Cossacks European Wars

Cossacks European Wars was one of the games we played at E3 earlier this year and has been continually updated since then. Now, in Europe, we'll be playing the game at its most gloriously beautiful--and it will be also come to the US. All this good news follows news from the last week that the game was still a little rough around the edges. As a result, we'll be bringing you our impressions on this upcoming build of the game later this week.

It's been a long time coming, but we'll finally be entering the familiar European battlegrounds, in a fully realized version of what was once a lush environment to experience in the strategy game. The demo we played during E3 let us check out two locations, Encore's town of Caballero, and the long underground saloon--both of which were bustling in a traditional way, and the capital city of London. Here we were able to watch a wide-open environment, which, at the time, was almost too big to comfortably fit in one's pocket. Once we'd explored the streets, it was easy to glean the clues that we needed, including an earpiece that you can collect for your naval skirmish to take control of your ships, a mighty scrap from a statue of the Persian warlord, and the deeply guarded ship of our battleship. It was also easy to get to the edges of the map with some of the sights and sounds that we've encountered so far, such as the rumbling of an enemy squad that is marching through the hull of a small ship that was carrying an enemy ship with some kind of cataclysmic effect.

In addition to the aforementioned cover, there were also some weapons to be found aboard the sailing vessel that were available to the ship's pilot. One of the more interesting things to note about the naval combat is the sound quality that accompanies it, which is quite the upgrade over the infamous debacle that was the flag gun. In fact, in all of the cockfights that we encountered, there was a near-constant micromanaging sound that the ship was pretty clear on which enemies were coming from the appropriate positions. Your ship sounds like it should be absolutely marching at full speed, so if you see a slow or slippery group of enemies below, you know that you have to fire a few rounds at them before they move away.

One other good thing to note about the game is that, unlike the action in the movie Independence Day, there are some clever graphical features that allow you to see which of the marines is hiding in the dark of the sun. These shadows come into play in a few different ways, depending on the version of the game you're playing. The first time you play as a marine you can hear one of the silhouettes of what looked like a pilot in the white tank, complete with copious explosions. In the next level you can hear someone playing a light-armored marine who's sitting with a light-armored marine who's eating popcorn with a cigarette, and in a later level you see a beam of light pointing towards a tree in the distance, which will mark the objective for you to do in order to proceed to the next level.

At the end of each level, you'll have the opportunity to "fear" one of your marine's wounds to complete the level. This means that you'll have to kill off all of the enemies to complete the level. Once you finish the level, you'll be awarded with an alternate ending. In the version we played, you'll be able to replay it using the "try again" mode. If you don't want to play the game with the alternate ending, you can replay it on the hard difficulty level. You'll also be able to replay the original game using a new mission editor.

When we played the game, we were impressed by what we played. Though you'll have to pick and choose who to play as, you'll be able to select from any of the Marine squadmates that you want. The designers have made sure that the single-player portion of the game is basically identical to the multiplayer portion of the game. The mission was broken up into three distinct sections, each with its own goal. The first portion of the game let you play as Jack Adams, a member of the New Conglomerate. Adams' first assignment was to clear out a mine guarded by marines and a powerful soldier that you could use to bust through a dam's defenses. You'll find that your job is going to be to liberate the area, and you'll also face off against the marines that you encounter. The second section will let you play as Polina Petrova, a member of the New Conglomerate. Under your command, you'll have to follow Petrova through a minefield and pick up the object you need to move to and deliver it to your teammates.