Action Service

Copyright : Cobra Soft | Reviewed by : Malc Jennings

Somewhere in a top secret training camp located in Western Europe, final preparations are being made. As one of Europes elite commandos you have volunteered to joing the famous Cobra Command, and embark on a vital mission so critical that all training is under real life conditions. Today you must complete your induction course - four grueling tasks to be completed - live or die by your toughness, ability and cunning.

Negotiate high walls, ditches, barbed wire fencing and ferocious guard dogs! Demonstrate your skill at using hand grenades and planting bombs, whilst avoiding land mines and FM rifle attack. No holds barred hand to hand combat.

Graphics

The loading screen is very well drawn and gives you the impression that danger is just ahead after you hit the fire button. In game graphics are nice, not overly chunky and make good use of the colour system. The typical army colours have been used throughout the various courses of the game and there?s certainly a suitable amount of detail gone into the game in general.

It plays fast, no serious graphical glitches such as suddenly becoming invisible or colour clashing.

Sound

A very nice theme tune plays along shortly after the loading screen has been displayed. After that the game is loaded and we are reduced to the occasional bang and ping! as you select options, make mistakes and get the Go! command by the leader of the group. Its a fairly mixed bag really and certainly not a bad thing, some titles have no music or sound effects at all and given the nature of the game this is probably just the right level of sound required. The tiny musical sound that plays if you fail is also quite a nice touch.

Gameplay

Action Service is pretty much like every other training course style game. You go through screen after screen of different challenges such as running over obstacles, avoiding nasty things like dogs and ducking under wires, climbing through pipes etc. Its certainly a mixed bag of tasks even if it does become a little repetitive over time.

It plays extremely well, there are no slow-down issues, the graphics are top notch and its just one of those simple games you can pick up, load and play without having to read through several pages of instructions or spend a few hours practicing with the joystick and keyboard. It might not be as big a budget title as say Combat School by Ocean Software but its a very good alternative and probably one of Cobra Softs better titles.

If you like your obstacle course games then this is certainly one to check out, if you?re not sure then I would still give it a go.