In Cold Zero you assume the role of John McAffrey, a former LAPD
sniper, who has become a private detective after an unfortunate hostage
killing situation. Players must complete sixteen missions around
the world. Victory can be decided by choosing all-out action or stealth
and you can, in fact, finish the game by killing very few enemies.
If you choose the all-out action path, then you are provided with
more than one hundred different weapons ranging from knives to heavy
weaponry. These divergent paths make Cold Zero suitable for die-hard
action gamers or even adventurers like me.

What really differentiates
Cold Zero from other action games is its strong plot. It ties together
sixteen huge missions that support
each other to form a well woven story of double-crossing and deception
that evolve into a spider’s web of intrigue.

When I first heard that
this game provided more than one hundred different weapons, I quickly
assumed that Cold Zero was just another
kill-them-all bloodfest. But after playing for about two hours,
I realized that using stealth and good timing make the game easier
to beat and more enjoyable compared to shooting every enemy on
sight.
Why? Well, there are two main reasons which will be explored
in detail.

First of all, this game
has some wonderful AI implementation. If you make a noise by recklessly
killing an enemy, his friends
might
become alerted and will either hunt you down, if they have
better weapons, or wait until they can strike you from behind.
Also,
enemies move around quite a bit and will not remain in one
place waiting
for you to kill them. On some occasions, you will never see
an enemy in the exact same place when you replay the mission for
the second
time. One cool thing that happened was I managed to shoot at
an enemy before he could use his gun. He then stood still,
now
afraid
of me,
and raised his hands to surrender. He could then be approached
– with my weapon at the ready – and conked in the head. Of
course there
are still a few instances where the AI does not work properly
and your enemy will accidentally kill his own friends if they
stand
between you and him.

Second, you can inflict
more damage to an enemy when he is not aware of you. Basically,
you can defeat an enemy with one
hit
from behind.
It will take at least couple of hits to knock a foe down
if he is aware of your presence.

Being a big fan of turn-based
combat systems, Cold Zero‘s combat system was sometimes a nightmare
for me. Since everything
must
be done in real time, you need to pay attention to your
surroundings at all times. Victim’s bodies must always be hid out of view
so as not to attract attention. In my opinion, this is one of the
weaknesses of the game. It is very difficult to control a combat
situation at times as a foe could storm from any directions without
your knowledge and one simple noise can raise an alert for an entire
area. This greatly increases the frustration level of the player.

There are five main indicators
that are very vital for your actions: life energy, condition of
bulletproof vest,
stamina,
visibility,
and sound level. Where the life energy, bulletproof vest
and stamina are standard statistics for RPG games, visibility
and
sound level
are very unique. Visibility determines how well your
enemy could see you. Visibility level can be decreased by shutting
down all
light resources around you. For example, to avoid a nearby
enemy you could
shoot out a streetlamp or turn off a power generator.
This
is actually one of the best features in the game. Combined
with
the sound level,
the game becomes more realistic. The sound level is determined
by how much noise you produce. Sneaking around your enemy
will produce
no sound. Walking, running, dropping an item, or opening
a door will increase the sound level. Unless you use
a silencer, firing
your
gun will alert every single enemy in the area. When you
sneak, you use more stamina compared to when you walk,
but once
your
stamina is low, you can not sneak until your stamina
has regenerated. This
is, in my opinion, a brilliant concept.

All of you pack-rats
who like to collect everything will have a tough time with Cold
Zero. Your character has
a weight limitation – though
it does increase with the progress of your strength statistic. Once
your inventory weight is close to the limit, you will not be able
to run or sneak and if the weight limit is exceeded then movement
is impossible. It’s best to choose wisely and not take every
single object even though inventory items ranging from cell-phones
to guns from dead or unconscious enemies can be collected and sold.
The value of an item depends on its condition and damaged weapons
have less value than usable weapons. So unlike games in which the
weapons never show any sign of wear, every weapon in Cold
Zero has
its own life cycle. The more you use them, the quicker they wear
out. Even though you have a repair skill to repair your weaponry,
at some point they do become unusable or broken.

The sound effects and
the graphics are both outstanding and realistic. The sound that
is being produced by
an object, either through
conversation or manipulation, depends on your distance
to
them. The closer you
are, the louder the sound. This works the same with
object manipulation. You can only manipulate an object
if it
is nearby. The camera
angle can be maneuvered to any angle which is a big
plus for this type
of game. At the beginning of each area, you can locate
each enemy and study their patterns. By using this
information you can then
map out the most advantageous route.

Cold Zero is a very long
game and provides between 30 to 40 hours to complete depending
on the difficulty
level.
The three
levels
– easy, normal, and difficult – also affect the strength and
vulnerability of the enemies. There is also limited multiplayer support
that allows up to sixteen players to compete against one or more
opponents.

Even a very good game
has some weaknesses. First, keeping track of all of these details
can become
a nightmare.
Weapons can
become jammed
or worn out, grenades can bounce off walls and
a foe can inform if you are nearby and will then
find
a better
spot
to shoot
from. Light
is sometimes your worst enemy during the battle.
People have their own agenda and don’t expect
them to stand
still doing
nothing while
you are roaming the streets. All of these details
make the game very complicated, but satisfying.

Second, some sub-quests
and more NPCs would have made the game more interesting. Instead
of focusing
on one
major
objective, several minor objectives would have
added more flavor. Also,
some alternate
endings could have spiced things up.

Despite these few criticisms,
Cold Zero has everything necessary for an enjoyable RPG/Action/Adventure
experience. Not recommended
for purist adventurers that do not want to
deal
with any combat or fast-paced action, but
for
those who
like the
combination of RPG/adventure
and do not mind a few action sequences, then
the fresh concept and innovation of Cold
Zero make
it a must-buy
game.

Final Grade: A

System Requirements:

• Pentium®-III 750 MHz
• At least 128 Megabytes
  of RAM.
• Windows 95®, Windows 98®, Windows ME®, Windows 2000® or Windows
  XP®.
• A DirectX® 8-compatible graphics card of at least 32 Megabyte Video RAM.
• A DirectX® 8-compatible sound card.
• A Windows-compatible
  mouse, keyboard and CD-ROM drive.
• At least 350 Megabyte
  (MB) free space on your hard disk.