Set in a fictitious country called Zekistan, Full Spectrum Warrior puts you in command of two teams, Alpha and Bravo. Now we say "in command" because you do not control any of the individuals within each team. Full Spectrum Warrior is what is known as a strategy shooter, something that hasn't really been done on a console before. It has all the elements of a real time strategy game, a tactical shooter and a third person action game but on its own is not really any of these. The game has been in the making for the best part of three years and was primarily designed for the US Army as a training simulator although the domestic version has been modified for the gaming audience. Rest assured, though - for what it's worth, the army version is also hidden on the disc.

A full spectrum warrior is a soldier that is trained to handle combat in all environments, and its the unique demands of urban team-based combat that the game is designed to simulate. It is your job to command your teams through a variety of objectives that are spread throughout the day starting from early morning. Before you send them into combat you must complete your own training which is spread over five missions and takes around an hour to complete. During this time you learn all the commands available to you and tactics used such as suppressing fire, flanking and utilising your soldiers' skills and weapons. Each team has four soldiers which consist of a team leader, rifleman, grenadier and an automatic rifleman. Throughout the game in both training and single-player (and co-operative) play there are two teams and occasionally a third, Charlie, which are under players' command.

Alpha and Bravo each have four members with the same skills, and each member can be selected at will by pressing in the allocated direction on the D-pad. The A and B face buttons are used to issue commands, with the X button used to select an area to shoot at. You cannot aim directly at an enemy and expect to hit him within the first few shots like an action game, so unfortunately this can occasionally cause frustration. Changing teams is done with the Y button and the white button allows you to report in for mission updates.

During each mission a map can be viewed via the team leader's PDA which is accessed with the black button. Occasionally you can call in for air support should you need it while most missions give you the option to call in for an aerial surveillance with the enemies' locations sent to your PDA. To move each unit to a designated area is done by moving the left analog stick which moves a formation diagram across the terrain and then pressing A to set the location to which the team will then move. There's a few other complex commands that can be issued and these are taught during the MOUT training.

As the game first starts, some of the commands can seem a little complex, but within a short while these become second nature. Although the training can be skipped if you wish to play co-operative play via Xbox Live, this is not recommended as there is no help available during the actual game and the death of your soldiers would come quickly and often.

The co-operative play is an excellent addition to the game. Two players join up on Xbox Live with the host commanding team Alpha, and the guest commanding team Bravo. Being able to play the whole game from beginning to end through co-op play is a feature not seen in too many Xbox titles. Sure, there's a few where you can play together selecting a certain map or stage, but Full Spectrum Warrior expands on that: each save point will record the co-op play and you can continue on from where you left off with either the same team mate or another player altogether. Unfortunately this feature is not available in the army version, which, as mentioned before, has been added as an extra feature.

The Army version has more options to change the difficulty of the game play from the amount of enemies featured to the adjustment of the wind, which can play havoc on the smoke grenades and how the smoke is deployed. It certainly adds a more tactical element to the game and is unfortunate that these options are not available in the normal co-op game. There are two difficulty levels available for the normal game mode and co-op, but these only really affect how many grenades you have at your disposal and the difficulty level of the AI.

The environment is represented well with haze effects in the horizon and heat waves causing distortion due to the climate. The streets are littered with objects which can be used as cover and most of these are destructable. Cars can become riddled with bullets, as well as other inanimate objects like couches, crates and barrels to name a few. The textures work well in the game and even though they don't push the Xbox's graphical capabilities, they do look up to the standard of the rest of the game. There are also some decent looking particle effects as bullets fly, rockets explode and grenades explode causing damage to buildings. Even the soldiers look the part and suit the game well with clipping only appearing when playing on Xbox Live, but this can be expected to help maintain an effective net code reducing the chance of lag. The only time this occurs is when soldiers run through each other; besides that everything else maintains its solidity.

Authentic sound effects and an excellent musical score accompany the action and really add to the atmosphere. As well as this, the communication between teammates can be humorous at times although be warned, there is some potentially offensive banter which cannot be filtered. Each of the characters comes across with his own personality, from an ex police officer called back to duty, to a gamer who spends all his pay on his car and upgrading his PC. Even his 'gamer speak' comes through occasionally which will no doubt be familiar to most players.

Full Spectrum Warrior does work well but there is also a few small problems which unfortunately can make for some annoying situations. These are mainly vision issues with the programming. Every now and then an enemy will be taking cover behind an object and even though to our eyes you can see his full body, none of the bullets hit unless you manage to outflank him into the open. This can make either team vulnerable and open to gunfire as they move away from cover. Another problem is the occasional unresponsiveness of the commands which will not be executed as quickly as one would like. This can also cause a premature death of one or a few of the soldiers.

The last issue we have found with the game is the occasional linearity of some of the levels. Despite being set in the middle of suburbia, there are not as many routes to take as we would have liked. There are times when the teams can be split up to take different paths but often such alternatives are not available. But for the size of the city, Gameplanet would like to have seen multiple paths available throughout each level.