The revival of the cult Commandos series in the form of the prequel Origins caused a lot of anticipation among fans of tactical stealth games. However, the new game from Claymore Game Studios, despite all the efforts of the developers, turned out to be a controversial project, combining both the advantages of the classic series and serious problems of modern games. Let’s figure out what is more in it – nostalgia or disappointment.
In the modern gaming industry, along with popular remasters and remakes, a new trend is gaining momentum – “return to the roots”. This approach involves the release of new projects based on well-known franchises, where the characters, mechanics and style of the first parts of the series are used. And everything that was created between the original and this “revival”, as the developers hint, can be safely forgotten.
However, there is a fundamental difference between “returns” and remasters/remakes. Remasters and remakes update the graphics, fix (or, on the contrary, carefully preserve) old bugs, but at the same time leave the high-quality basis of the classic game untouched. “Returns” are new projects, often created by the same developers who previously brought the game series to a dead end with their experiments. Now they are trying to recreate the legendary games of the past, relying on their understanding of their essence. But, as a rule, the result is unconvincing: if these developers really understood what they were doing, they would not have led the franchise to a dead end in the first place.
The situation with Commandos: Origins is somewhat different. The reboot of the franchise was entrusted to the studio Claymore Game Studios, part of the German publishing house Kalypso Media. This publishing house specializes in strategy games, among other things, and has such projects as the Tropico series, Railway Empire and Spacebase Startopia in its portfolio. Therefore, the recently acquired Commandos franchise fits perfectly into their strategy. First, the developers released HD remasters of the second and third parts of Commandos, and now they have taken up the “return to the roots”. Commandos: Origins is a prequel to the original game, telling the story of the creation of the legendary special forces unit.
The advertising materials gave hope for a quality product. Reality, as usual, made its own adjustments. Origins does take a lot from the original, but in this case, in some aspects, it is more of a minus than a plus. In other cases, on the contrary, following the original would be more appropriate. But first things first.
We find ourselves in 1940 in North Africa, in the guardhouse, where Sergeant Jack O’Hara, a Green Beret, is serving a sentence for disciplinary violations. Since he is tough but reckless, he is offered to join a special unit where he can put his skills to good use, and the discipline and drill that he dislikes so much will remain behind the front lines. Together with a sapper, they begin their work, simultaneously attracting new team members.
In the first missions, the developers move us to Norway, then to Western Europe, then back to Africa, introducing all the future team members and teaching the player the basic mechanics of each character. In addition to the green beret and sapper, the team includes a sniper, a marine (navy seal), a spy, and a driver. Each of them has unique abilities that must be used to successfully complete missions.
Thus, the green beret and the sniper can climb communication poles and move along wires, and the sniper and the marine have long-range silent weapons – a rifle and a harpoon, respectively. In addition, each fighter has his own special skills. For example, the sapper can set traps, and the driver can use stationary machine guns of the enemy.
Compared to the original, the characters’ abilities have undergone only minimal changes. In this sense, Origins remains close to the classic Commandos. Other key mechanics that were laid down in the original and became the standard for the genre have also been preserved: the cones of enemy visibility, their behavior when detecting suspicious objects and traps – all this will be familiar to fans of the series.
Yes, the game does have many conventions typical of the genre. The artificial intelligence of the enemies often looks comical: a huge green beret “silently” and “unnoticed” crawls under the nose of an oblivious guard to quietly eliminate him. However, this is more of a game convention and a feature of the genre that has not disappeared anywhere since the first Commandos.
The developers offer the player to explore sandbox missions, where each non-player character is assigned a role and route, while only the player is given complete freedom of action. And at first, this approach works.
The first tasks are completed with interest. The player studies (or remembers) the skills of his fighters, tests the limits of their capabilities and sometimes even tries to expand the boundaries of what is permitted, set by the developers. Somewhere the level designers left obvious hints, hinting that in this place it is more convenient to act in a certain way, and somewhere you have to solve the problems yourself. At the average level of difficulty, there are no special problems with the passage, although the traditional for the genre “quick save” and “quick load” are still relevant: tried one approach, did not work – we load and try again. When you find a working approach to solving problems, the levels begin to pass very quickly. However, the first passage of one level can take several hours.
This is where the main problem with the revived Commandos lies. In the original 1998 game, as well as in its 2001 and 2003 sequels, the levels were relatively small simply due to the technical limitations of the platforms of the time. This did not allow for too much time in one “sandbox”. Therefore, players were regularly changed the scenery and the composition of the team, which helped to avoid a routine.
Origins has very large levels. Although they are made well and thoughtfully, with small interesting details, methodically eliminating hundreds of fascists over the course of several hours turns the process from entertainment into routine work. Over and over again: inspecting positions, identifying weak links, placing fighters, entering command mode, giving orders, completing tasks. You cut out one or two opponents – you are saved, you cut further. Rare moments of interest arise only when you need to use weapons (with limited ammunition) or find a way to penetrate a seemingly impregnable location.
By the way, apparently, it is precisely because of the scale of the locations that “quick” saves and loads work not very fast, even on SSD. For a genre where Save/Load is almost a game mechanic, this is a serious drawback.
The game makes no attempt to please the player or reward him in any way. The pleasure of the gameplay begins to fade by the middle of the campaign, leaving the player alone with routine operations. Fans of the first Commandos, of course, will find something to do: you can complete missions for a while, experiment with different approaches to solving problems. However, here the developers have thrown a spanner in the works – the game was released in an unfinished form. And this could not go unnoticed, because one of the key screens, the statistics screen, works with errors.
In addition to the problems with statistics, the game has many small bugs. For example, the marine loses the harpoon after using it, the alarm goes off at inopportune moments (or, conversely, does not go off when it should), the command indicator remains active after performing actions. The list goes on.
But the question arises: is it worth playing such a game? And especially buying it for a rather large price? It is unlikely that you will be able to return your money to Steam, because the first missions in Commandos: Origins may seem exciting, but what will happen next is already a big question.
Diagnosis
The developers of Commandos: Origins did a great job. But “great” does not always mean “good”, although there is something to praise them for. Origins could have become an example of how to approach the revival of a classic. Excellent graphics, good (with reservations about the size of the levels) level design, familiar mechanics with small but useful additions. Commandos: Origins cannot be called a new word in the genre, but in this case it is even a plus. However, as often happens with Western developers, the game was released in an unfinished state. And this is unacceptable.
During the campaign, my attitude towards the game went through three stages: joy, irritation and, finally, acceptance. But I’m afraid it wouldn’t have come to acceptance if it weren’t for the Game Pass service, thanks to which I got the game via subscription.
Overall, Commandos: Origins is a brave attempt to revive a cult series that, unfortunately, doesn’t live up to its promise. It may be of interest to fans of the original series, but it’s unlikely to be a worthy choice for a wider audience. If you’re still interested in trying Origins, it’s best to wait for significant discounts or access through subscription services like Game Pass.
Pro
- Familiar mechanics. The game retains classic Commandos elements
- High-quality graphics. The game’s visual style is noticeably improved compared to the originals.
- Thoughtful level design. The levels are detailed and contain many interesting solutions
- Nostalgia: Players familiar with the original series will find their favorite characters and gameplay in the game
Contra
- Huge levels. The scale of the locations turns the process into a routine, especially in the later stages
- Unfinished. Numerous bugs and errors
- Slow saves/loads even on SSD
- High price. It’s a shame to ask for full price for such a raw game.
- Fading interest. After the first missions, the novelty wears off and only routine work remains
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Images courtesy of Claymore Game Studios and Kalypso Media. Cover image source: SteamDB
