- Site: Battlestations: Pacific
- Publisher: Feral Interactive
- Developer: Eidos
- Genre: Simulation
Game Media
By Brad Cook
“I have returned,” General Douglas MacArthur famously proclaimed in October 1944, after winning the Battle of Leyte in the Philippines. So have you: Battlestations: Pacific picks up where its predecessor left off, taking you beyond 1942’s pivotal Battle of Midway and through the climactic Battle of Okinawa in 1945.
This time, however, you can also flip the perspective and experience the other side of the war in an alternate history campaign that sees you participating in the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor and eventually returning to Hawaii for a final victory. The storyline, which is based on a plausible extrapolation of historical events, imagines what would have happened had the Japanese fleet prevailed in several key battles, including Midway and Guadalcanal.
Battlestations: Pacific’s 28 missions bring those campaigns to life with improved realistic graphics, including transparent water at shallow depths, ships that can split in two as they sink, a new cockpit view, battles that take place at night, new weather effects, and more. You’ll also now be able to land troops on islands and take control of them, enabling you to establish critical waypoints as you move across the ocean.
Don’t Fade Away
“Never give an order that can’t be obeyed,” General MacArthur also said. Keep that in mind as you play through both campaigns, where you’ll have access to dozens of authentic planes, ships, and submarines as you juggle controlling a particular craft and overseeing big-picture battle strategy. Set formations, order your units to behave offensively or defensively, and set patrol routes. During combat, you can switch between units, allowing you to, for example, maneuver a fleet into position before hopping into the cockpit of a plane and taking off from an aircraft carrier.
If you find yourself shot down or sunk, don’t worry: simply take control of another available unit and join the fray once more. Each mission presents a series of objectives for you to achieve, such as eliminating a certain number of enemy units or ensuring that your comrades in arms reach a specific destination. Complete all objectives to earn gold medals and unlock new units that can be used in future missions; complete the secondary and hidden objectives to earn naval supplies that confer bonuses, such as improved unit effectiveness or the ability to summon air strikes.
But what’s next when you complete both campaigns? General MacArthur once observed: “Old soldiers never die; they just fade away.” Make sure that doesn’t happen by heading online for multiplayer sessions and continuing to sharpen your command and combat skills; read on to learn more.
Game Hardware
Check out our systems for your best gaming experience.
Stay on Target. A Japanese Zero dives into the action at Pearl Harbor.
Support Function. Genyo Maru ships carry vital fuel oil for the Japanese navy. Since oil burns easily, it’s not hard to sink them.
Battlestations: Midway
Learn more about the Battlestations series by reading our previous feature which covers Battlestations: Midway. This version begins with the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor and then finishes the action-packed campaign at the Battle of Midway.
System Requirements:
- Mac OS Xversion 10.5.8 (version 10.6.4 recommended)
- 1.8GHz Intel processor (2.4GHz recommended)
- 2GB RAM (3GB recommended)
- 256MB video RAM (512MB recommended; ATI X1 series and Nvidia 7 series video cards, and Intel GMA graphics chipsets not supported.)
- 9GB hard disk space
Multiplayer Mayhem
Before you connect with GameRanger for online Battlestations: Pacific sessions, make sure you’ve unlocked all available units in the single-player campaign — they’re crucial for Duel and Island Capture modes. Need any tips and tricks for getting you through the game’s two campaigns? Strategy Wiki has walkthroughs for them, along with suggested combat tactics and more.
There are five multiplayer modes, with many maps to choose.
- Escort: Make sure a unit or group of units arrives safely at its destination — or survives for a preset time period — or stop the other team from accomplishing that goal. You have multiple spawn points to choose from, so make a wise selection: the wrong one can force you to travel a long way to rejoin the battle, costing you precious time.
- Siege: Land sieges were common in the Pacific theater as the Allies made their way from island to island. This mode lets you recreate those battles. While capturing the island will definitely end the game, most contests conclude when one side runs out of resources, as represented by a strength number that drops as units are eliminated.
Competitive: Team with up to seven other players to attack enemy units worth various points. The one who racks up the highest total wins. This mode typically comes with objectives too — for example, you could be tasked with defending a base, and if the enemy takes it over, the session will end. Otherwise, the match is over when a time or score limit is reached.
Watch for targets that earn bonus points, but pay attention to who’s shooting at it: the player who lands the killing blow will get all the points.- Duel: Choose one of four unit types — battleship, heavy cruiser, destroyer, or fighter plane — and use only it to attack the opposition. The last player left wins this everyone-for-themselves free-for-all. Since Duel sessions tend to be over quickly, you can play until someone wins a predetermined number of matches, or until time runs out.
Island Capture: Where Duels offer quick snacks of action, Island Capture serves up a full meal. Two teams compete to capture as many islands as possible — each one they secure offers bonus-granting naval supplies and an increase in the rate of victory points awarded. The team that hits a victory point threshold first, or who has the most points when time runs out, is the winner.
This mode allows you to control multiple units and offers the most complicated strategy experience. You’ll need to work closely with your teammates if you want to win. Each map has small, medium, and large variations of Island Capture, allowing the game host to set up a session that can be finished in as short as half an hour or as long as two hours or more.