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PRODUCT REVIEW
Warfare Incorporated
By James Booth

Warfare Incorporated from Handmark (see http://www.handmark.com/), a real-time strategy game in the flavor of Command & Conquer, is probably the best game I have ever played on the Palm platform. The first real-time strategy game for the Palm, Warfare Incorporated has amazing graphics and sound, an extended storyline, and challenging game play in an amazingly small file. Although I refer to the Palm version in this article, Warfare Incorporated is also available for Pocket PC.

Premise
In Warfare Incorporated, you play the role of Andy Whitmore, a low-level engineer at ACME Exploration. You are charged with the exploration and exploitation of Icarus, a newly discovered planet in the Tau Ceti system that is rich in Galaxite, a precious mineral. Early on it's discovered that OMNI Industries, ACME's archrival, have also discovered Icarus. The corporate war is then on, to claim as much of the planet as possible, before OMNI steals it all.

Impressions
Warfare Incorporated has some of the best graphics of any Palm application I have ever encountered, as you can see in Figure A.

FIGURE A

Warfare Incorporated has astounding graphics for a Palm game. Click picture for a larger image.

I would say they are equivalent to the graphics of the original Command & Conquer for the PC. There are detailed explosions and building collapses, damage indicators, and 4-channel digital sound effects.

You can choose to play either the six solitary, stand-alone, Challenge missions, or the 15-mission Campaign. I dabbled with each of the Challenge missions after finishing the full campaign, and they are challenging to say the least.

The Campaign, of course, has a series of missions that get progressively more difficult the further along you get, and an unfolding storyline. Strategy is a key element of Warfare Incorporated and most missions cannot be solved with plain brute force. All the missions require some element of resource management, whether it's raw materials, or utilizing a finite attack force to best advantage. Throughout, you (playing the role of Andy) receive advice and mission briefings via cut-scenes and email from your superior at ACME, as shown in Figure B, and from Andy's girlfriend Jana Perez, who was on the initial Icarus survey team and is still on-planet.

FIGURE B

Mission briefings and tips come as cut-scenes and email. Click picture for a larger image.

As you progress, personnel and equipment upgrades become available, allowing you to strengthen your forces, upgrade base defenses, and capture enemy installations. You have seven different types of vehicles available, from small single gun scouts, to heavy artillery. In addition there are three different types of foot troops, a security guard, rocket trooper, and corporate raider for capturing enemy installations. There is also a special foot unit for several of the missions, but I don't want to give away too much.





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