Review: Warhawk (PS3)

So, how do you want it? Direct PlayStation Store download, or boxed retail version? Will that be with Bluetooth headset, or without? Not content with months of dithering over the title's possible online-only release, and for the longest time being advertised with FMV from the ultimately canned single-player campaign, even on release Warhawk is an awkward customer. Uncomfortable in its skin almost from the get-go, the PlayStation Network poster-boy seems to be proving an unexpectedly accurate representation of Sony's online experience.

As an action-shooter on the most basic level, there's little to fault, making for a better game of soldiers than you might expect considering the developmental angst. The five different battlefields and the character models than inhabit them are cut in a chunky, cartoonish fashion, exchanging realism and frilliness for attractive functionality. Weapons, too, have a bulkiness about them, and even without vibration support their report is satisfying and instantly recognisable, something of vital importance when under fire, the choice of response potentially deciding your fate. In 5.1 Surround Sound, Warhawk's battlefields are audibly chaotic, but brimming with information.

The vehicles of Warhawk handle much like the firearms- solid and vulnerable. Leaving for the moment the tanks (indestructible against grunts, disconcertingly vulnerable to co-ordinated attacks) and 4X4s (fast, bouncy and liable to getting picked off), the titular aircraft are one of the most enjoyable, if initially unwelcoming, elements of the game. Used primarily to terrify ground troops and get one's self to the nearest fire fight, its jump-jet design makes for a novel way of carving up the sky, once you get a hang of it. Swapping between hover and flight modes requires moving between two control schemes, which likely results the more daft crashes new players make as the right stick swaps between adjusting your aim and performing elaborate evasive rolls.

After a few hours' play, it begins to make sense and swooping low across the scenery and mercilessly gunning down your adversaries in a hover after a high-speed cluster-bomb attack becomes second nature. The much-touted motion control however isn't quite so up to the job- while perfect for flight-mode control as you weave amongst canyons and around hills, it falls down somewhat as you attempt to reconcile moving the pad in a hover while aiming with an analogue stick, and without the option to select more precisely where to use the Sixaxis pad, you're rather stuck- it's either every vehicle in every way or nothing.

While there are a number of further niggles here and there- why not use Halo-style vehicle controls, for instance?- they fall into insignificance when playing. Weapon balancing on foot is excellent, with every one having a time and place, an unavoidable weakness and a perfect use. In practise, there are some favourites- the assault rifle is a reliable friend, for instance- but only the basic service handgun is truly replaceable.

For all that finesse, stick 32 players into a match and it often becomes outright chaotic. With headset use at a sad minimum on most servers, crossfires and team killing are something of an inevitability; on the flipside, co-ordinating with the few players who do use them reaps massive rewards. Even at its least demented, Warhawk has an element of disorder to it- rag-dolled bodies flying, chain-reaction explosions tearing up the scenery- but in many ways that adds to, rather than diminishes from the charm. The only way to wind up regularly on the wrong side of a bullet is to forget to pay attention.

The only major flaw is in the online implementation; put bluntly, it doesn't totally work. Early issues with inaccessible servers and resetting stats have since been addressed, but at present there is no option to quickly join any particular game type- only filter the complete server list- and the game's military-style rank system seems to be either inexplicably easy to progress through, entirely random, or completely broken, and is never explained in the game's documentation.

These are issues that should be addressed with future software updates behind the scenes at Sony, as will the limited range of maps via downloads. The fact that these niggling flaws are so quickly forgotten once in a game is a testament to Warhawk's quality as a videogame, though not, perhaps, as a complete online experience- which was rather the point.

Rating: 8 / 10

Words by Colin Whiteside