	Future Tactics: The Uprising
	Developer: Zed Two Publisher: JoWood Release Date: Out Now Players: 1-2	Words By:
What is the gaming world coming to? For years I sat around waiting for a turn-based strategy game and now it seems that every other game I review is one. It’s hard to pinpoint what started the trend going, but one thing is for sure, I’m not complaining. Future Tactics: The Uprising is yet another game that falls into this trend and thankfully it brings a few new things with it. Each of the 19 or so missions are played out on battlefields, and you have a handful of characters to give your orders to try and survive the alien invasion which has destroyed most of the people on the planet! Although FT is a turn-based game, the one thing that surprised me is just how arcade like the game plays – it’s a turn-based game in disguise and plays in a very similar way to the Worms games that many people will be familiar with. Each player takes it in turns to give the troops orders (moving and attacking being the most common). Changes from the norm soon become apparent. There are no movement points, when you want to move one of your characters you are given a “movement zone” in which you are free to take up your new position, this can be as simple as just moving closer to the enemy or moving for cover or a higher vantage point. Not having movement points makes you feel like you have much more freedom to move where you want to go. Similar arcade like moments are shown when you choose to attack your enemy; it becomes easier to hit your target based on how close you are and any cover involved, but once you have chosen your target the game shifts into first person mode. Here you are looking down the sight of your weapon, which is moving around the screen and which you have to try and keep steady over the target. Once you’ve lined up your shot you are then greeted with the first of two lines which move across your view, the idea here is again to stop this line over your target, and then do the same with the second line that appears. Where these two lines join is where your shot will end up. Trust me, it’s much simpler than it sounds and adds a little “something” to the combat – getting a head shot feels rewarding as it’s down to your skill and not just stats and a mouse click. Again anyone who has played Worms will feel very familiar with FT. As well as shooting the enemies you can also have fun shooting the environment, as with nearly every game these days, it is destructible. A misplaced shot can be seen blowing a crater in the floor behind your target or actually crumbling a platform away completely. You can always use this to your advantage, be it slowing your enemy down by destroying their pathway, or even dropping a ton of rubble on their head, again all very satisfying as it is you that did it. The strategy in the game is rather basic, mostly made up of deciding where to stand to take your shots from or which enemy to take out first – FT could probably be more accurately described as a Turn-Based Shooter. It’s a game which has its foot firmly in the “FUN” camp and this is something that is evident from the graphics. They are very bright, chunky and cartoon-like in appearance. So is it all good? Is it a Winner? Well sadly no - there is no doubting that it may seem like it’s going to be when you first start playing and the skilful shooting does prove a challenge, but the game soon becomes rather repetitive. The levels, whilst always looking nice, never offer anything different – the enemies don’t vary enough and the mission objectives are always pretty much the same. As I said above there is very little opportunity for strategy at any point in the game and it does just soon become a case of moving into position and shooting the enemy, once the novelty of the shooting has worn off and you have blown up enough rocks the game rapidly looses its appeal… This is a shame as the core idea behind the game is a good one, and the way it plays out does deserve another chance. Maybe next time more thought could be given to the strategy and more variety for the missions. Maybe a dynamic campaign rather than an A to B story would really help.

Best Bits
- Tidy, cartoony graphics look nice.
- Fun for a while.

Worst Bits
- The fun wears off quite quickly.
- No real strategy.


by: dUnKle