Navy SEALs: Weapons of Mass Destruction (PC)

GameSpot editors' review

• CNET editors' rating: 0.5 stars Abysmal
  Detailed editors' rating
  Overall score: 1.6 (0.5 stars)

• Reviewed by:
  Erik Wolpaw
• Reviewed on: 08/11/2003
• Updated on: 08/12/2003
• Released on: 07/18/2003
• Originally published on GameSpot: Navy SEALs: Weapons of Mass Destruction (PC) Review

Even good games usually put the design credits at the end, or at least place them in a separate option off the main menu. ValuSoft's new budget-priced first-person shooter, Navy SEALs: Weapons of Mass Destruction, lists the developers' names front and center during a movielike credit sequence that plays during the opening cutscene. It's hard to imagine that anyone would want his or her name prominently displayed on such an abysmal game, especially one whose only distinguishing feature is that it's actually even worse than the awful game that preceded it, a contender for worst game of last year, Elite Forces: Navy SEALs.

The game takes place across nine virtually plot-free levels in three global hotspots. The first six levels require you to shoot the living daylights out of some stuff in Iraq and North Korea. Rather than go for the logical axis-of-evil triad and set a few levels in Iran, the last three missions take place in Pakistan, a country of as-yet-un-quantified evil, though people sometimes confuse it with Iraq, which may explain why it was included here. Apparently, in order to get the game onto shelves while its subject matter was still topical, some features were cut. In alphabetical order, these are: gameplay, graphics, and sound.

As it turns out, missions that actually work were apparently another feature that had to be cut from the game. We were forced to restart one of the Iraq levels a few times because we managed to break the game's scripting in such a way that the mission became unbeatable. Later, we had to restart the third North Korean level a few times because of what appeared to be another scripting problem. In fact, we never managed to get through this mission. Because of this, we never saw any of the Pakistan levels. Based on the available evidence--Weapons of Mass Destruction's awful first six levels and the abysmal entirety of the original Navy SEALs--we're guessing that the parts of the game that take place in Pakistan also really, really stink.

The game's box urges you to "exploit your enemy's weaknesses." If you had to pick just one weakness to exploit, it would have to be absolutely everything that your enemies do. Even by the low standards set by the worst first-person shooters in history, the enemy AI in Navy SEALs is bad. Enemy soldiers will stand around while the guy right next to them dies screaming in a hail of bullets. Then they'll stand around while they get shot. Sometimes they'll run from cover to open ground where they'll stop and wait for you to shoot them.

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