I vaguely remember playing this a lot on N64 with my cousin back in the day. It was a blast but very difficult. Now I beat the playstation version on my PSP on Easy and Medium, and this version was much worse. The controls were terrible. I had to go into the emulator menu to rebind buttons, since the game only had 3 crappy presets. I managed to get it set up for L and R to strafe, triangle and X for looking up and down, D pad for movement and turning, O for run, square for shoot, right on the analog stick for change weapon, up on stick for reload, and left on the stick + another button to do all the other functions. It was very awkward, but manageable. The biggest problem was vertical aiming. The auto aim was decent enough horizontally, but could not handle much verticality. It was so bad that the most important aspect of the game was planning routes to minimize fighting enemies at different heights. The controls should have been set up more like Medal of Honor or the 3rd person Duke Nukem games: tap triangle to toggle an aim mode that would use the D pad while disabling movement (allow strafe), hold triangle for sniper mode, O for both interact and reload, X for crouch, L2 and R2 for switch weapons and nightvision, run is not needed. Seriously, get rid of the awful aiming and functions bound to combination buttons. Condense down to the number of buttons available.
My plan was to play each level on Easy, then Normal, then Hard, but that did not last long. Easy was braindead simple with enemies that could not hit the broad side of a barn. It was far too easy to be fun, but a good way to learn the level for higher difficulties. I only had trouble with the gimmick levels; the light sensors on the missile silo where I tried to shoot, grenade and electronic kit them before remembering the stupid double button crouch that never needed to be used before, and the god awful stealth level in the villain's penthouse. That was one of the worst video game experiences of my life with instant failure for being seen or even killing the guards. It was complete bullshit trial and error around deliberately setting off alarms to lure guards away. What kind of incompetent guards don't search an entire room after the alarm goes off repeatedly? And the god damn cameras that I could not even get a good look at before setting off the alarm, especially the 1 that was blocked by a door but could still somehow see me. After many many many attempts I managed to make it to the computer and almost make it back out. There had to be a better way, so I looked up cheats. Ooo remove all terrorists cheat. That made me fail because killing them was failure, but they did not spawn upon restarting. This level should have been scrapped. Why the fuck would you send a special forces team armed with smgs if you are not allowed to kill anyone? At least use non lethal weapons.
Medium was a fair challenge though the difficulty of the missions varied independently to the order they were played. Some took many attempts to get through without any deaths while others were breezed through in 1 or 2 tries. My preferred set up was: heavy armor, shotgun, silenced beretta, heartbeat sensor, and flashbangs. It was all about using the sensor to know exactly where each enemy was and either corner camping or strafing out for a quick blast before returning back to cover. Flashbangs were good if the enemy knew I was there but could not be flanked, and for groups or awkward angles. It surprised me how quiet the guns were as they only alerted nearby enemies. Oftentimes it was easier going loud because of corner camping. Sometimes I had 1 guy with M16 for long range, or a stealth guy with light armor and silenced mp5. I did not see the point of the carbine, short mp5, and variety of pistols. I also never used medium armor, electronics kit, door charges or extra ammo. Frags were rarely useful, and the lockpick and demo kits were only useful for a couple of missions. I hated how long it took to throw grenades and flash; like 5 seconds! It was interesting how wounded characters needed to sit out for 1 or more missions to heal, and deaths were replaced by generic guys with terrible stats. It forced some thought into who to take, and to play it safe to avoid deaths. The actual tactical options in this tactical shooter were very disappointing though. Occasionally I could flank enemies with another character when they were alerted to a different character, or leave the teammates in overwatch positions to cover me, but the majority of the game was a punishing first person shooter with 3 lives; play 1 character until he gets hurt, killed or low on ammo, then switch to the next. There should have been environmental interactions to make the electronics skill and kit actually useful, like disabling alarms and cameras, taking over cameras to see where the enemies were, and setting off devices to distract. Hard difficulty was not fun at all with crack shot enemies with lightning reflexes; not good in a game with poor controls and extremely low hp. On top of that the team AI got killed by the enemies more often than not, making it feel even less tactical. The team AI should 100% kill any enemy in front of them without risk, making putting them in overwatch and trying to lure enemies a viable strategy. It would also help if the game could be paused on the map with ability to give orders, paused during play with ability to adjust aim, saved during missions, and if the heartbeat sensor was on the HUD. A few other things that annoyed me: hostages and teammates blocking the way, doors not opening because I was in the way, trouble fitting through doors, ladders were terrible to climb up and even worse going down (too many times they took fall damage and even died), AI team gun fire sounded the same regardless of weapon, and them automatically moving forward after shooting an enemy.
The first 4 missions were not bad, and I even managed to beat them on Hard. 5 was the time limit mission in the missile silo; the 2nd worst mission. It took a ton of attempts to beat it on Medium without deaths or setting off the alarm. I had 2 guys on full stealth to clear the way from 1 rear entrance and camp at the final double sensor that could not be bypassed. The last guy was heavy, shotgun, lockpick and demo kit to deal with the end area. I tried heavy shotgun assault on Hard but there was a higher chance of enemies triggering the alarm. I stopped playing here as this level was bad enough on Medium. I also found stealth much less effective on Hard. Hard really needed save state scumming. The revive teammate cheat was the closest thing I found to that, so at least if I could beat a mission with 2 deaths I would suffer no penalty. Mission 6 in the amusement park was easy with shotguns; doable with 1 guy. 7 in the dam was full stealth and not difficult. For 8 the biolab I had 1 guy with M16 take the loading dock, 1 guy with mp5 take the guardhouse and snipe the guy in the main building, and the shotgun guy kill everyone else. Mission 9 at the airfield was a little awkward with the layout but it was simple enough with shotgun and M16; the 3rd guy was not needed. Mission 10 was mostly soloed by a full stealth guy who inserted at the side. I avoided the main entrance. The other 2 came in the loading dock but I only killed 2 guys with the shotgun; the guy overlooking the loading dock needed the stealth guy to get him from the same height. Mission 11 in the ship was not too bad with full shotgun assault. 12 was the worst mission while 13 at the stadium was probably the best because I actually needed 2 guys to coordinate; I had 1 full stealth guy clear the way to the computer, while a guy with demo kit disarmed both bombs. I gave the 3rd guy a demo kit too but it was a waste because both bombs were in the same room. The final mission was confusing with a lot of enemies and really showcased why hacking should have been present due to cameras and control panels being everywhere. I barely scraped by on Medium with only 1 survivor at low hp. I judged the side entrance better but needed M16 for the distance there. The 2 shotguns took over after that.
Awful controls and unforgiving difficulty ruin this game. There was some fun to be had with controlling multiple characters, but overall this game was probably not worth porting to the playstation. I might try to get further on Hard after playing other games, and I bought the PC version.
5.5/10 for playstation version
