Preview: Hands on with Frontlines: Fuel of War - Xbox 36026th March 2007Frontlines isn't all about the drones of course, other roles play their other parts in the action. As we discovered early on, you can't always rely on your drones to the job in hand. You need to mix up the roles you choose depending on what your team-mates have chosen, what role the enemies have taken, in addition to reaction to the action around you and the objective that is currently active. Drones will be useless at times due to the counter measure role which allows an enemy to take them out with their EMP grenades. The other two roles on offer, ground support and air support, shouldn't be dismissed either. Despite us being slightly under-whelmed by the impact that a level 1 air-strike had on the environment (we we're expecting it to leave behind a huge crater, it didn't) as you move up the levels the air attacks do become more visually stimulating and powerful. You simply select a position on the street and let rip, preferably when there are a dozen soldiers in the area. At level 2 you have access to an impressively powerful bomb and at level 3 it's a fuel bomb that creates what looks like a nuclear explosion and takes out enemies within a certain radius.  Thanks to the combination of role and soldier types the tactical possibilities in Frontlines is immense and close team work is bound to win the day online. Drones fill the air and the streets, air strikes go off all around you, ground support players busily go about building rail guns to defend an area and all this whilst you have to try and focus on reaching your objective. It's hectic, frantic and tactically compelling. Unfortunately, we couldn't really put this team play into practice because, although our team mates were sitting next to us, we couldn't hear them in order to pass on instructions nor find out what roles they had chosen due to the DJ at the event playing his music full blast. It's a bit disappointing that we couldn't hear the game in all its glory, but if the trailer was anything to go by we're expecting good things. We've mainly banged on about how great drones will be in Frontlines, but there was also enough depth to the gameplay to keep the action fresh and to keep us immersed enough not to head to the bar at every 15 minutes. In summary, Frontlines: Fuel of War is shaping up to be a superb shooter. *We didn't put these items on Ebay! The stress reliever has been well used. We love Supreme Commander and Titan Quest has gone to a grateful fan!
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