Soldier of Fortune Review

The Dreamcast version of Raven's gritty PC first-person shooter arrives shortly on the heels of news that Sierra has canceled its Dreamcast port of Half-Life. This should act as some consolation for Dreamcast owners. Although they'll miss getting a port of one of the best PC first-person shooters ever, they'll receive a Dreamcast version of one of the best PC first-person shooters in recent years.

In Soldier of Fortune, you're John Mullins, a mercenary who works for the UN's covert operations branch, The Shop. Your assignments range from saving hostages to retrieving nuclear warheads, and all of them require you to travel to such far-off locales as Bosnia, Iran, and Japan. Wherever you are and whatever your assignment, one thing holds true throughout: You face enormous opposition. Enemy forces might be made up of skinheads, soldiers, or terrorists, but they all want your head on a plate.

Much has already been said in the press about the high degree of violence in Soldier of Fortune, having even been classified as an 2602950adult movie in British Columbia . It definitely earns the mature rating it received from the ESRB, and it's certainly not for kids. Limbs are routinely blown off, causing the enemy soldier to writhe and scream madly as you watch it happen--and a shotgun blast to the head or neck can have decidedly explosive results. It's gratuitous, to be sure, but perhaps not as completely tasteless as it's been made out to be in the past: It is simply a game that's attempting to be more realistic about its brutal subject matter. It succeeds in this, seeming very true to life, save for the setting of Mullins' secret headquarters and his armored comic-book-style nemesis, Decker.

Unlike some of the other first-person shooters from the last few years such as Half-Life, Star Trek: Voyager: Elite Force, and Red Faction, Soldier of Fortune leaves puzzle-solving elements behind in favor of pure action. There are no keys to collect, no guards to sneak past in disguise, and no security cameras to avoid. There are some buttons to push and levers to turn, but otherwise, you're just fighting for your life. The game is made up of a series of intense firefights that feel like the more exciting parts of other first-person shooters. It's a visceral game that's more akin to id's Doom than it is to Half-Life, and those who like their shooters more straightforward should take to it immediately.