War! What is it good for? Well, if you look at the shelves of your local games emporium, it’s good for selling lots and lots of war based games. Into this already overcrowded arena comes Tiny Troopers: Joint Ops for the PS4, where you take on the form of diminutive soldiers, blowing the porgies out of the opposition, mainly in a Middle East environment. You will engage in many differing operations from escort to intelligence gathering as you work your way through the campaigns.

The single player gaming controls take a little time to get to grips with; the joystick control both the direction that your troops will move in - you can have up to four at any one time - and the direction of their bullets. Movement is via the left stick and fire by the right, after a while it becomes untenable to just rush the opposition, but careful manipulation of the two sticks and you will find that your can strafe the enemy and even walk in circles, firing all the time and staying out of their slower line of fire. You will also get access to both rockets and grenades for taking out larger targets but I found the way this was done meant my guys often had to stand still whilst I aimed, quickly turning them into cannon fodder.

The menu has a number of things to explore. The gallery lets you re-watch any introductory animations you may have unlocked. The game is released over multiple platforms, so there is an option to cross save your game, allowing to play on the move with your Vita and then transferring your progress to the PS4, it also works the other way around. In the options menu you can turn off both the vocals and the music, personally, whilst the music was on the militaristic, jolly side it soon became repetitious. There are three play modes, the tutorial, the single soldier campaign and the Spec Ops Campaign.

Boot the game up and you start with very few men and not particularly impressive firepower, this is not a problem as during play you will collect dog tags, medals (which revive fallen comrades) and points (which can all go towards either making your soldiers harder by buying them better equipment, or you can save your points on extra manpower, although be warned these guys often only join you for the next mission and can be a little on the expensive side).

The tone of the game is light and the environments are a combination of open spaces and narrow passages, these can be tricky if you lose the focus on getting all of your squad through. This can also become an issue with some of the buildings and trees, leaving part of your squad stranded. This focus on the squad also has consequences for combat. Your guys move all together and so present a temptingly large target, focus too much on one character and your likely to find the other three have been shot.

There is never a chance you will not know where you are supposed to be heading as the game provides a pointer. It’s not a very long game, but it is inexpensive and each of the levels will take you between five and ten minutes to complete and the squad you tenderly nurse to uber strength can be played in ether of the campaigns.

Although the game appears on the PS4, elements of the shading betray its origins as a mobile game, not so much it would spoil your enjoyment and I guess as the game had to have a continuity of look and feel across the Vita, PS3 and PS4, it was the PS4 version which would suffer the most.

Overall it’s a fun game and certainly worth considering if you have a Vita as well as your main console.

7

Charles Packer