DESCRIPTION

Battles of both first-person shooting and real-time strategy are waged in Raven Squad: Hidden Dagger, an action war game set in the very near future. Players take command of a squad of mercenary soldiers, either from a top-down, strategic view of the nearby surrounding area, or from a first-person perspective, as one of the soldiers in the mission. Under regular circumstances, players can switch between the FPS and RTS perspectives at will, and the game's interface is designed to make it easy to move from one mode to the other.

In the soldier's perspective mode, computer-controlled squad mates can find areas that provide cover from enemy fire, but some environmental objects are destructible, so the battlefield is always changing. In the strategic mode, players can scroll around the map to survey the surrounding area, and assign general, location-based orders to lead the team through upcoming obstacles and enemies. Most missions feature two squads, each with three soldiers. Solders all can perform basic tasks such as moving and shooting, and each has a unique specialty, such as sniping, flash-bang attacks, or rocket launchers.

Missions involve, escort, escape, and assault, with newsreel-type footage filling in the story between stages. In an online, two-player cooperative mode, each player takes command of one squad. The game plays out in the jungles of the Amazon, where opposing factions of native bandits pose threats or offer alliances. The action is fast, the explosions are big, and the dialog and storyline seem to pay tribute to the mercenary enthusiasm of cheesy, post-Vietnam action movies of the 1980s. ~ T.J. Deci, All Game Guide