It's very ironic to see how a game about tanks turns out to be such a "tanker"
Meet "Da Wardnez", a five-man mercenary unit who are frequently called in to combat terrorism in the world. The members are : Charles "9-1-1" Valdez, who looks and sounds like Steve Urkel from Family Matters, Darnell "Earshot" Jones, who needs a hair dye badly, Cecil "D-Tour" Coles, who built the tank you're driving and will act the same way Q does when James Bond damages his gadgets, Alvin "Props" Fielder a guy who for some reason tries to imitate Tony Montana but fails miserably and finally the commander Mike "Dogg-Tag" Reynolds who tries to be like Samuel L Jackson but also fails. As you've probably noticed, the characters are filled with every stereotype about African-Americans that you can think off. Because of this, the story is more of an annoyance then a delight.
One thing that's crucial to have when playing this game is the instruction manual. When you begin a mission, you're never sure what your objective is. At the bottom left of you HUD there is a small image of something along with a number. The game itself never explains what these means, which is why the manual is so essential. Once you get this out of the way, you'll find that the game is actually quite engaging, albeit very hard. The game is played from a first person view, which makes it hard to avoid shots coming from the side. Aside from that, the navigation is dreadful. After you've beaten a stage, Earshot will give you directions to the extraction point. The biggest problem with this is that the directions he's giving don't work for the most part. There are cases when you're told to go straight ahead when you're facing a body of water or a pile of impenetrable trees. Coupled with this is the fact that the levels are very big, meaning you will get lost a lot. This would have been so much better if you where given a proper map with the extraction point clearly indicated. The characters keep annoying you throughout every mission by shouting things like "Yo! Way to go!" in a very obnoxious way every time you destroy something or "Get the hell out of the way, Jack!" whenever you get hit.
Between each level, you can buy upgrades from Tony Montana wannabe Props. However, since you're likely to take a lot of damage and your health doesn't regenerate between levels, you're forced to spend much of your hard earned cash repairing your tank and thus can't afford the new upgrades.
The controls for your tank are fairly good. The R2 and L2 buttons moves your tank's turrets, hitting them simultaneously re-centers the turret and there's even a way to move with one side of the tank's tracks only. Despite this, the controls take some time getting used to, but they're not a big problem.
The graphics of Shellshock shows what the original Grand Theft Auto games might have looked like if they where in 3D. Everything looks horribly pixilated and polygonal. The way the enemy tanks are animated makes it look like something is dragging them along the ground. The music score isn't much better either. Having hip-hop songs in a war-themed game is like having Blümchen's music in The Godfather. The hip-hop tracks aren't even good, consisting of the same loops played over and over again.
Some people say cheating is wrong, but in Shellshock's case, it's quite the opposite. Without cheats the game is unfair and way too hard but with cheats the game becomes a little fairer. Nevertheless, the game is poorly designed and filled with enough racial insensitive characters to support a lawsuit. If you want a good war game, try Medal of Honor. If you want a good tank game, leave this one and try Mass Destruction.