INTRO:
It is a very rare shooter indeed that does not have the player taking control of a lonely player character who either has to shoot up a bunch of opposition to get from one spot in a level to another or fight other player characters in a game of reflexes during the era of SWAT 4. That SWAT 4 is one such game makes it particularly noteworthy.
Perhaps an even more noteworthy fact about this game is the origins of its franchise, which did not start with a first-person shooter. (Of course, it was not the first in its franchise to use first-person shooter designs; its immediate predecessor, SWAT 3, was the first.)
Anyway, SWAT 4 has the player taking control of a squad leader, who has to lead his squad-mates to comb buildings and incapacitate dangerous individuals (called "suspects" in this game), preferably through non-lethal means and according to strict rules of engagement. The game will always be watching the player for any violent tendencies, and has no qualms in handing game-over screens to players who shoot first and ask questions later.
Instead of running-and-gunning, the player will be directing squad-mates to advantageous locations to ambush and surprise suspects, and even then, the player is expected to shout them down and take other non-lethal actions instead of shooting them outright.
PREMISE:
The premise of the game justifies such restrictions on the freedom of gameplay in SWAT 4. In the single-player mode and even the multiplayer mode, the player takes control of a SWAT police officer that is expected to incapacitate and apprehend suspects, only using lethal force as a last resort.
The story campaign, called the "career" mode, is a bunch of disjointed missions with no narrative other than the camaraderie between the squad members to tie them together. It would not be offering much of a story-telling experience, but it is very good at showcasing the various scenarios that SWAT police officers would get into.
GAMEPLAY – THE SQUAD LEADER:
In the single-player Career mode, the player takes control of the squad leader, who at first glance appears to be much like the player characters in other first-person shooters, e.g. a guy with limited field of view that is toting a gun. However, he is not a bullet-sponge, unlike so many other protagonists of shooters. In fact, a bullet to his chest or his head at close range is enough to take him down, and taking a hit anywhere else would either hobble his movement speed or his aim (or more precisely, he loses his hitscan capabilities).
The squad leader does not have unlimited ammunition and is not able to replenish his supplies during a level, so the player has to be careful in order not to run out of ammo.
The same limitations on durability also apply to his squad-mates. Therefore, the player's squad is composed of fragile characters.
Most importantly, if the player character is incapacitated in Career mode, the game-over screen immediately comes up; the player has to restart the level if he/she wants to continue playing.
A SWAT officer is expected to do many things, so a player may have expected the controls to be quite daunting. Fortunately, the game makes use of context-sensitive designs to simplify some controls. One instance of these designs is that some buttons have multiple functions that do not clash with each other, conveniently enough. For example, the same button that is used to have the player character opening doors is also used to shout down suspects and civilians.
GAMEPLAY – THE SQUAD & SQUAD COMMANDS:
In Career mode, the squad is composed of a pair of two-man teams, thus resulting in a total of five members, including the squad leader. At first glance, despite the settings of the game, this number can be a lot for a player to consider, as most rooms in the levels in the game can barely accommodate such a number of characters. However, the player would soon realize that having four squad members under his/her command is handy for exploiting the fact that some rooms have more than one entrance; surrounded suspects are more than likely to capitulate, as will be mentioned again later.
The player can set the squad to several A.I.-controlled behaviours, depending on the player's preference at the time. If the player wants to have the squad hoofing from one spot to the next, having them follow the leader would be expedient. If the player knows that there are very few suspects left, setting them to autonomous advancing-and-clearing is convenient, as the loss of squad members do not immediately gives the player a game-over screen.
However, it should be noted here that the loss of squad-mates is permanent throughout a level; they cannot be revived. This also leads to a penalty when the level is concluded (somewhat) successfully.
To give commands to the squad, the player makes use of menus that appear on-screen when the player toggles the squad command interface. The player has a menu for issuing orders to the entire squad, and one for each of the two teams. The composition of this menu is context-sensitive; its options change according to the object that the player is looking at before the menu is brought up.
However, the menu is at best only useful during quiet times, as it has to be navigated in real-time and is thus just not practical when there is chaos.
If there is a complaint with the composition of the squad and the teams in it, it is that the colour-coding for the teams may not be a convenient visual aid. The briefing before every level does give the player a screen to examine which squad member is under which team, and the player can opt to have the user interface show which squad member is under which team during a level. However, there does not appear to be any clear visual indicator on the models of squad members to indicate which team that they belong to.
Fortunately, there is at least some context-sensitive icons that will appear on-screen when the player looks at squad mates of specific teams, so at least he/she won't be confused as to who is who as long as the squad stays in sight of the player, which is more often than not a necessity.
If the player needs to have the squad split up and still needs to keep tabs on certain teams (or all of them), he/she can bring up the display of a video feed of what any other member of the squad is seeing; there will be more elaboration on this later, as this is a surprisingly sophisticated game mechanism.
It is worth noting here that each squad member appears to have a personality of his own, but for gameplay purposes, they appear to be identical in behaviour, assuming that they have the same gear; different gear will alter their behaviours, as will be described later.
Most of the time, A.I.-controlled squad-mates in Career mode make a good job of staying close to each other, even when ranging ahead of the squad leader. They are also quite aware of their surroundings; one particularly noteworthy example of this is their tendency to look up at the next flight of stairs when ascending stairways.
GAMEPLAY – VIDEO FEED OF OTHER SWAT OFFICERS:
The player can bring up a video feed of another member of the squad to see what he is seeing, as mentioned earlier. This is good enough if the player merely wants to monitor his progress, but with the press of some buttons, he/she can deliver some commands through the video feed, and these commands can be context-sensitive, depending on what the squad member is looking at.
In some levels, the player is briefed on the presence of SWAT snipers that are watching certain windows in the building. The player will be notified of any interesting occasions that the snipers are seeing, such as suspects getting into their field of fire. With some more button taps, the player can take control of these snipers and shoot anything that needs to be shot.
The above features are mainly available only in single-player mode, but in co-op multiplayer, which will be described later, the ability to bring up video feeds of squad members is retained, which is very useful (and was rare in first-person shooters at the time). Co-op multiplayer will be elaborated further later.
GAMEPLAY – CAREER MODE, SCENARIO PREPARATION:
As mentioned earlier, career mode is a collection of disjointed scenarios. These scenarios are preceded with screens that let the player prepare for the scenarios.
The briefing screen informs the player of the story narrative of the level; this is inconsequential as it is little more than an excuse to have the SWAT squad being pitted against suspects of various sorts. There may also be recordings of the emergency calls that led the police to the crime scene, which are entertaining but give only vague clues. There are photos of suspects and hostages, but these are ultimately quite worthless, as will be mentioned again later.
More useful information includes the temperament of and general composition of suspects and civilians in the level, as well as the estimated general armaments of the suspects. The most useful piece of intelligence however is the layout of the level; the importance of this will be elaborated further later.
The screen that is most useful and most used is the screen that allows the player to kit out specific squad members with different gear. The gear of every squad member is split into the following: primary gun, secondary gun, tactical items and breaching equipment.
The equipment screen also provides a short biography of each squad-mate, which gives a pretty good summary of his personality and the voice-overs that he would have. However, this has very short appeal, at best, as there is little in the way of character development in the career mode.
GAMEPLAY – NON- AND LESS-LETHAL GEAR:
The game is apparently quite careful with its nomenclature: gear is categorized into "lethal", "less-lethal" and "non-lethal" sorts. The less-lethal ones are perhaps some of the most interesting in the game, as they may accidentally kill suspects. For example, the less-lethal shotgun with beanbag rounds can actually kill a suspect if the suspect is shot in the head at point-blank range.
The game encourages the player to apprehend suspects without killing them, but that does not mean that lethal weaponry is undesirable. They are only lethal if they hit suspects at vital regions; non-fatal wounds, such as those inflicted on suspects' limbs do not count as too much brutality. These injuries can weaken the resolve of suspects and make them more susceptible to compliance; there will be more on complying individuals to stand down later.
It is worth noting here that while A.I.-controlled squad-mates (and the player) would be very conservative in the use of lethal weaponry, they are not so with less-lethal and non-lethal weaponry and will fire away with these as soon as they catch sight of a suspect. Although this may be desirable as the player can put pressure on suspects immediately, ammunition supplies are limited, as will be mentioned again later.
GAMEPLAY – TYPES OF GEAR & LIMITED SUPPLIES:
Primary weapons are the guns that the SWAT officers would be using most of the time, fittingly enough. Most of them are of the lethal variety, ranging from submachineguns and shotguns to assault rifles. These can be loaded with one of a few types of ammunition, and they will only have access to these particular sorts of ammunition throughout a level; they cannot switch.
Considering the emphasis on apprehending suspects alive and different hit regions on individuals, the player may think that lethal weaponry is discouraged. However, as long as shots on suspects do not incapacitate them or kill them outright, suspects can still be wounded to the point of breaking, as mentioned earlier.
On the other hand, it may be difficult to know when to shoot without being penalized for being trigger-happy (as will be elaborated on later), and even more difficult to aim and shoot at non-vital regions when things turn violent. Moreover, A.I.-controlled squad mates, when compelled to shoot, often go for lethal shots.
As this game is about SWAT police officers, the player should not be expecting a vast array of guns. There are a couple of shotguns (with firing rates and magazine sizes being the differences between them), two assault rifles (with their firing modes being the main differences between them) and two submachineguns (one has options for suppression, while the other is less subtle).
There are two main less-lethal primary weapons: the less-lethal shotgun and pepper-ball gun. The less-lethal shotgun appears to be the only weapon in the game with Beanbag ammunition, which can be expediently expended on anyone (even civilians) to inflict pain, whereas the pepper-ball gun is practically a long-ranged pepper spray, which will be described later.
Secondary weapons are mainly sidearms, such as (definitely lethal) handguns. Handguns, like lethal primary weapons, can be loaded with different ammunition, which makes them a complement to less-lethal and non-lethal primary weapons.
The player can replace handguns with tasers, which are (somewhat) non-lethal. Tasers are very short-ranged, but if the player can stick the prods into suspects, the electrical shock is enough to force any of them to capitulate. However, a serious setback severely diminishes the utility of Tasers: they have very limited charges. After exhausting them, the SWAT officer is deprived of any secondary weapon.
It is unfortunate that the game does not offer more non-lethal and less-lethal primary weapons, as these are of limited use when there are enemies with gear that counter them.
Tactical items include grenades, of which there are a few but none of which are definitely lethal.
One of the grenades is the flashbang, which is perhaps the most useful of the grenades as it appears to affect just about everyone, including the SWAT officers themselves (unless they look away if they see a flashbang being thrown). Blinded suspects not only cannot aim to fire, but are also more susceptible to calls for compliance.
Another grenade is the CS gas grenade, which envelops an area with tear gas that debilitates anyone who does not have breathing filters in it, as well as obscuring vision. If it is affecting anyone, the player would be able to hear coughing. Debilitated individuals are a lot more susceptible to compliance.
Tear gas does not work so well if the suspects do have breathing filters, however, though the grenade still reduces their vision, which is a welcome nuance.
The final grenade is perhaps the most amusing, as it is a less-lethal weapon that may have varying effects on people. If it exploded on unarmored individuals, they will most likely be in a lot of pain and will stumble around while clutching parts of their body; they are quite susceptible to calls for compliance in this case. If they are especially unlucky, the balls released by the grenade may hit them on the head and simply knock them out.
However, if the grenade exploded on suspects that are wearing armor vests, it has diminished effect, though they will still be stumbling around in agony for a while as body armor only covers the torso. On the other hand, cover also negates the effects of the explosion.
Using all three grenades on suspects is more than likely to weaken their resolve to the point that they capitulate almost immediately. However, grenades are limited in supply, as are many other expendables that the SWAT officers have.
In lieu of grenades, the player can equip the officers with the Pepper Spray instead. The Pepper Spray has multiple charges to use as opposed to the very limited grenades, but it has very short range and limited effectiveness against suspects with breathing filters. This makes it more useful against uncooperative civilians than against armed suspects.
A SWAT officer can also equip a door wedge, which can be placed under a door to jam it in place. This is handy in levels with many pathways and entrances, as sealing off one or two means removing one or two worries about being surprised by suspects that had yet to be accosted. However, door wedges cannot be recovered; they can only be removed. Therefore, the player will need to consider the placement of door wedges carefully.
Breaching tools are the last category of equipment. These are used to blow open doors for the element of surprise against the occupants of rooms that are to be cleared. However, it has to be mentioned here first that doors that have been breached are rendered useless at controlling entry into rooms.
There are two methods of breaching, depending on which breaching tool is used. The first method, which uses C2 charges to blow open doors, is a lot louder and has the advantage of unnerving occupants, though it comes at the risk of harming anyone that may be too close to the door and as has just been implied, alerting other suspects in the level. However, it may be the best way to counter enemies that have set themselves up for an ambush.
The other method, which is to rip the handle and lock of the door open with a breaching shotgun, is almost as loud and unnerving, but only damages the door.
It must be noted here that all of the player's gear have limited uses and ammunition; the same applies to the gear of A.I.-controlled squad-mates. There is no way to replenish them during a level, so the player must make each shot and each use of an expendable count.
GAMEPLAY – USE OF LETHAL FORCE:
As SWAT officers, the player and his/her compatriots (either A.I. –controlled or human-controlled) are to only use lethal force when suspects have given them the reason to do so. Failing to keep this in mind and shooting suspects without provocation repeatedly may cause a game-over.
It may be difficult to know when to use lethal force if the suspect has not opened fire himself/herself. Warnings and threats that are given by dangerous and armed suspects are usually tell-tale signs that they are about to do something that justifies a lethal reaction from the SWAT team, but these acts occur very quickly followed by actual aggression.
Only very experienced players would be able to spot these and then shoot without incurring a penalty on conduct, but even they will have a hard time hearing these audio cues over the shouts of compliance from the SWAT officers.
On the other hand, the A.I.-controlled squad members are usually smart enough to know when to fire live ammunition, if they are armed with it. Sometimes, they appear to shoot before armed suspects even open fire, but this may or may not be considered proper conduct; the squad member will remark on whether he has made a mistake or not shortly afterwards.
While mistakes by squad-mates do appear to make them more authentic and believable, a player that is trying to get a perfect score for the level would be stymied outright by such decisions by the A.I.-controlled squad-mates. This can be frustrating.
GAMEPLAY – CLEARING ROOMS:
Rooms are hazards to the squad, as SWAT police officers in this game are not exactly equipped with the capability to know exactly where suspects are. However, there are some tools to inspect a room that has not been cleared.
One of these tools is the optiwand, which the player character or a squad-mate can place under a door to look into the next room via the "mirror under door" command, if there is space under the door for that. Suspects on the other side of the door are incapable of spotting the device, though they may still unwittingly open the door when the optiwand is in use.
However, the view provided by the optiwand is still potentially limited; if the room has plenty of furnishing to obstruct sight, such as a room full of cubicles, the player and the A.I.-controlled squadmates would not be seeing much.
More importantly though, there are rooms that are quite dark. The game does not have pitch-black darkness of course, as there will always be some source of ambient light, no matter how weak, but a room can be dark enough to make it difficult for the player to spot suspects himself/herself.
Fortunately, the A.I. of squad-mates does not appear to be hampered by darkness; if part of a model of a suspect, no matter how small, can be seen jutting out of a piece of furniture, squad-mates using the optiwand can see them, as long as they are in view of the optiwand. However, squad-mates will not report the exact location of the suspects that they have spotted, though they do provide a number and how close they are to the door.
It is also worth noting here that A.I.-controlled squad members that have spotted suspects using the optiwand will keep their locations in mind when charging into the room.
Rooms are also where the configuration of two teams within the squad comes in useful. Some rooms have more than one entrance; the two teams can be directed to different entrances so as to have at least one team flanking suspects that may be behind cover in the room, when they do barge in. This also gives an opportunity to scout out the room through different perspectives using mirrors under doors, if said doors allow such a technique.
When the player does decide to have the squad barge in, they go in simultaneously, at least by default. The player can choose to have each team enter the room out of phase to surprise any suspects that are distracted by the first team that went in; however, this can involve some meddling with hotkeys and menus, which is micromanagement that takes one too many crucial moments, unless the player is very speedy.
In any case, it is still in the player's interest to utilize as many entrances as possible, including one for the player character himself (though the player has to keep in mind the restrictions on the use of lethal force, as mentioned earlier), or at least jam the doors that the squad cannot cover. This is because suspects may attempt to run away through entrances that are not covered, and that surrounded suspects are more likely to capitulate.
Of course, suspects may react poorly instead when they are surrounded with no path of escape. For this case, the multiple approaches that the squad has taken would ensure that at least one segment of the squad has a clear field of fire.
Alternatively, a player may want to conserve resources and resort to stealthier means to enter rooms. This is handy if suspects happen to be facing the wrong direction when the squad enters. This tends to be the case when the squad enters through doors that were locked, which can be quietly picked open by any SWAT officer.
It has to be mentioned here that although A.I.-controlled squad-mates do appear to follow the usual steps of throwing grenades into a room before barging in when ordered to do so, they may throw a grenade such that it did not affect anyone in the next room, as they may be cowering behind cover. They may even throw a grenade such that it hits an obstacle and rebounds back to the SWAT team that threw it.
Instead, it may be more prudent to have the player character himself tossing the grenades where they would be most effective. Of course, this means exposing the player character to suspects and thus risking a game-over. Moreover, the player can only use his/her player character's grenades; he/she cannot have squad-mates relinquishing their own grenades, which is a lost opportunity for better game design.
GAMEPLAY – SUSPECTS & CIVILIANS:
Arresting suspects involves having to compel them to stand down before the SWAT officers can disarm them and tie them up with cords. A suspect that has yielded makes clear animations, which include kneeling down, laying down his/her firearm and raising his/her hands in the air or on his/her heads; this is fairly consistent throughout the game, so there should be no issue of mistaking a set of animations for a yielding animation (though they will seem repetitive soon enough).
It is worth noting here that civilians also have to be arrested and bound. This may seem somewhat abusive at first (as the civilians themselves will remark when they are restrained, amusingly enough), but the player would eventually realize that this is a necessity as civilians that are running around can very easily ruin tactical plans and get themselves harmed, for which the player will be penalized for anyway.
To compel suspects and civilians to yield, the player has to break their resolve. Perhaps amusingly so for a first-person shooter title, the main way to do this is to shout them down. The A.I.-controlled SWAT officers will automatically do so when they catch sight of any suspect. There is no limit on hollering at people, so the squad can shout as much as is needed. In fact, this is the best way to get civilians to stand down, as they are the easiest to scare into submission.
On the other hand, shouting makes a lot of noise, which can be heard by other suspects and civilians across a room or two.
Suspects are more stubborn than civilians at capitulating, especially if they are armed. However, suspects also happen to showcase some of the most entertaining and unpredictable aspects of the A.I, as well as some of the best challenges and worst frustrations in the game.
Not all suspects behave in the same manner, which can make for a significant learning curve. Fortunately, the career mode is quite competent in introducing them. The first few levels feature suspects of known temperament, among other details like whether they are armed or not and where in the level they would be expected to be. The first few levels also have suspects that poorly coordinate with each other, if at all.
Later into the career mode, the player will encounter suspects of professionally trained backgrounds. These are a lot tougher to deal with, mainly because they are a lot wiser to SWAT tactics. For example, they are likely to run away from grenades when they see them, and more often than not are behind cover. They also sometimes come to each other's aid when one or two of them have been accosted by the SWAT officers, often through other entrances into a room that the player has not secured.
In any case, more often than not, if a suspect is not already firing at the SWAT officers, they will point their firearms, if any, at the SWAT officers, while warning the latter not to come any closer; at least for the first few moments of this standoff, the SWAT officers may only resort to shouting.
If an armed suspect goes further in his vehemence and threatens to shoot, the player can fire shots at suspects' limbs to force the suspect to disarm or stumble, both of which will weaken the suspect's resolve. The A.I.-controlled squad-mates will not do this, however, so in career mode, the player has to do this on his/her own. (In fact, they are more than likely to just outright kill the suspects.)
However, even if the player can make a successful hit on a non-vital region, this comes at the risk of incapacitating the suspects, e.g. knocking them out or having them lying on the ground groaning, which is less desirable than having them kneel down on their own accord.
Suspects that are spooked may not necessarily immediately capitulate though. The more stubborn ones may attempt to run away; if the player is lucky, they may drop their firearms, if any, and deprive themselves of their only source of leverage against the SWAT officers, which in turn make them easier to deal with when they are accosted again later.
Speaking of dropped weapons, the player has to secure these, not for replenishment of ammo (as there is none to be had) but to prevent them from being retrieved by other suspects and, very rarely, civilians (who would insist on having some form of self-defence when shouted at, amusingly enough). They disappear from the game world when secured, which is a convenient if unbelievable game design.
Later in the game, the player will come across bound civilians, typically referred to in-game as "hostages". Suspects will sometime threaten to kill them, and they certainly will if carelessly pressured; this offers a different challenge, though some players may prefer this over having suspects threatening to kill the SWAT officers instead.
It is worth noting here that the SWAT officers do not make any attempt to free the bound hostages, though players can still report in the presence of hostages that have been freed from any immediate threat.
After a suspect or civilian has capitulated, he/she can be bound with cord and will stay where he/she is. He/she cannot be freed in any way, even by suspects or civilians that are still roving around. This can be a bit unbelievable, but this is perhaps a game design that was intended for convenience. However, restrained suspects and civilians remain as actual characters in the level, and can be unwittingly harmed.
GAMEPLAY – EFFECTS OF LESS-LETHAL/NON-LETHAL WEAPONRY ON PLAYER CHARACTERS:
Friendly fire is an ever-present hazard in every play session, whether single-player or multiplayer. Therefore, the player may want to check his/her fire, especially when using shotguns, which have poor accuracy over any range other than point-blank.
The effects of hitting allies with live ammunition are predictable, of course; the player character takes damage on particular segments of his body, and the function associated with that part of the body is hampered as a consequence. For example, having an arm injured affects the player's aim.
What are more remarkable are the effects of hitting allies with less-lethal and non-lethal weaponry, which are interesting enough for particular mention.
Having a player character hit with less-lethal munitions, such as the balls from stinger grenades and beanbag rounds, causes the vision of the player to wobble; the movement of the player character is also hobbled, and the player character cannot aim much either. If the player character is hit with pepper munitions instead, the player's vision blurs tremendously and movement is also slowed down.
These effects are of more importance to the multiplayer mode than the single-player mode, as it allows players from one team to overpower those of another without resorting to lethal force, as will be explained further later.
GAMEPLAY – RANDOM POPULATING OF OTHERWISE STATIC LEVELS & LEVEL DESIGNS:
Perhaps one of the most appealing yet frustrating aspects of the game is the procedural generation scripts that are used to populate levels with suspects and civilians. This aspect is not immediately apparent in the start of the career mode, as the first few levels have specific numbers of suspects and civilians, both of which will move about on their own accord, which somewhat disguises the fact that the game actually spawns them in different places every time the player replays these levels.
Later in the career mode, the number of suspects and civilians becomes uncertain, as are their positions in the level. The amount and locations of locked doors, as well as the locations of objective-related items, also change from replay to replay.
This randomness makes every replay of a level a different challenge from the last attempt, whether successful or unsuccessful. While it keeps the game from going stale too quickly, it is also a hindrance to a player that is trying to advance through the career mode.
However, the layout of a level remains the same regardless of the number of times that it is replayed. Therefore, the player can at least make use of this fact to make plans for how to approach a particular level.
Of particular importance to the player's plans is the choice of entry points into a level. Certain levels have more than one entry points, and the player has to pick one to have the squad spawning into the level there. Yet, this is usually just a matter of preference, as the random placement of suspects, civilians, objectives and locked doors reduce the tactical value of picking entry points.
However, some levels do have suspects and civilians being located at certain regions of the level though, as will be specified in the briefing, so picking entry points is of more consequence in these levels.
GAMEPLAY – CAREER MODE, DEBRIEFING
At the end of every level in career mode, the player is graded according to his/her performance in a handful of aspects, the most important of which is the completion of all mission objectives without the squad leader (the player character) being taken out. However, the player does not simply advance to the next level upon this; he/she has to gain a high enough score to qualify for the next one. The difficulty that has been chosen for a session of the career mode determines the threshold that has to be surpassed.
To obtain more points, the player has to strive to arrest all suspects and secure all civilians without knocking them out or killing them, as well as securing weapons that suspects drop onto the ground when overcome. The player can also earn more points by making sure that the player character does not get injured or that none of the other squad members are brought down. There is another way to earn more points, but this one can seem to be a hassle, as will be described later.
On the other hand, the player can suffer penalties to his/her grade if he/she makes mistakes. Civilians and hostages being harmed in any way confer the most significant penalties. Unwittingly injuring squad mates also comes with a penalty.
However, the most common penalties are those for unauthorized use of force, e.g. harming suspects without just cause. Each penalty is small, but they can stack indefinitely, such that the player's score can be driven down to zero if there are many suspects in a level and the player is nonchalant with their lives.
COMPLAINTS – TRIFLES IN GAMEPLAY:
All of the above game designs are competently sophisticated and appear to be well-implemented. However, there is a game feature in career mode that can be considered quite unnecessary.
After achieving something significant, such as apprehending a suspect, the player is expected to report this occurrence to the tactical officer that is overseeing the operation. However, this is not done automatically; instead, the player has to manually look at whatever that has been achieved in order to search for a context-sensitive icon and then tap a button to have the player character muttering the report via radio. Failing to report situation updates comes at the cost of points that could have gone into the score when the level is completed.
This can be a hassle, gameplay-wise. If the game designers had intended this as an attempt at bolstering the perception of the authenticity of the game, they could have designed the feature of reports to be automated.
As mentioned earlier, the briefing before each level in the Career mode sometimes provides photos of hostages and suspects. These have at best only value of novelty, as suspects and hostages are often moving around so much so that facial identification is quite difficult to perform until they are already detained.
(If they die face-down, or get knocked out and lay face-down, they cannot be identified at all; there is no option to flip bodies.)
COMPLAINTS - PRODUCT PLACEMENT:
The year 2005 was a dubious one for the gaming industry, as it featured one too many games with product placement, after game-makers found out that they can legally put these in to earn extra revenue. SWAT 4 was unfortunately a game that was affected by this troublesome trend.
At launch, the game did not have much in the way of product placements, or at least the featuring of brands that are actually real. Two months after it was released, a patch was released to introduce some new game content, such as new maps and tools for mods. Unfortunately, this patch also added ad-streaming for computers that are connected to the Internet; unless blocked, the game will communicate with Sierra's online services.
This feature makes use of in-game objects that can support displays of images for ads, such as walls, posters and billboards. Ads are displayed across them, yet the stretching and fitting of the images are not really well done either, such that they look out of place with the rest of the environment. The game also supposedly records how long a player looks at ads and how many that he/she has looked at, among other details. These allegations, if indeed true (they are not as easy to verify now), would make SWAT 4 to be of most dubious worth.
(It is worth noting here that Sierra was running into business-related difficulties during this time, and this product placement in SWAT 4 may have been a consequence of its attempts at corrections.)
GRAPHICS – TEXTURES, MODELS & ANIMATIONS FOR CHARACTERS:
As a 2005 game, SWAT 4 did not have state-of-the-art visuals at the time, due to uneven distribution of effort in its graphical designs.
This can be seen in the texture packs and models that are used for the characters. The SWAT police officers get the best of the texture packs, having plenty of detail; this in turn accentuates their sophisticated models, which also include parts to visually depict the amount of gear that they have left on their persons.
The textures that are used for civilians, in contrast, tend to be muddy and pulled over the polygons of their models, distorting the already unremarkable textures. Their models are at least somewhat competently designed, having enough polygons to depict believable anatomy and convincing animations.
As for the suspects, they have textures of variable quality. Suspects that resemble civilians, e.g. such as those that are clad in casual clothes, often have similarly muddled textures. The silhouettes of their models also resemble those of civilians, and they would have been difficult to distinguish from civilians if not for any firearms that they may be carrying. However, some suspects are not armed.
The more difficult suspects, such as those that appear much later in the career mode, have more distinctive and detailed models, which make them a lot easier to differentiate from civilians.
The animations of character models are mostly believable, and may have been the result of motion-capture as well. This is especially so for the animations of the SWAT officers, most of which look authentic.
The animations for suspects and civilians that are standing down are also quite believable, but they are repeated for just about every suspect and civilian, such that their appeal would diminish very quickly. Their other animations can be said to be the same: competently done but unremarkable. The game also resorts to rag-dolling for dead or incapacitated characters, which happens to highlight the uneven efforts of designing believable animations even more.
GRAPHICS – TEXTURES & MODELS FOR LEVELS:
The levels are mostly indoors and it is night-time for most of them. One can see this as a design decision that concerns the settings and themes of the game, but it can also be seen as a conveniently lazy decision that has been made with the intention to limit the scope of the game's graphics.
However, the limited scope has allowed the game designers to create levels that are not only believable (e.g. an office building does appear to have layouts that are practical for an office building), but also contribute to the game of cat-and-mouse between the suspects and SWAT officers.
The textures of the levels add to their believability by having variety. This is appropriate, as there are many levels in the game with different settings, from a clubhouse and said office building to construction sites and penthouses.
There are also quite a number of objects in levels, though most of these are indestructible models that have been rigidly adhered to features of the levels and have little function other than providing aesthetics. Only a few objects respond to violence in believable manners, such as computer screens cracking when shot at, while most of the consequences of shootouts on the surroundings are seen only as decals, such as flat spatters of blood and bullet-holes.
Of course, one can argue that the gameplay discourages violence and the player should not be concerned about not seeing things being wrecked or disintegrating gratuitously, but nevertheless, bouts of violence reveal the lack of believable designs for the environs in the levels.
As a side note, the hitboxes for the environments may sometimes confuse the path-finding scripts of characters. Suspects and civilians may be helplessly rooted around corners, or stuck against objects such as furniture, though these can be the result of their A.I.-controlled behaviours, of course. What is less acceptable though is squad-mates getting caught in the same objects and locations.
GRAPHICS – LIGHTING, SHADOWING & PARTICLE EFFECTS:
As mentioned earlier, virtually all of the levels in the game have night-time settings; only a few are set at other times, but even these are set at times of the day when substantial sunlight is not expected, such as a level that is set in a construction site and at dawn.
Nonetheless, there are a few indoors levels that make use of windows to cast pretty lighting into a room, but having characters move into these sunny spots would reveal that the lighting is simple eye-candy with rigid lighting scripts that at best cast shadows at believable angles, but little else.
Speaking of lighting, the player should not expect any other light source to be more practical and reliable than the flashlights that the SWAT officers carry. The lighting that they make was not exactly cutting-edge at the time, but they were good enough for the job of illumination.
There are attempts to cast minor shadows on the models of characters, but most of the effort is spent on the SWAT officers; other characters appear to have not benefited from as much attention. Coupled with the disparity in model designs as mentioned earlier, most, if not all of the other characters in SWAT 4 look dull when compared to the SWAT officers.
Where there are light sources, the game generates and projects soft shadows. The shadows do not appear to do a good job of portraying differences between harsh and soft lighting, however. Furthermore, they are not distinctive enough to help a player spot suspects that are hiding behind cover.
Being a game with settings based on the real-world, the player should not expect much in the way of particle effects from SWAT 4. Most of these will come from gunfire, which, if the player resorts to playing as bloodlessly as possible, would be quite rare and thus difficult to appreciate. Even if they do appear on-screen, they are not remarkable, though they are still far from ugly and crude.
SOUNDS – VOICE-OVERS:
The voice-overs are the best aspect of the game's sound designs. As with the game's graphics, the SWAT officers get most of the attention from the game designers.
In Career mode, the voice-overs for the named SWAT officers provide the differences that prevent them from appearing as clones of each other. After all, each of them behaves in the same manner, gameplay-wise, and even looks just about the same (what with their standardised gear and uniform).
The player character is the most taciturn of the lot, which is a bit disappointing as there had been plenty of such characters in the shooter genre, even back in 2005.
The other SWAT officers are chattier, such as Reynolds, who sometimes makes remarks on his fitness despite his age (which is also poked at by the other three squad-mates) and how young people get themselves into trouble. They also sometimes make comments that reflect their professional experience, such as their disapproval of panicking civilians that make bringing order to chaos so much harder.
However, these voice-overs are only for quieter moments during levels in the Career mode, such as the starting moments when the squad is grouped around the entry points. Most of their voice-overs are heard only when they are hollering at suspects and civilians.
These yells are fittingly fierce, loud and varied, and are easy to appreciate when a suspect or civilian capitulates after having been intimidated by the noise that the SWAT officers are making.
The quality of the voice-overs for suspects is second-best in the game. The suspects appear to have too few voice-actors and actresses to provide them with convincing variety, but the inflections, drawls and other manipulations that they make to their voices are at least enough to give them some semblance of difference.
As mentioned earlier, different suspects have different backgrounds, which are portrayed through their voice-overs. However, due to the urgency to deal with the suspects as efficiently and safely as possible, the more interesting things that they spout, such as their motivations for doing what they are doing, are drowned away in the torrent of calls for compliance by the SWAT officers, or if the situation worsens, gunfire.
The voice-overs for civilians are the least impressive in the game, mainly due to lack of variety. Although they do sound believably distraught, especially when they are being coerced by SWAT officers to stand down and be tied up with cord, their voice-overs are repeated for many different civilians and would sound like they came from the same one or two persons to a player with keen ears.
When things do quieten down however, such as when suspects and civilians have complied with orders to kneel and be restrained, the more entertaining ones of their voice-overs can be heard. Many of them are not very happy with being tied up, and will let this be known to the SWAT officers (who may also make counter-remarks).
SOUNDS – SOUND EFFECTS:
The sound effects in the game are mostly conveyed through the discharge of weapons, but this is a rarity if the player decides to play conservatively and resort to cornering and shouting down suspects. (In fact, all that shouting can drown out most of the other sounds in the game.)
When things do turn violent though, an observant player that has some experience with shooters that have modern-day settings would notice that much of the gunfire, with live ammunition, is competently done but is unremarkable, as is to be expected of such a game.
What would be more refreshing though are the sound effects for the non-lethal and less-lethal weaponry in SWAT 4. The Pepper-ball Gun in particular can sound amusing, as it very much sounds like a toy gun, albeit it is launching balls of very unpleasant chemicals. Listening to (and watching) a suspect blabber while he is being electrocuted by a Taser (which is quite a silent device in this game) is also very entertaining.
The significance of the ambient sounds in SWAT 4 differs from level to level. Levels that are located in entertainment- and recreation-oriented places have more ambient sounds, namely music coming from speakers, but otherwise, the player should not expect more than hums of machinery, such as the more subdued hums of computers and the droning of motors.
SOUNDS – MUSIC:
The musical soundtracks are composed by Eric Brosius (who had worked on the Thief games). They are mostly a blend of orchestral, percussion and electronic, and are generally ominous to listen to. This can be considered quite fitting, as the gameplay is not without suspense. However, one can also say that they may be a bit too foreboding for a game that does not exactly have outrageous settings.
Each soundtrack has segments with a more exciting tempo, which is appropriately used for moments when the action heats up, such as when the SWAT officers are chasing down an uncooperative suspect that happens to be firing while retreating through rooms.
Unfortunately, although the soundtracks are good, it is in the player's interest to keep the music toned down, as suspects and civilians can sometimes be heard through walls; their whispers and quips may be drowned out by the music. If the player wants to appreciate the music, he/she would have to listen to them separately of the game.
MULTIPLAYER – COMPETITIVE MATCHES:
The multiplayer mode in SWAT 4 is comprised of competitive multiplayer matches and co-op gameplay involving the official levels. The competitive matches will be described first.
The competitive aspect of the multiplayer mode of SWAT 4 does some things differently from the Career mode and the co-op variant of multiplayer.
Firstly, there are two teams operating against each other, and both have, peculiarly enough, the same gameplay as the SWAT officers in Career mode; even the "suspect team" has the same capabilities, despite being designated as suspects.
Regardless of the game mode, the opposing teams have the mutual interest of incapacitating each other, either by killing each other or debilitating each other with less-lethal weaponry; the latter approach grants more points.
Secondly, there appear to be a few more primary firearms, such as the AK-47, which is not available in Career mode. There is also a magnum handgun with plenty of stopping power. However, these additional guns lack tactical flashlight attachments, which can be a problem in dark levels.
There are also more options for the protective gear that the SWAT officers use, such as a helmet with tinted visors that reduce the effects of looking at a Flashbang when it goes off, as well as providing cranial protection. Alternatively, the player can swap this for a gas mask, which completely nullifies the effects of tear gas at the cost of reduced field of vision and protection for the head.
There are also options for types of armor: light armor is generally effective against any non-armor-piercing rounds fired from any weapon, while heavy armor provides full protection from less-lethal munitions (thus allowing for some friendly fire), but is susceptible to automatic weaponry.
As mentioned earlier, players on one team can attempt to attack players on the other team with non-lethal and less-lethal weaponry in an attempt to daze them, after which they may attempt to approach the latter before performing a restraining move and tying up the latter with cord. There are more points to be had from doing this when the scores are tallied later.
That the player characters in multiplayer have the same gear as the SWAT officers in Career mode means that they have to use the same tactics as that used in Career mode. This in turn means that multiplayer matches are a game of cat-and-mouse, as either team tries to estimate the progress of the other before the eventual confrontation, which can be an exhilarating experience. More importantly, the experience would be different from those in many other first-person shooters.
Barricaded Suspects is a match type that has both teams simply pitted against each other; either team has the goal of scoring more points against the other.
In Rapid Deployment, the SWAT team has to disarm bombs that are spread throughout a level before time runs out, but they can do so in any order. This balances the advantage of time that the Suspect team has.
In VIP Escort, one of the players in the SWAT team is designated as a "VIP". While he is not as defenceless as "VIPs" are expected to be in similar match types in other games, he has rigidly assigned gear, which excludes a primary firearm. Anyway, the Suspect team must apprehend the VIP and hold him for an amount of time, but unlike other apprehended characters, the VIP can still somewhat move about, albeit slowly, which can make for a very tense match.
MULTIPLAYER – CO-OP & SCENARIO GENERATION:
However, the segment of the multiplayer mode that would be played the most is the co-op session. All of the levels in the Career mode can be played with friends, with each player taking control of a squad member. Multiple human users who have to keep the rules of engagement in mind when playing can make for a very different kind of experience from that in the usual first-person shooter title.
It is also worth noting here that the ability to bring up video feeds of what other squad members are seeing is also available in co-op mode, which is a handy convenience. The menu that is used to give commands to squad-mates in Career mode is also available to every player; when a squad-mate gives an order to another, an icon appears over whatever object that the other player has been told to interact with, which is a handy visual aid.
If the player wants a more unpredictable session, the player can pick an existing map and randomly generate a scenario for it through the feature of Quick Mission, which is surprisingly quick; the player needs only to set the parameters, like number of enemies and their level of difficulty. The parameters that have been generated can also be exported as files of their own, thus allowing friends to replay a particularly troublesome scenario that had been randomly generated.
MULTIPLAYER – OTHER THINGS:
SWAT 4 allowed for multiplayer sessions that can be had over Sierra's online service or LAN. In hindsight, the latter option is perhaps a wise one on the part of the developers, as Sierra folded later and ceased support for the game. Unfortunately, this also meant that searching for other players to play with over the Internet has become a lot more difficult.
CONCLUSION:
SWAT 4 appears to be a title in the first-person shooter subgenre that does many things differently from the norm. It is not the first of its kind, of course, but shouting at enemies first instead of shooting them and having to keep enemies alive instead of killing them outright can be a tremendously refreshing experience, whether in single-player or multiplayer.
Even if the competitive multiplayer matches do not offer the appeal of defeating A.I.-controlled opponents through shouting at them and applying non-lethal and lethal harm judiciously, they are still noteworthy because the gadgets and tools that player characters have encourage more thought into outmaneuvering and apprehending opponents instead of confronting and fighting them outright.
Unfortunately, SWAT 4 also highlights a dubious occasion where product improvement can turn out to be anything but. Although updates to the game had added more technical support to the game and fixed its bugs, they had also introduced marketing and advertising elements that would be very displeasing to customers that prefer game-makers to not treat them as sources of side revenue.