Outfront II E3 2005 Preshow Report

In a rather odd turn of events, Best Way is developing a sequel to its well-received World War II strategy game Soldiers: Heroes of World War II but has given it the working title of Outfront II. Confusing naming scheme aside, it seems that Best Way is intent on matching all of the features of Soldiers in Outfront II, as well as offering up some new twists for returning players.

Players of Soldiers will remember it as a squad-based, real-time strategy game, which gave you control over a variety of soldiers and vehicles across four separate campaigns, one for each of the German, American, British, and Russian combatant nations. One of the unique aspects of the game was that it allowed you to take control of individual soldiers or vehicles and let you manually aim with the mouse for extra precision. That feature is making a return in Outfront II, and it appears that the developers are going to make it even easier to manually control units through such additions as a free camera. If you're more of a strategic gamer, then you'll be pleased with the new AI upgrades and movement options. Instead of the simple walk-run-crawl movement options of the first game, your soldiers will now have a much wider array of movement available to them, including three separate running speeds, climbing, a stealth movement, and a cover-to-cover rush. You'll also have to monitor the new morale stat for your soldiers, lest they become overwhelmed by fear on the battlefield.

Of course, any sequel to an RTS game will add new units to the mix, and Outfront II is no exception. The developers are promising some exciting additions in this area, the most prominent of which are the flamethrower soldiers and flamethrower tanks. Flamethrowers are obviously devastating when used against opposing infantry, but as an added bonus, you'll apparently be able to use flamethrowers on wooden buildings to catch them alight, forcing enemy units within to rush out, preferably after you've covered all the exits with your other soldiers. In addition to flamethrowing units, though, Best Way is also hoping to include amphibious vehicles, artillery pieces that are movable by infantry units, and mortars and machine gun emplacements that can be constructed from parts that infantry carry with them until they find a spot to lay them down.

In addition to the new gameplay tweaks, Outfront II will showcase numerous new graphical upgrades to the already impressive engine used in Soldiers. The biggest change here is the winter landscapes, where snow blankets the ground and even falls from trees and buildings, but Best Way is also embracing every graphical buzzword you could probably think of, with increased texture resolution, bump-mapping, and specular lighting all being added to the engine's roster of features. In addition, they're adding around 40 new animations for soldiers and vehicles.

Fans of Soldiers: Heroes of World War II will want to keep an eye on Outfront II, as it appears to be improving on the original game in many significant ways. While we didn't get a chance to play the game itself, we're hoping to get some hands-on time with it at E3, so stay tuned for more details.