Conflict Vietnam

Though war games have been popular ever since the dawn of the video game, the age of 3D gaming has seen the genre explode into a sprawl of RTS games and third and first-person shooters. Continuing this trend, as well as its own popular series of games, is SCi's Conflict Vietnam.

Despite going head-to-head with Eidos' Shellshock game, released the very same week, Conflict Vietnam is surprisingly different to its competition. Where most games of this type are fundamentally based upon historic events, Conflict Vietnam merely uses the setting of the Vietnam War to tells its own tale of four soldiers stranded in enemy territory, struggling to get back to allied forces.

Essentially a squad-based strategy game, Conflict Vietnam sees players assuming full control of these four soldiers as they attempt to negotiate an extremely hostile environment through the use of stealth, weaponry and a selection of skills and tactical abilities. Players will be charged with out-flanking enemies and 'neutralising' threats and targets as they make their way across a series of highly dangerous locations, including the Vietnamese capital.

The game as a whole spans some 14 sizeable missions that are varied and that also come with a unique set of objectives. Environments are truly massive, beautifully detailed, and although Conflict Vietnam doesn't follow the events of the war itself, it's a convincing affair.

Conflict Vietnam is very much in keeping with its two predecessors in that it provides players with solid team-based gameplay, lush visuals, smart enemy AI and some spectacular cinematic events. This is the third instalment of Conflict, but it's unlikely to be the last.