Bohemia Interactive has put out some new screenshots for their upcoming game Carrier Command: Gaea Mission. The game is a remake of the 1988 computer game Carrier Command, which was quite a noteworthy title in its day for having what at the time were very impressive 3D graphics. Carrier Command: Gaea Mission is scheduled for release in the second quarter of this year for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and PC, which I believe makes this game Bohemia Interactive’s first appearance on a console.
Like the original, the gameplay is a combination of action and strategy, with the player taking the role of the commander of a futuristic aircraft carrier. You must direct your carrier’s forces, manage its arsenal and resources, and establish bases to provide supplies and reinforcements, but can also remotely take control of individual combat units and pilot them in battle.
The game is set on a human-colonized world called Taurus, where your carrier’s operations take place in a large ocean with 30 islands in 6 different climate zones, with battles fought both on land and at sea. Your carrier has a number of different unit types such as attack aircraft, amphibious assault vehicles, and ground troops, some of which can be configured and equipped in different ways depending on their mission- for example, you can load up your aircraft with heavy weaponry for intense combat or have them travel light for reconnaissance. Gameplay focuses on establishing a network of defensive and resupply bases while destroying or recapturing the enemy’s, defending your carrier from attack, and and eventually hunting down and destroying the enemy aircraft carrier, all while it’s trying to do the same to you.
The game will offer both a story mode featuring an extended campaign and a mode more similar to the original Carrier Command, in which you can set up parameters for a one-off scenario and square off with an enemy carrier and its forces. The story mode is based on the universe of the Gaea science fiction series by author P. D. Gilson from Helios Publishing. I’m not familiar with the author in question, so I can’t comment on whether this bodes good or ill, though I do think it’s nice to see more games cross-fertilizing with print science fiction and would love to see more of that sort of thing.
Bohemia is best known for their tactical first-person military shooters like Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis and the ArmA series, which are known for their unusually high degree of realism. (Weapons and ballistics are modeled realistically, civilian areas actually contain civilians and there are consequences for blowing things up willy-nilly in populated areas, you can’t recover from being repeatedly shot in the face by spending twenty seconds crouching behind some sandbags, etc.) So subject matter like futuristic super carriers battling on an alien world is something of a departure for them, although the basic idea- a combination of action and military strategy in a large, open world- is similar to games like ArmA and something Bohemia Interactive has an established track record with.
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