SURVIVING THE STRIKE “Tougherbe approached enemies with now speed need and to swift manoeuvring”
piloting a ground vehicle – the armoured beast that is the experimental GAV unit.
New to Urban Strike is the introduction of ground missions where your pilot disembarks from his ‘copter and fights on foot using a machine gun and missile launcher. Developer Mike Posehn has since revealed that these sections were introduced under pressure from publisher Electronic Arts and that this was never an idea that he was particularly happy with.
There are three ground-based missions in the game – one taking place in an oil rig, one in Alcatraz and one in a Las Vegas casino. They are unquestionably the weakest sections of the game – you character is far less responsive that when you’re piloting your ‘copter and the enemies you’re dealing with far less interesting. You can see why Mike would have preferred to put the resources spent developing these sections into improving the core game. These missions are sparse enough that they provide a little bit of novelty, but it would be hard to argue the game would miss them.
Amore fundamental change made to Urban Strike is the removal of the ability to strafe your ‘copter, completely changing the way you must approach combat. Rather than dodging enemy fire by shifting from side to side, tougher enemies now need to be approached with speed and swift manoeuvring. Hit and run flyby attacks where you unload on an enemy before they have a chance to train their guns on you, before attacking again from another angle, are effective. Whether this change amounts to a net positive ultimately depends on your personal preference. Again,
Mike Posehn has indicated this new direction came from the publisher and that he didn’t feel the game’s engine was suitable for this more fast-paced combat style, but the change at least forced players to take a fresh approach. Given that the this was the third consecutive year when we’d had a Strike game, that change of approach was arguably necessary.
More uncontroversially positive is the scope and scale of the game. Over the course of the game’s ten missions, we’re given relatively large spaces to play in, each offering just enough of a twist on the objectives you’re tasked with completing to make the missions feel unique. For the most part, the game looks fantastic – the cloudy San Francisco, essentially a blank space with a few buildings popping out, is a notable blot on the copy book – offering a diverse array of environments for us to visit. The game kicks off with a Jungle Strikereminiscent mission set in Hawaii, moves us to the Baja Oil Rigs and takes a stop in a Desert
Strike-esque Mexico level before we head to the promised urban landscapes, such as the towering skyscrapers of New York and a night mission in neon Las Vegas. This aesthetic variety combines nicely with good mission design and novelty diversions – the ground missions and the GAV, for example – to give its campaign an epic feel.
Urban Strike would be the last of the 16-bit era Strike games and, despite getting less attention than its two predecessors in the modern day, is a worthy addition to the trilogy. While the series would continue into the 32-bit era with Soviet and
Nuclear Strike, it is the 16-bit games which Urban Strike bought to a close which, rightly, are remembered most fondly.