You get to experience this tedium ad infinitum in the first full level at the
controls of your island. Your island must move through a series of
waypoints on a course marked by large floating rocks. Many of these rocks
have blimps between them that will destroy your island if you run into them, so
the first part of the level involves sitting in the tower until you are close
enough to the blimps to shoot them, stopping the engines, running to a gun,
entering the gun, shooting the static blimps, running back to the tower, turning
the engines back on, and then repeating this process all over again. You
can't even save time by strategically placing your base's guns and other
installation to minimize transit time - you are given the choice of only a
couple of possible slots when placing something.
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| Checking things out on foot. |
Later things begin to shoot at you - either static blimps with guns, guns
based on the rocks, or planes that come by and bomb your island. This adds
more problems for you as you now have to run between your base structures and
repair them after every encounter. Also, the limited slots for placing
guns inevitably creates gaps in your firing arcs, forcing you to wait until the
planes are kind enough to come within range of your gun.
This all happens in the excruciatingly long first island level and will try
the patience of some players to the point that they might just give up on the
game. Who wants to spend an hour or so repeating the same boring routine
over and over? Things don't get much better from there, especially since
the game's vague level objectives often leave you wondering why you are doing
something and what you are supposed to be doing next.
Later in the game you do get access to automatic turrets and defensive
fighters, but the poor AI of your defensive structures will force you to take
control of them anyway. When you get the ability to leave your base in an
aircraft and fly around, you'll need to stick close to home because if you leave
your island's defenses to their own you'll invariably lose your island.
I really wanted Project Nomads to be a good game. With such an
interesting premise, gorgeous graphics, and genre-bending gameplay, the game had
a lot of promise. However, any good feelings generated during the game's
opening and initial sequence were quickly squashed by the game's numbing tedium.
In The End, This Game Hath Been Rated:
52%. Looks great, no filling.
System Requirements: Pentium III 450; 64 MB RAM; 32 MB
Video RAM; 4x CD-ROM; 850 MB Hard Drive
Space; Mouse.
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