Unit 13 (PS Vita)

Sneaking out shortly after the Playstation Vita's launch, Unit 13 was produced by the same team responsible for the SOCOM series, which also features special operatives in a third-person perspective. I'm actually surprised that this game wasn't branded as part of the SOCOM franchise since it shares a lot of the same DNA of that series.

Unlike most modern-day military games (specifically the Tom Clancy series of games), Unit 13 doesn't really have an overall plot. Each of its 36 missions are bite size affairs, perfect for the morning commute, and are fairly stand alone, so you can play them through in any order. This is probably the game's biggest weakness as some of the missions are fairly repetitive, with the same maps being used with different enemy layouts or objectives. The repetitive nature wouldn't be as big an issue if there was some over-arching storyline or sense of advancement, but when every mission ends with your character exiting the map, and no consequences to your actions, it becomes very easy to put down the game and not bother with it for a few weeks. In trying to make the game appealing to casual play throughs, they've missed out on the addictive nature that made playing games such as `Uncharted: Golden Abyss' such a must.

Like most games nowadays, there is a sense of progression for the characters whose statistics can increase based on the amount of points you earn for them, but you don't feel much attachment to the characters themselves, as they are effectively boiled down to their soldier class and not given much personality. You can choose from six classes, each with their own expertise and weapons load-out, such as Sniper Rifles, Shotguns, etc. The game itself `recommends' an operative for you to use for each mission, removing some of the tactical elements.

The game features co-operative play (available through Wi-Fi connections or 3G) and you can see friends progress on the leaderboards, and even share some of the unlockable missions via the `near' feature, although this hasn't been something I've been able to enjoy since no-one on my friends list has the game!

Graphically, the game looks great. It is reminiscent of the early Xbox 360 graphics and falls slightly behind the current generation of games for that system. There is a rather bland feeling to the locations, which seem to either be pale grey corridors in some military air-base, or sandy brown walls of a Middle Eastern village. Where the background is less than impressive, the level of graphics on the characters that are displayed in third person is actually pretty impressive and is much better than anything from the original PSP's line-up of 3D shooters.

The game has a fairly steep learning curve, especially in some of the more stealth-orientated levels, where you can get swarmed by enemies quite quickly once you have alerted them to your presence. Luckily, the game does have a few checkpoints per mission, so it isn't the biggest chore to replay small sections of one mission to try a different approach to a trickier level.

In terms of controls, the secondary thumbstick definitely adds a whole new dimension to playing this genre of game on a handheld. The PSP versions of the SOCOM franchise had suffered from not having that second thumbstick to control the camera and aim reticule. It is so intuitive to play these games with a dual thumbstick approach that I am surprised it took Sony this long to release a handheld machine with this function.

Overall, this is a great budget title, but not quite worth the full retail price of £39.99, due to the rather barebones feel to the game. If you own a Playstation Vita and want one more game for some variety on a long train journey, than this works well in that respect, but there really isn't enough here to warrant it to be anyone's first game for their machine.

If you are after multiplayer action, even if it is only in the form of cooperative play, Unit 13 delivers the goods, with tight controls, solid graphics, a great atmosphere and some nice addictive hooks, giving loads of replay value. There is nothing really original on offer and there is no actual storyline and the characters have no personality for you to get attached to them but these are not really things that should put you off as, as I said before, it just wants to quench your thirst for some quality stealth/action missions. Even though it's nothing original, for one of the first shooters on the VITA I am eager to see where shooter's will go on this console as this is a great first attempt on this machine. All in all I would give this an 8 Great stuff...
I am a critic for pure playstation fans so you can read this full review and other at our website.
Hope I helped you make a decision. Shame Sony are ushering Zipper out of the back door as I speak....

Unit 13 from Zipper interactive (the developers that bought us SOCOM) is a barebones frustrating third person shooter with no personality of its own. Despite this the games design makes it a perfectly serviceable portable game that provides hours of gameplay, some of which is fun!

Console experiences on the go are what the VITA promises and UNIT 13 does at least show this will come true give competent development. The dual sticks mean UNIT 13 feels very familiar. You aim down the sight with L1, shoot the bad guys with R1 and take cover with circle. Grenades have been mapped to the touch screen, which works well.

Aside from the solid controls UNIT 13 doesn't do anything particularly brilliantly. The most frustrating issue is the games difficulty. I'm all for realism and a good challenge in these sorts of games but UNIT 13 is far to punishing it times. Regardless of what character you're playing as your health is low, I'm talking of Call of Duty Veteran difficulty low. It wouldn't be so bad if the combat consisted of mostly mid to long range fire fights but this isn't the case. You will frequently be rushed by suicidal, shotgun wielding, bad guys who will take you out in a single shot. These cheap deaths are frequent and very frustrating. Checkpoint can be a good few minuets of gameplay apart too so prepare yourself for replaying large chunks just to reach the bit you last died at.

To add to the problems is the enemy AI. They have a habit of noticing you even if you are completely hidden from view. However, despite their apparent x-ray vision, their ability to fight you intelligently is pretty poor. As mentioned certain enemies will just rush you blasting shotgun round in your direction. Others will just spam bullets at you constantly even if you are well in cover.

Here are just a couple of examples of how bad the AI can get. Upon death enemies will sometimes continue to fire countless rounds at you as if you're still alive and kicking. Other times the enemies will be shooting at the nearest wall, not even in the same direction as you. Of course human like AI would make the game impossible but UNIT 13 isn't even close to being realistic.

There are 36 missions in UNIT 13 but no story to speak of. Every mission is stand alone and take the form of simple "kill all enemies and plant an explosive" style or more complex stealth and times missions. As well as these are so called "Elite" missions whereby there is no health regeneration. At the end of a mission your are given a star rating based upon how well you did. This provides incentive to replay levels to better your or your friends' scores.

You pick one of six characters to take on the mission all of which have different strengths and weaknesses. As you use the characters they will level up which improves the character by providing new abilities and weapons etc. the characters themselves have no personality to speak of, just very bad accents.

Another disappointment with the game is the recycling of the environments. By level 5 I was already beginning to play on maps used in previous levels. The level design is very basic too so it's a shame there aren't more of them to dilute this issue.

Graphically UNIT 13 isn't terrible but there are much better looking VITA games out there. The frame rate is choppy, especially during heavy fire fights and during the brief cinematics. Shadows are incredibly low resolution too with better shadow effects seen on high end PSP games.

Final Comments

The short snappy missions of UNIT 13 are great time killers though are not always particularly fun. As a package it's hard to recommend with its £30 price but if you really need a third person military shooter for your VITA then UNIT 13 is all you will have right now.

6/10