Something stinks, and it is not the mustard gas...
The developers obviously worked hard on the art direction and concepts for this game and the grittiness of the ruined battlefield and its inhabitants are the main attractions. The ambience of gatling guns, gas masks, bombstrapped dogs and sniper duels is quickly ruined though, by the inclusion of vicious helicopters, automated gun turrets and advanced submachineguns. At one point in the game you are taken captive in an underground research facility where you learn that experiments are being carried out on the prisoners. All of a sudden it felt like Castle Wolfenstein and I was more or less expecting to be jumped by zombies while venturing deeper into the installation.
The gunnery and weapons work well for the most part, although the weapons do feel a bit underpowered and i never really got to terms with the inventory set-up. The default hotkeys are way off, and I kept ending up with the wrong weapon in my hands a bit too often.
All of these flaws can be forgiven if a game remains entertaining to play, and as you've guessed already, Iron Storm finds itself seriously lacking in this department. Part of this can be attributed to the tough odds. Not because the opponents are particularily smart but because you are pitted against well placed snipers, ambushers warping in behind you as you pick up supplies and worst of all, indestructible enemies. Yes, for some reason, suddenly the grunts you have been taking down throughout the campaign become invincible. This is the ill placed cue that it is time for a stealth mission, or that you need to go some place else to flick a switch. Particularily frustrating is the part where you need to sneak into a prison camp where I spent a good hour trying to take out an enemy helicopter which was onto my heels, only to realize it was impossible to destroy.
The ending really takes the cake. Except for the token FPS "oh noes"-double cross that everyone saw coming a mile away the more disturbing part is that not only do you not get an opportunity to deal with said traitor, you also fail to accomplish neither of your two main objectives. These are instead carried out by NPCs arriving from nowhere, ultimately rendering your crawl through the rest of the agonizing levels completely unnecessary. At that point though, I was so fed up with the game that I had resorted to cheat codes anyway. The last level with its backtracking through a maze of locked doors and levers to flip got tiring really fast.
Overall, the game does offer some enjoyment, particularily through the early levels, but due to its difficulty and the frequent lapses in the action where I found myself scratching my chin wondering where to go next, I can not really recommend this game to anyone but the most masoschistic players out there.