In 1988 Tom Hanks starred in a movie called “Big”. In that movie, Hanks character is a child trapped in a man’s body who works at a toy company. A product he helps introduce is an electronic comic book. He explains that this electronic comic book can be played so that the user makes the decisions that help form the story and thereby creating a different “game” each time. Well, that particular scene from “Big” was way before its time because we are there! Handmark and Spiffcode have collaborated to release Warfare Incorporated, a multi-platform RTS (Real Time Strategy) game for any PDA.

Game Overview
You are Andy Whitmore, a Mining Operations Trainee, and you work for ACME Corporation (the second largest corporation in existence). Recently, an ACME owned, unmanned probe reported that an unexplored planet, Icarus, contained massive deposits of Galaxite (an extremely valuable mineral). ACME immediately dispatched a ship to the location-on board are Gordon Fox, Mining Base Commander, Jana Perez, a Senior Research Scientist (and Andy’s fiance), and finally Arthur Olstrom, a Senior Mining Executive. The ship also contains the necessary equipment and people necessary to capitalize on and defend their claim. ACME needs to stake its claim to Icarus before OMNI Industries (ACME’s competition, and the largest corporation in existence!) to become the most richest and powerful corporation.

Your mission begins, Andy (your character) is sent down to Icarus to begin mining operations and stake ACME’s claim to the planet. Andy has been sent because Gordon Fox, the mission commander, is still missing after taking a shuttle to the planet surface two weeks ago. You’ll be responsible for setting up and protecting the mining operations. Your fiance, Jana Perez, a Senior Scientist for ACME will train you on establishing a mining base. The basic test is to set up operations and mine 3,500 credits of Galaxite.

Game Play
Warfare Incorporated is a Real Time Strategy (RTS) game. You begin your mission with a briefing and a set of objectives. Usually this entails setting up a base and beginning mining operations. There are popup screens along the way to help guide you through your objectives and offer suggestions. In the event you require help during the game you can always access it by selecting the menu button at the bottom left of the screen and then select Help. The Help menu contains a table of contents that you can navigate to get any information about the game from the Story Background, Getting Started, Options, Controls, In game menu, Personnel, Vehicles, Buildings, and Advanced features, there’s even a Tips section! You can now proceed to complete your objectives for the first mission!

Graphics
This review will cover several different aspects of games in general, but I must admit I had to begin with the graphics, they are simply put, FANTASTIC! The attention to detail in the terrain, buildings, vehicles is impressive to say the least and the animations are fluid. As was mentioned previously, this game is multi-platform so it can be played on any PDA. That means you can play it on Palm’s greyscale devices, 160 x 160 color devices, 320 x 320 devices, and 320 x 480 devices. The game also supports landscape mode for any device that has OS support for landscape mode, such as the Sony Clie UX series, Pocket PC’s, and the Tapwave Zodiac console. I personally played the game on my Sony NX70V and I must say that this is one of the most impressive games I’ve seen to date, the graphics alone are worth checking it out!

Controls
Movement of the units (personnel or vehicles) is very simple and intuitive. You simple “paint” a box around the units you wish to move. You will know the units have been selected because their status bar (which shows the units health) will appear above it. There is a variation on how to select your units, it’s called the “Lasso Selection” (you can select this type of control through the Options menu, then Game, and then check “Lasso Selection). This option allows you to draw a line around the units you wish to select instead of painting a box around the units. This allows you a little more fine tuning your selection instead of just taking the whole group. Once you have selected your units, you then only have to tap on a location on the screen where you wish to move the units or enemy you wish to attack. Movement of the map can also be controlled by use of the stylus or you can use the hard keys to move as well. The Date Book and Address keys move the map to the left, the To Do and Memo keys move the map the right, and finally the Up and Down keys move the map up and down. While you can use the hard keys to move around the map it is generally quicker to use the stylus instead since you can either drag and stop to move to a location or tap on an area on the other side of the map and instantly be moved there.

Sound
As mentioned previously, the graphics are stunning. Second only to the graphics are the sounds. The sounds that have been incorporated help immensely in the game play. While you may not be able to see the whole map you can simply listen to know if your units are under attack. You can hear guns firing and the sounds of troops dying. If you are under attack you can simply move troops in to assist. You also can hear your troops acknowledge your orders when requested to move to another location. They will respond with “Yes sir” , “Reporting sir” “10-4 sir” or “On my way sir” among other responses. This attention to detail helps the player through the different levels by allowing them to use other senses than simply hand/eye coordination.

Options
There are four aspects of the Options menu, Game, Sound, Performance, and Color.

The Game options menu allows you to control game speed (the speed which the personnel and vehicles move is most noticeable), the “Lasso Selection” for selecting your units on screen, and the Difficulty setting (Easy, Normal, and Hard).

The Sound options menu simply allows you to control the sound level or to mute the game.

The Performance options menu allows you to those animations you wish to see in the game. You can select from a list of animations those that you wish to deactivate. Why anyone would remove any of the animations is beyond me, but they do allow the option to remove them.

Finally, the Color options menu allows you to reset the colors on your device by adjusting Hue, Saturation, or Brightness.

Replayability
In reviewing a game one of the most asked questions is, would you replay this game? If a game is too easy and cannot entertain you or keep you intrigued, you quickly become bored and quit playing. If the game is too difficult you become frustrated and quit playing. These are not problems with Warfare Incorporated.
Because of the different options you set, you can control aspects of the game that make it comfortable for you. You can reduce the difficulty level to easy and reduce the speed of the game so that you can respond to the game at a pace that’s comfortable to you.

You also have the ability to save multiple games. If you attempt a level and just can’t seem to get through that last objective you can save the game there and not have to begin the mission at the beginning. These options alone make the games replay value extremely high.

Next, you have the choice of either playing the “Story Missions” or “Challenge Missions”. The “Story Missions” allow you to select your mission level instead of playing through the levels sequentially. Please note, if you choose this method you cannot attain the top ranking in the game. The “Challenge Missions” allow you to select a specialized mission from a list of missions.

In the future, I can see the possibility of “expansion packs” with new missions for Warfare Incorporated. If this were to ever become true it would easily add to the replay value.