- publisher: MicroProse
- developer: Blue Tongue Software
What! Starship Troopers… another game based on a movie. Oh no! When has such a thing ever been a success? Errr.. never. Well actually, for those of you who didn't know, the movie Starship Troopers was actually based on a book by Robert Heinlein. Well it turns out that the movie was missing quite a few things that were an important part of the book (namely a decent plot and believable characters).
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But beyond the obvious, it was how the MI (Military Infantry) was portrayed in the movie that really ticked off some faithful readers. In the movie they are like a bunch of mindless peons in simple body armor, but in the book, they are more like small combat divisions with their classic combat suits. These combat suits are very important to the infantryman because they multiply every muscle movement he makes, making him far more powerful. This was completely omitted from the movie. Thankfully the game will be more true to the book, and how you control your combat suit will be a big part of the game play.
The game will cover the entire Third Terran Space War. Most of the engagements seen in the movie are present as well as a few more. And unlike the book and the movie, who have ambiguous endings, the game will cover the entire war. For example, the movie ends with the capture of the "brain-bug", and the humans now know how the bugs think. This is merely the final mission of the first campaign.
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The developers hope to be as faithful to the book as possible, but still keep some of the atmosphere from the movie. Having three levels of combat suits will achieve this purpose, Marauder, Scout and Command, and each will be more powerful and yet more difficult to control. There will also be 15 types of bug enemies including the tiny chariot bug all the way to the enormous plasma bug. The plasma bug is the bug that was able to blow spaceships out of orbit by firing something out of their rear end.
In Starship Troopers, you will command a small platoon of troops, and because there is no resource management, you will only focus on tactics, strategies, and plenty of action. But it is important to keep your troops alive because they will become more and more effective as they gain experience. You will begin fresh out of boot camp and be involved in various missions such as Seek and Destroy, Bug Hole Demolition, Recon, and Specimen Capture. Your squad will also contain medics, engineers, and other specialists. You can also call for medical evacuations, and air strikes. Your troops will have access to a variety of weapons (which you can check out on the website) such as rifles, and even nukes. But use nukes with caution because radioactive fallout is dangerous even to armored troopers.
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The game will also feature guest appearances by some characters from the movie and the book including Sergeant Zim and the Roughnecks and various spaceships such as the Rodger Young and the Valley Forge.
The novel rocked, and the movie sucked, and lets hope that the game takes after the novel rather than the movie. It has a great premise and from the screenshots nice graphics and like almost every other RTS game, it will be the gameplay that will make the difference.
(Check Out the Screenshot Index for More Images)
