have zero initiative.
Level design is superb. The buildings, inside and out, look realistic as you explore them. Be it a suspect's house, an office building, a diamond wholesaler or a convenience store, the designers knew what they were doing and made sure that not a polygon was out of place. And the attention to detail is staggering. Graffiti on the walls and dumpsters in some areas, chunks of wall missing to expose support beams, even down to moths buzzing around lights and roaches crawling on the floor. Not one detail was overlooked here.
Sounds are spot-on, as well. Music tracks seem straight out of a cop movie and each weapon has a distinct sound when fired (and if you equip each SWAT member with a different weapon, you'll know who's firing at any given time just by listening; it's not something you need in the course of the game, but it sometimes helps to figure out who has wandered off where if the game bugs out). The only downside is the voice acting. While TOC (Tactical Operations Command, the ones you report to and receive orders from) and your SWAT team have distinct voices and sound realistic, suspects and civilians tend to use the same recycled voice files in most missions, including the expansion pack.
The only other downside is that, to achieve the maximum possible points (you need a minimum to clear the level and move on, depending on your chosen difficulty) you have to arrest suspects rather than kill them and you have to report every arrested/wounded/killed suspect to TOC, as well as any injured/dead civilians you come across. You must also handcuff civilians who've not been wounded and report them to TOC, as well. Finally, you must also collect -every- weapon dropped by the suspects to get maximum points. This can be a problem given the game's physics, which sometimes let weapons bounce up onto shelves and the like, or slide under desks and even into solid walls where you cannot collect them. Coupled with the idiocy of the partner AI, and the fact that if a SWAT member or yourself is wounded or incapacitated during the missions (or you die, the mission ends) you get penalized at the end. There were multiple times I had managed to complete all of the mission goal, but I had been wounded and all four of my team members were downed in the course of it and it cost me so many points that I failed. So, yes, it can be frustrating at times, but the game is still incredibly fun and challenging.
If you don't already have this game, I highly recommend it. The "Gold" edition, which I purchased, has both the core game and expansion in one package, which gives you more missions, more multiplayer options and new weapons and equipment. For a 2005 PC game, it has definitely held up and aged well.
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Top reviews from the United States
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Reviewed in the United States on November 29, 2010
Platform For Display: PCEdition: GoldVerified Purchase
Reviewed in the United States on October 14, 2012
Platform For Display: PCEdition: Gold
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Platform For Display: PCEdition: GoldVerified Purchase
Reviewed in the United States on February 15, 2013
Platform For Display: PCEdition: GoldVerified Purchase
Reviewed in the United States on August 26, 2014
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Top reviews from other countries
Travis Tuovinen
SWAT 4 Tough but Rewarding
Reviewed in Canada on September 5, 2013Platform For Display: PCEdition: GoldVerified Purchase
Dianna Speirs
awesome game
Reviewed in Canada on February 27, 2022Platform For Display: PCEdition: GoldVerified Purchase
Graham
Still a great deal of fun
Reviewed in Canada on December 9, 2012Platform For Display: PCEdition: GoldVerified Purchase
Nicolas
Five Stars
Reviewed in Canada on October 4, 2014Platform For Display: PCEdition: GoldVerified Purchase
