Battle Engine Aquila review

Battle Engine Aquila

Military mecha are disappointingly lacking in Western pop culture. We've had The Transformers, possessed of both shape-changing and stomping ability, The Iron Giant, who was a big softie really, and that's about it. We need more examples of towering, technological terrors to permeate our society, rather like the robotic humanoid in that Beastie Boys video. World leaders could travel in sixty meter high steel titans, impervious to any assassin's bullet, ambulances would become oversized mechanical toads, leapfrogging their way over traffic jams towards emergencies and I'd be able to travel to work in a Cyclopean titanium hound, firing high-intensity laser beams at anyone who got in my way. At the core of such striding sentinels would sit the lone pilot, a single individual in whose hands immense power rests.

Such is my vision, one which I often babble about for over an hour before I am again sedated and strapped back into place in the giant underground complex that is the Boomtown reviewing facility. You can imagine how excited I became, then, when presented with Battle Engine Aquila to review. I can't remember the last time I drooled so much in anticipation, nor have my restraints ever been tightened so firmly. Could this game, originating a stone's throw from my own home town in Surrey, be the catalyst for home-grown, Japanese-style giant robot acceptance? I really am nuts, aren't I?

Plane sailing

An enemy base swarming with tanks to destroy. It may not be an objective, but it's still fun.

The eponymous Battle Engines would give Dubya a coronary; being that they are weapons of mass destruction so obscene in their power they make my earlier ideas sound credible. A hulking yet streamlined quadruped bristling with weaponry, stoically absorbing enemy ordinance as it stalks the battlegrounds of the future, occasionally leaping into the air to take flight for short periods of time. Such devastating devices only meet their match when pitted against entire armies and so the premise of Battle Engine Aquila becomes clear - blast the living crap out of hordes of enemies on land, sea and air.

Into this melee are thrown a variety of allies, including wingmen, motherships, your own bases and, often, armies which you support. As an Aquilanaut you'll be spearheading assaults, establishing beachheads, defending convoys and repulsing invaders. Each of the game’s missions are a variation on a theme and, although that theme is a basic one, there's always enough going on to keep you occupied.

War and pieces

Your machine can destroy buildings and motherships, but is destroyed in water. When fighting over the sea, you'd better not run out of power.

This certainly isn't a bad looking game either. The graphics may not be up alongside the best the PC has to offer but the reflection of the sun on rippling water, the laser pulses arcing across the sky and the suitably sci-fi unit design combine to produce a sight most pleasing to the eye. When you're on the ground, the detail and texture quality suffer somewhat, but the fogging distance, thank God, is generous and there's only a slight slowdown in the more intense battles. Buildings disintegrate dependent on where you hit them and tiny foot soldiers are tossed aside by your brutal weapons. It's cool to be powerful.

Such battles are, naturally, the focus of the game and the action, be it on the ground or in the air, is almost like an over-scaled first-person shooter, being that you are able to strafe whilst on the land and effectively defy the laws of physics when airborne. Engaging ground targets is much easier when conducted up close and personal and enemy fighters and bombers are obviously simpler to tackle airborne. Flight is limited to a minute or two, after which you must land to regain energy, and any solid object, be it a building or hill, a carrier or an enemy dropship drifting through the sky, is a valid landing zone. Indeed, there's something to be said for landing on the deck of a battleship and opening fire straight at its bridge, and limited flight time challenges you to choose your moments well.

Fire and forget

This is one of your bases, which amongst other things (your annoyingly weak army) you have to protect.

This dual combat dynamic, combined with the target-rich environments and melodramatic action should make Battle Engine Aquila damn good fun, and it very nearly is. It's accessible, simple and attractive, but little more. Of course, games don't necessarily need depth to be successful and many of the most addictive arcade games ever were based on one or two unbelievably simple concepts executed with beautiful precision. Battle Engine Aquila's concepts just don't cut the mustard, though. The manoeuvrability of your Battle Engine makes dogfighting something of a non-starter and aerial battles are quickly won through sheer firepower anyway, whereas ground battles are mostly a ballet of sidesteps. Combat boils down to them outnumbering you and you severely outgunning them, the balance falling far too much in your favour.

When the majority of your mission failures come about by the destruction of a critical allied installation or a clumsy collision with the ground, the enemy start to feel far less like a threat and far more like a piece of the scenery. Being placed amid a pitched battle and being able to turn the tide feels good at first, but the slow pace of the action, the auto-aim on most of your weapons and the sheer volume of kerpow that you can rain down just makes you feel like you're sweeping up someone else's mess.

Tanks for the memory

Choose your weapons carefully for the mission ahead.

All is not lost. The addition of two-player split-screen action is very welcome, as we need far more games that encourage friends to crowd around the PC, but it's a shame there's only three levels of co-operative play, a drop in the ocean compared to Battle Engine Aquila's extensive campaign with its occasional branches and variations. Battle Engine Aquila is easy to pick up and get straight into and gawping at the glorious explosions, landing on an enemy dropship and opening fire at passing fighters or mowing down troops and trees with your pulse cannon are all fun in short bursts. There's just no thrills amongst all the gloss.