Act: Law Enforcement 2020 [by Ian Software]

Game Review: Law Enforcement 2020
Release: March, 2003
Genre: Action
Developer: Ian Software
System Requirements: Pentium 200, 16 Bit Color, 15 MB Free HD Space
Price: Freeware

Freeware games are a mixed bag. More often than not the user finds they get what they pay for and that there’s a reason these games are being given away. Law Enforcement 2020 from Ian Software stands out from the crowd with its decent production values and entertaining premise but at the same time still feels like a “freeware” game, like something is missing.

At first glance LE2020 seems much like the classic “snowball fight” style of game, viewed on the horizontal plane instead of the typical top-down view. Each round starts with a short build-time in which the players buy defensive equipment like walls, tunnels, gun emplacements and extra troops. Once the game starts each player must navigate the defensive blockades built by their opponent and attempt to score a kill or achieve some other mission objective like recovering hostages.

The game is multiplayer-only and requires 2 users on the same computer (no LAN or internet option). This is the first strike against it but that’s not really Ian Software’s fault. The PC has always sucked as a “multiple simultaneous user” entertainment source. It’s not as easy or as comfortable as gathering around the Playstation or X-Box. With two users sharing the keyboard controls the game becomes almost unplayable (or certainly much less fun) especially since the controls for player 1 are on the right side of the keyboard even though he plays on the left side of the screen, with the opposite for player 2. Fortunately you have the option to use game controllers, which improves things quite a bit.

The volume of weapons, objects and even vehicles that can be purchased add a lot of flavor and matching wits against your opponent in real-time can be quite challenging. For example if you see your opponent buy a helicopter during the build-phase you know you are going to have to build some sort of cover or shelter to defend against that. No two games will ever be alike.

Graphics: 6
The 2D graphics in Law Enforcement 2020 are fairly generic yet they do have some personality to them. The tunnels, towers and gun emplacements you build are incorporated seamlessly into the map so there isn’t the dreaded “tile map” look that plagues many 2D games. However the horizontal “platform” styled view worked against my enjoyment of the game. Since the play area is limited to the screen dimension (no scrolling) there isn’t much room to maneuver and games ended too quickly, usually on account of luck over strategy.

The low-resolution graphics seem dated but the overall the presentation is fairly well polished.

Sound: 4
Like the graphics, the sound design is strictly utilitarian, generic sound effects and old midi styled music. They do the job but don’t really add anything to the game.

Game Play: 6
The game moves a little fast and if I wasn’t careful an entire squad of troops could be killed almost instantly after issuing an attack order. On the other hand that speed and the fact that your troops have no AI (they blindly run at the enemy when ordered to attack) gives the game a wonderful “Keystone Cops” feel to it. The carnage of watching an entire squad of men die horribly is worth the download alone. Be sure to try out the “Acid Cauldron” weapon J

Playing this game with both players huddled over the keyboard is extremely difficult and severely reduced the fun factor of the game. You’re going to want at least one game controller.

Options: 8
LE2020 stands out in the sheer volume of customization options given to the players. You can change your controls (which you will definitely want to do), adjust starting health, number of troops, which weapons are available, weather effects – almost every aspect of the game can be altered and you can save these alterations to create your own “themes”. There are also different mission styles that can be played against each other, mostly those you would see in a strategic first person shooter – assault, skirmish, war, genocide, capture the flag, hostage, siege and assassination.

Fun: 5
On the whole I found Law Enforcement 2020 to be briefly entertaining but nothing that stuck with me for very long. I was able to convince friends to play it once or twice but they quickly grew tired of it and wanted to play something else. The lack of any single- player mode means that unless you find someone who is a die-hard fan of the game it will likely sit on your hard drive without ever getting played more than a few times.

I also had some frustration with the collision detection and controls, which aren’t bad enough to kill the game but have an overall “strange” feeling to them that I couldn’t quite place. Not to mention a few bugs that made missions like “Assassination” impossible to play (once the build-phase was completed the game simply declared a game-over without any chance to play).

Overall: 6
Without a doubt LE2020 has the potential to be very entertaining, if only you can find people willing to share a keyboard to play it. The games are fast and don’t use up a ton of system resources so you can easily play to kill time while downloading or running other software in the background. This is a gem in the rough and I can’t help but think that with a little more polish this game could have been so much more than it is. At the very least it’s worth the download to check it out and while freeware games may lack some polish you certainly can’t argue with their price.
Added: June 24th 2003
Reviewer: Kyle Nau
Score:
Related Link: Ian Software
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