Tom Clancy's EndWar First Look
We get some early details behind Tom Clancy's EndWar, the World War III real-time strategy game from Ubisoft Shanghai that aims to tie together the big three Clancy franchises
Now, with EndWar, the first entirely new Clancy game brand since 2002's Splinter Cell, Ubisoft Shanghai plans to unite its three heavy-hitting military action franchise into the Clancy game to end all Clancy games--or, more likely, to spawn a new series. Set during a near-future World War III and expected to connect elements of Rainbow Six, Ghost Recon, and Splinter Cell, EndWar is a real-time strategy game, both a new genre for Ubisoft-published Clancy games and an unusual choice for a title planned excusively for consoles.
"The message we want to send is that first and foremost is it is a console game," explained Ubisoft Shanghai's Julian Gerighty during a recent Ubisoft event. While Gerighty would not rule out the long-term possibility of EndWar appearing on PCs, it is currently only in the works for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, and there are no existing PC plans.
"Our mandate was to take all the values of Clancy and make the most epic wargame about World War III for consoles possible," Gerighty went on, "and we were given all the time and resources we wanted."
To that end, EndWar's team contains developers from every console-based Clancy game to date, as well as some big names from the strategy world: the game's creative director is Michael de Plater, formerly the creative director at Total War series developer The Creative Assembly, and the game's lead level designer hails from now-defunct Command & Conquer developer Westwood Studios.
I pressed Gerighty as to why the team would take a completely console-centric approach to a genre so strongly suited to a mouse and keyboard interface.
"Our goal was to break the cycle of thinking about the mouse, the top-down view, the PC, the keyboard when thinking about RTS," he responded. Most surprisingly, the entire game has been crafted to be playable with voice commands. Holding down a trigger button during play will bring up a list of commands applicable the current situation; at a given moment, they might be "attack," "retreat," "regroup," or "reinforce." Troops can be broken into color-coded units for easier manipulation. Gerighty put forth an example command: "Red unit, capture strategic point delta."Of course, users lacking the patience or inclination to deal with voice commands may opt for standard controls at any time. Oddly, despite the desire to separate from PC-style RTS mechanics, EndWar still uses an analog stick-controlled cursor. The face buttons and d-pad executive commands and handle unit grouping.
To give the game a more action-oriented feel, the team has brought the camera down from the traditional top-down view to a more urgent horizontal orientation. This is a technique put to good effect by Massive Entertainment in its Ground Control series and its upcoming World in Conflict. There is also an option to switch to a top-down view or inlay a 2D map on the screen.
It is difficult to get a sense of how EndWar's control and camera mechanics work, as Ubisoft did not have a playable build of the game at the event, but Gerighty did point to one surprising source of inspiration.
"On the console, we looked to Madden football," he said. "At the end of the day, Madden is a strategy game on a football field. We brought the camera down to the field."
EndWar's single-player component begins with two introductory scenarios each for the United States, European, and Russian factions comprising World War III's major players. Following these six missions, the player chooses a faction and plays through its campaign. While each campaign has an overall set arc, battle-to-battle strategic opions will be up to the player; after completing a mission, options open up and the player may choose where to invade next to continue waging war. Battlefields span a diverse range, with a list of locations including Washington D.C., Moscow, Cape Canaveral, and Paris, with some 40 total territories.
These territorial choices take on much more significance in EndWar's online multiplayer mode, sure to cultivate a dedicated online following when the game launches. When playing in the online Theatre of War, the player picks a faction and a particular battalion, then customizes it visually and functionally. In what Gerighty described as an MMO-inspired feature, that battalion will stick with the player from battle to battle, with surviving units gaining experience and abilities, and casualties being replaced by green troops for the next round.
At the end of each day, control of each military front is tabulated based on the performance of the gamers who played online games set in those fronts. This worldwide strategic data will be tracked continually. In keeping with the action-slanted feel of the game, multiplayer games will support up to six players per side and are intended to last approximately 20 minutes.
Many details, particularly how exactly EndWar will control, are still being kept fairly close to Ubisoft's chest, so it is difficult to make a call this early regarding its feasibility on consoles and the practicality of its voice control. That said, the approach does mean that the game will not be a PC-to-console port, and Theatre of War sounds enormously promising. Ubisoft is expected to show more of the game in the coming months.
Ubisoft plans to ship Ubisoft Shanghai's Tom Clancy's EndWar some time in the current fiscal year, which ends March 31, 2008.
