Part 1: A Leap in the Dark - Part 1

A Leap in the Dark

When you boot up the game, you're greeted by this intro. But it actually has no real connection to the game, and is probably only included because it contains some explosions.





With that out of the way, let's get into the game.

This is the starting screen. And yeah, this game can be played against other people. The skull in the middle also spins when you hover over it, producing a wob-wob noise. Here we also have the first bug - sometimes that sound will not stop. It will persist as long as the game runs, and you have to exit to stop it.

When you start a new game, you set up a profile and then end up here..

The first button plays what I consider to be the real intro to the game. A narration of the events before the outbreak, and what happened afterwards.

Please watch this, otherwise you won't really know what the fuck is even going on.



So, after the world went to shit, our heroes sat in a bunker for ten years. Now they're fed up with it and want to take their chances. An understandable decision, I think.

Before I can get into the game, I also have to choose a difficulty setting. Either Easy, Normal, Difficult or Apocalyptic. I'm going with Difficult, since the last setting would require me to exploit the game mechanics a bit too often. According to the Readme, the different settings influence how much ammo you will see during the campaign, and how much damage your vehicles can take. That last thing is really noticeable, as the same vehicles are much more durable in enemy hands. I also think that the higher settings add a few more enemies, but I never really bothered to check.

Well, let's start this...


Missions will always start with this oddly tinted screen. Aside from a bit of fluff, you'll also get a new tooltip each time.



Say hello to our initial team!

From left to right we have: Sorana Sorgarowa, David Reaves, Boris Kerkowitsch and Prof. Dr. S. Petrow. The guy on the radio is Prof. Dr. Vigo Jolinzky. He'll be our contact to the base, and will also provide us with intel and directions. There is another member in the group, but I'm going to introduce him in the first base update. I'll also transcribe the info dump for these characters real soon.

If you look at the little faces at the bottom, you can see a few symbols next to them. The symbols right next to their faces show their experience level, and are displayed as military ranks. But don't ask me how levels and Xp actually work, since it's very mysterious and I have no freaking idea. All that I do know, is that units will receive a skill on their fourth and eight level and that David has the highest level right now.

This also brings me to the other symbols, which are for the skills. Sorana starts with the Medic skill, which allows her to use medkits more effectively. David has the light weapons skill, which obviously makes him better with them. It's a really neat skill in the early missions, but will quickly fall off when heavier guns show up. To be clear; this skill is a waste in the long run and I won't choose it for another soldier. Lastly, Boris has the explosives skill which allows him to handle mines and TNT. This is important for two reasons. First, only a soldier with this skill can handle such things, the other soldiers will kill themselves if you try it. And secondly, mines will be a thing throughout the whole game. You'll need someone to clear them out, or deploy them for you.

And lastly, let's take a quick look at our equipment. Everyone is armed with a pistol, has two packs of ammo and Sorana also carries a few medkits.



I'm going to include most of the entries from the in-game encyclopedia, and will only give my opinion when I think that it's important. Like, I don't really need to tell you that the pistol is a shitty gun and that medkits heal, right?

With the groundwork done, let's go already!


We start in a military base, which actually looks nothing like our real base at all. Our place looks much better than this dump.


On this screen you can see something kinda important about this game, that I also have to discuss - the size.

I'm zoomed out as far as I can be, and all that fog in the distance hides much more land. Take a look at the minimap. What you can see now, is only a part of the corner of the whole map. They are really, really big! But that doesn't mean that all the space actually gets used, often it's just terrain without any relevance. But it's always a good idea to look at the whole map. Either to make plans, or to hunt for a secret.

Jolinzky told us to first check out the command post in the area, so let's do it.

There is a crossroad in front of the base, and our target is to the left. See that orange triangle? That's an indicator for some kind of contact, I'll call em "Blips" from now on.

Orange means that it's in a neutral/unaware state, while red blips are hostile and in active "attack mode". This distinction is important. An orange Blip will only turn red after it notices you. Either by catching sight of you, after seeing a friend die or by hearing/witnessing a big ruckus. Enemies don't have peripheral vision and will only spot things in a straight line. On top of that, you can also reduce your own visibility by changing your stance to kneeling or being prone. If a Blip goes to red it will attack and will also seek you out. Enemies often magically now from where you attacked them, even if they couldn't possibly do so. But here is the thing, they will only go to the spot where you attacked from, and if you can evade them, they'll go back to the orange state.

By knowing all of this, you'll have a much easier time being stealthy and moving into advantageous positions. But this is also a bit of a generalization, since some enemies have special behavior patterns, that trigger after they have been in the red state once. And lastly, Blips can also be yellow which indicates that they are afraid and will flee. This usually happens when a unit has no chance to damage another. Like a soldier with a pistol that has to face a tank.

Anyway, let's see what this Blip actually is.



Haha, fuck that bear!



The team roughly pumps twenty pistol rounds into his snout. Wildlife is a threat in the beginning of the game, and can very well kill you. But once you have some gear or vehicles, it stops being an issue.

Let's see what we can find in the outpost.

Loot boxes will always look like this, and are thusly easily identifiable. I find a stash a 9mm ammo and two Uzis.



However, I only give David an Uzi because they are ammo-hogs. Here is also an important info about ammo and a flaw in the game. The game can only handle full ammo boxes. This means that you'll loose leftover rounds when you reload a weapon. This is very annoying and a huge fucking flaw in a tactics game. Yes, if a box holds twenty rounds and you reload a weapon that still has nineteen rounds in it, you'll just loose those nineteen rounds.

With the first objective done, I move back to the crossroad.

Our next objective lies straight ahead, but there is also another dirt road on the right. Let's follow that instead.

On the way, I meet the next type of enemy.



Fucking wolves.

They show up in groups of at least three, and are kinda fast. I gun them down easily right here, but in larger numbers they can rip you to pieces.

Let's see what we can find at the end of the road.

Remember what I said about larger groups of wolves?

"There's a couple of wolves hanging around the Jeep."

"Yes, and?"

"Yes, and there are living creatures out here. But I want to find out if there's anything we can use in that Jeep."

Well, we can see that there is a box next to the Jeep. Fighting this pack head-on will likely get one of my crew killed. And remember, death is permanent.


So instead of going from the front, I move the squad around and up on a hill. This allows me to kill the pack while it charges up to me. This is a really simple tactic, but should demonstrate a big rule in this game - try to fight on your own terms. If you don't try to be smart about your battles, you'll suffer for it.


I pull this off without a scratch, but it got a bit close at the end.

Since the wolves are corpses now, let's approach the Jeep.






At least I got two boxes of 7,62 rounds! I have no use for them right now, but this will change soon.

Now I can move on to the next objective..

..ahw hell.

But hold on, only the right group are wolves. The left group are actually deer!




Deer will just flee when you get near. But they do have a use, and it's a sneaky one. If you can get them to flee in a certain direction, you can use them to distract wolves!


Buuut, I fucked it up and only manage to aggro a single wolf.

So I just gun them down and move on...


Oh, what is that?!



It's the first vehicle!



The Humvee is a pretty neat ride in the early game. It can fit four people, can take different weapon systems and can stand a bit of damage. This one has an M60 without ammo, but I got the two boxes earlier. One important fact about vehicles, is that you need two people in them to drive and shoot. But instead of yapping about how vehicles handle, I'm going to show it to you and will add some things afterwards.



As you could see, pathfinding isn't perfect. Vehicles will often zig-zag and will take very strange ways when moving over longer distances. There is a setting for how CPU intensive you want it to be, and I have it set to the highest. Still, kinda wonky. The next problem is that there is a bit of latency between clicks and units doing stuff, which is pretty annoying. But I should also say that the Humvee wasn't on top of his game, since the wolves were fleeing. If they would have been hostile, my unit would have engaged them on its own, while also being quicker on the targeting. Since they were fleeing, my gunner always climbed in and out of the interior between salvos. Yeah, roof mounted guns need to actually be staffed, and the people on them can get hurt.

But the biggest problem with units in general, is that they will stop when assigned a new order. Think about that. If you move towards an enemy, but need to adjust, your unit will stop for a second while the new path is calculated and will likely get shot. This is real ugly and shouldn't be in a RTS game from 2002. The first C&C came in 1995, and I don't remember it having such issues. At least not as noticeable as this game has. With that said though, you kinda get used to it when playing the game and can learn to deal with it. It's still dumb though.

Anyway, the next goal is to blow up the dam.




This is a job for Boris and his brick of boom.


You plant TNT either by double clicking in your inventory, or by dragging it to the ground. But remember, you need the explosives skill or you'll die. Once planted, you can set a timer to any amount that you want. You can actually have three timers going at once, but the third timer will be covered by the pause symbol. It's generally better to pause the game while you set timers, especially if you want to synchronize your explosions or are around enemies, but the third one must always be set in real time.

It's also a good idea to stay away from the blast, since it has a large AOE.






What will our heroes find out there? Mutants? More bears? Maybe nothing at all?

E: Sorry for the ugly stills on the clips, but Youtube seems to brighten them automatically and I'm not fond of it! The videos look much better than this