The Sum of All Fears Review

The Sum of All Fears motion picture is out, and so is the PC game, which uses the same graphics engine as Ghost Recon. And like Ghost Recon, Rogue Spear, and Red Storm's other shooters that bear the Tom Clancy name, it's a tactical shooter in which you undertake missions in modern-day, real-world locations, though this time the game takes place in several of the locations featured in the movie. And while it seems pretty clear that some parts of the game were rushed to get it onto store shelves in time for the movie's release, The Sum of All Fears is still a solid team-based shooter that's surprisingly accessible, even for new players.

The Sum of All Fears has some handy options for beginners.

If you're new to tactical shooters, you may not know that they generally involve you playing as a character with a few computer-controlled teammates whom you can order to provide cover for you, clear passageways, and stand guard. Unfortunately, a lot of tactical shooters can be difficult to pick up and play for new players--they move much more slowly than arcade-style first-person shooters like Quake III and Serious Sam, and if you take just one good shot from an enemy, you're dead. But if you are new to such games, you won't have too much trouble getting started with The Sum of All Fears, since the game comes with a full training mission, as well as a lot of helpful features to help you get started. Like other Tom Clancy games before it, The Sum of All Fears has a minimap for each mission that clearly indicates where you need to go next in order to accomplish your next objective. But the game also has some handy options on the easy difficulty mode; for instance, the heartbeat sensor remains permanently active--this item detects enemy soldiers, and in previous games, you couldn't use it and a gun at the same time. Also, easy difficulty lets you auto-aim, which snaps your gun sight directly onto an enemy tango--all you need to do is pull the trigger.

The Sum of All Fears may be a multimillion-dollar summer movie, but the game isn't quite as spectacular. That's not to say that The Sum of All Fears looks bad--the game has some good-looking character models and some good-looking death animations when you take down your enemies. Unfortunately, even though the game has a decent number of maps (11 single-player maps, plus seven multiplayer maps), a lot of the game's environments look rather plain. And the actual levels are pretty standard for a tactical shooter: Among other things, the game has a Middle Eastern military base, an underground network of caves and sewers, an office building, a warehouse, and a richly furnished mansion. If you've played other tactical shooters before, you shouldn't expect to see too many new things in the game's levels. And like most other such games, The Sum of All Fears' environments aren't very interactive. You can open a few doors, pick up and manipulate a few objects, and that's basically it--other than the game's glass windows, which, for some reason, tend to shatter loudly a second or two after they're shot out. Don't expect to see any walls or buildings destroyed by movie-style explosions or any out-of-control vehicles smashing through gates.

Shattering glass, gunshots, death cries, and nearly all of The Sum of All Fears' other sound effects are short, clearly and effectively indicate what just happened, and are convincing enough. The game also makes limited use of 3D sound in a few areas (this is especially apparent in the sewer level of the second single-player mission), though it's really more of a gimmick than anything else. Your best indicator of where your friends and enemies are is your heartbeat sensor and your minimap. Otherwise, The Sum of All Fears has a quiet, barely noticeable soundtrack, passable voice acting for the mission briefings, and decent voice samples for the terse orders and signals that you and your teammates exchange whenever you take down an enemy, drop a grenade into a room, or take a hit.

For some reason, glass breaks long after you shoot it out.

Beyond that, The Sum of All Fears plays like a slightly more streamlined version of Ghost Recon. Again, the developers apparently simplified several aspects of the game for beginners who might pick it up based on their interest in the motion picture. For instance, The Sum of All Fears has a much-simplified planning phase--all you do is choose which weapons you and your squadmates will carry, and that's it. Your squadmates don't have any kind of ability scores, and they're all exactly the same. They get replaced only when they die, and unlike in previous Tom Clancy games, you don't "buy" more experienced soldiers later on in the game, either.

The single-player game has the same sort of pacing as a lot of tactical shooters: lots of quiet, slow parts in which you advance through the level, punctuated by short, extremely quick firefights with enemies. To help you out, you can bring up a command menu to give direct orders to your teammates. The command menu is considerably different from (and simpler than) Ghost Recon's, since that game took place in large, open locations, while The Sum of All Fears mostly takes place in enclosed areas. You can order your teammates into two formations, have them follow you or stay in one place, and have them approach closed doors and open, clear, or toss a grenade through them.