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	Firefighter F.D. 18
	Developer: Konami Publisher: Konami Genre: Action Players: 1 Similar To: Reign of Fire (...kinda) Rating: Teen Published: 03 :19 : 04 Reviewed By: Ryan Newman Overall: 6 = Fair

Screenshots

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Intro
As much as videogames love to put players in perilous situations, it's rare that the events could actually happen - unless, of course, you know where aliens, giant robots, and/or dragons reside. Firefighters, police officers, and paramedics all see and go through events that must of us, fortunately, will never have to deal with, but only rarely are their adventures put in digital form, whether it be realistically or exaggerated - tactical enforcement officers aside, thanks Tom Clancy. Konami is seeking to fill that void with Firefighter F.D. 18, an action title that puts players in the middle of raging infernos and entices them with a fantastic premise, but ultimately fails to deliver past its initial wallop.


Gameplay: 6.5/10
The opening movie, with the player's character reliving a past experience where a child dies in a fire, really brought the title to the proverbial fork in the road: it could have gone in a surreal direction with a realistic take on fighting fires or it could go the way of a bad 80s action movie that tries to disguise itself as something more. Unfortunately, it went with the latter.

At first, I was convinced that Firefighter was going to be a great title. The first stage takes places in a congested tunnel with fires raging all around, cars wrecked into barriers, flame bursting out of pipes, and gasoline ready to ignite. Putting out fires before they reached gas tanks and making it to survivors before they died was tough, but rewarding. The levels are broken into segments, and rescuing a set amount of people will complete that particular portion. To smooth out the process, a mini map shows where the trapped people are and a rough layout of the area; obstacles, however, are not shown and are left for the player to navigate around. The controls seemed a little stiff, but I went with it because it was easy enough to turn the hose into the needed direction. As I went farther along, the action became intense with cars exploding on all sides, people crying out for help, and fire surrounding me completely. It was a rush I wasn't expecting, and was more than pleased with.

The second level slowly chipped away at my expectations, and within the course of its segments, it was apparent that the game was only going to get worse. The realization of this occurred when it hit me that, even though the game seemed very random, it wasn't; in fact, the game was very deliberate and focused. Sequences are scripted, so when someone says the ceiling is going to collapse, it does so in the same spot every time, but, it also occurs in the same area that the player tends to be in as the routes to get to certain spots are limited, so it's really that the ceiling is about to collapse on you. After the first time through a section, the spontaneous calamities just become tiresome. The first time through later levels also becomes annoying because the player's character has long animations that exaggerate the situation. Whenever something happens, be it he slipping on oil, hopping around on fire, or opening a door, seconds are being lost, and since each survival is timed (the people slowly die) and losing one person means losing the game, so few seconds of he looking cool really don't pay off.

Farther along in the game, the scripted events only compound on another and always happen right on the player. The problem with this is that there are no real means for the player to escape from a backdraft or a collapse. The best thing the firefighter can do is a quick dash, which is suppose to be for going through fires that can't be put out so that he can reach a survivor. The fire hose has a setting of a steady stream or a spray, with both working randomly good in any given moment. So, later on, a room might have 20 explosions (which are all file cabinets… so watch out for exploding file cabinets if there is ever a fire in your office), floors collapsing (complete with long animations of him pulling himself out), ceilings collapsing, only to conclude with the player reaching the door and hearing, "BACKDRAFT!", then become immediately engulfed in flames. The pain taken from flames is the only thing I found to be random; while you are suppose to tell the strength of them by color, but it's pretty hard to discern how one fire can be brushed off, while another that appears weaker can kill in a matter of seconds. It would also be a big help if the player could spray a room while they enter, but they can't.

Other problems include robots, oil spills, lack of health, and some annoying survivors. Keep in mind that most of the game takes place in large buildings (think of office buildings and the like); so that really makes the oil spills on the hallway floors seem very out of place. The same can be said about the robots, which are as annoying as people say; the controls play a part in this because they weren't meant for that kind of action (they are destroyed by being hit with the player's axe). Another negative part of their presence was the animation caused from they shocking the player: when shocked, the firefighter jitters and moves around, but does it so much that in several instances, I was shocked, he stumbled into a fire, got burned by the fire, wobbled back to the robot, hocked by the robot again, moved back into the fire, repeat until death. The lack of health is also a problem. Medikits and drinks are hidden throughout the floors, but since everything is timed, exploration is pretty limited - although, that did make me very grateful for the unlimited continues. The people being rescued are also annoying, with some threatening lawsuits and complaining 'where the hell were you?!' when their life is still about 70% full - hey, sorry, maybe you noticed I'm the only guy with a hose on an entire floor filled with fire, killer robots, exploding file cabinets, and gas leaks? Finally there are the boss fires, which sound like a decent idea, but they very rarely proved to be anything more than strangely irritating - ever been accosted by flying shirts that were on fire? You're about to be.

The story also becomes incredibly silly. Some insane arsonist is joined by the annoying-as-hell-but-will-do-anything-for-a-story-generic reporter and a host of some very lazy coworkers. Aside from assisting with bursts of foam, which did come in handy, and occasionally popping in to try to tackle the same flame the entire time the player is in the room, other firefighters do very little. It really is like a bad 80s action movie; the main guy does all the work with everyone else running around like fodder and the minor rolls being handled by actors from American Ninja 3.

What really stings is that I actually liked where the game was going. The player can break through weak walls with an axe, crawl on the floor to see under thick smoke and escape from exposed wires, move through vents, and just getting the unnerving feeling that the situation that could turn horrible at any second. Maybe it's the obsessive-compulsiveness in me, but I treated the fires like I did those damn Tetris blocks: they had to be destroyed. For that reason, the game does have an addictive quality for those of us who have to clean up specks of dirt when we see them or line up all our pens in a row. The major problem, though, is that the game's design takes the liberties of a videogame, without treating the player the same; while it can throw everything and the kitchen sink at a sole firefighter, he is left with limited tools and little health to combat the intentional and unintentional problems.

Graphics: 7.5/10
Fire and water have both been done better (see: Return to Castle Wolfenstein and Morrwind), but for this kind of game, where there is so much that it could bog down the system, they do a good job. The cool animations are also detrimental to the game, so those wear out their welcome quickly. The characters all look like they belong in a Silent Hill title, so be prepared for thick shadows and people who look like they are about to slit their wrists. The environments don't change much, but they are detailed enough to resemble everyday environments. Nothing extraordinary, but everything fits together well.

Sound: 6/10
The sounds are decent, with the hose sounding good but the fires coming off kind of lackluster. There are some great smaller sounds, like the metal of the hose dinging as it hits something. The voice-overs in the cutscenes are done well, with good synching and matching their characters. The voices in-game are horrible, though; they are constantly inconsistent and wrong, often saying that the player is on the right track or there is no one else in an area when you aren't on the right track and there is someone else there - not good.

Control: 6.5/10
If the game consisted of just putting out fires, the controls would've been better. With the left analog handling the direction of movement and the right handling the direction of the spray, the slow turning can easily be compensated by putting the hose on spray and just directing the hose, but that doesn't work whenever there is a robot in pursuit. The game also has a problem recognizing when the character is close enough to open an object: items like boxes can be kicked when reached, but my firefighter would often kick a door instead of opening it, which wasted precious time. The stiff feeling, and lack of any solid evasive maneuvers, really made the game feel limited.

Overall: 6/10
The slow speed of the action will immediately turn some people off, but it should be expected due to the subject matter. For most, the initial thrill of running through explosions and dousing cars before they explode will steadily erode as they continue to play. Eventually many will find themselves playing just because it's oddly addictive to attempt putting out all the fires out, but quickly turning the game off because the lack of any sort of defensive moves, health, assistance, and variety will wear out their nerves. With Firefighter F.D. 18, the developers took out all the fear of the unknown and replaced it with sequenced events that create a decent action game that serves well as a rental.

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