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63%
PROS
Tons of missions and vessels, easy to use, supports voice commands.
LOWS
Water graphics aren't too great, missions can get dull, boring after awhile.
OVERALL
If you are into naval technology and ships, you will probably enjoy Enigma's realistic edge. If not, you may die of virtual sea sickness or boredom.
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I would like to start out by telling you that Enigma: Rising Tide is a game only for people who like to command vessels and submarines. Rising Tide has decent graphics and is very realistic. Accuracy is the category where this game scores big time. DreamCatcher has put a ton of research into the design and specification of the vessels before modeling them and putting them into the game. When I say the graphics are decent, I am mainly speaking of the water. It doesn't give you that feel of realism like in Metal Gear Solid 2 on the tanker level. It is imperative that the water looks more realistic… especially since you are surrounded by it constantly.
A major thing I like about the game is the set up of the missions. You start out small then advance in ranks as you complete missions. Missions will get more exciting as you advance further, and you will also become more skilled and be able to handle harder tasks.
One of my major disappointments with the game was the lack of video clips, like in Command and Conquer. To replace videos there are small articles from a newspaper describing the past day's events. Well fine, but at least make the articles long enough to make them interesting! For the most part, the articles were brief and boring. Videos would have been a much better option…
Another thing I liked about this game is how easy it was to get used to controlling my own submarine and destroyer. For all of you newbies who hate spending hours trying to figure out how to turn an engine on, rest assured, you will most likely catch on very fast. Note: this does not mean Enigma is easy. On the contrary, you are still going to have to read the manual for this game. But if you play the game for about an hour, you start getting the hang of things and begin to know all the keys. Once you are at this point, the game becomes a lot more enjoyable.
It is important to accurately shoot at targets and take precise shots at enemies. Because of the level of realism, you are not going to be able to properly fire a torpedo while not facing straight. That is the challenging part of firing a torpedo from a submarine... you always need to be somewhat facing your target. Things like this can be annoying for some impatient players, however, for the users that love strategy, you will love the realistic edge to this game. If I may repeat myself, this game is very challenging. For quite awhile, I had trouble sinking tankers with my submarine. This is because I had to get used to estimating my enemies' distance from my location. When you are two thousand meters away from the tanker, you can't just fire the torpedo straight at the target. Instead, you have to estimate how long it's going to take the torpedo to reach the original two thousands meters of the tanker's current position. Then, you need to add in where the tanker will be once the torpedo has reached the two thousand-meter distance. It is kind of complicated...
One mission that I hated (not because it was bad, but because I was bad at it) had you shooting American speedboats. My officers had told me how the American speedboats were no match to my large German vessel. My vessel was huge, and was much better equipped than the American boats. My center gun was capable of destroying an American speedboat in one shot. These boats used their speed to their advantage, making it so that I would miss every shot I took on them. I was not fast enough to prevent them from coming too close my vessel. In the next two minutes, I heard an explosion in the back of my ship. Oops, no one ever told me these speedboats could fire torpedoes too…
If you wish to buy this game, you really just need to ask yourself how patient you are and if you really have the attention span to play this game. Missions can get dull, you will often fail, and graphics are not on par with newer games. If you are really into naval technology and ships, you might appreciate Enigma's realism. If not, stay clear of this game. You may die of boredom.
