Nerds That Geek Game Review – ‘Police Quest: SWAT’

Written by John Edward Betancourt 

​There comes a point where you can determine exactly when a franchise is heading into decline. There’s just a particular entry in said saga that doesn’t feel quite right, as if the powers that be simply didn’t put their hearts into it and every single entry past that point is going to be the same bland malaise that bores instead of exciting the audience and well, when it comes to the Police Quest saga, that moment arrived in 1995 with the release of the incredibly disappointing fifth entry in the series, Police Quest: SWAT.
 
Now, when this came out, I have to admit that I was extremely excited to try something new when it comes to this franchise. After all, SWAT officers and what they do is rarely explored outside of action films and considering the incredible job the other games did in taking us inside the mind and career of a Detective, I was expecting this particular game to just blow me away. Because the possibilities were endless storytelling wise and I couldn’t wait to see what wonders would unfold when I popped the first CD into my computer and well, that’s where my wonder with this game comes to an end.
 
Because quite frankly, the biggest issue I have with this game, is the sheer fact that is completely and utterly devoid of an actual story, and that hurts this game something fierce. Because quality storytelling, in combination with police procedure is what made this franchise so great, but here…we are treated to three little vignettes wherein SWAT is needed to diffuse the situation and that’s basically it. You go in, work with your team to bring an offender to justice and then just pitter around headquarters and the shooting range as you wait for a variant of those vignettes to cycle around again and that’s just plain boring.
 
Which quite frankly is a shame because this game has a lot of cool elements going for it. For starters, the full motion video was top notch at the time, providing the player with an immersive and interactive experience and the gameplay was unique as well since you had to learn how to learn properly use SWAT gestures and radio chatter to complete your mission and man, those awesome improvements to the game are simply wasted thanks to the weak calls that SWAT is sent to, and the sheer lack of a cohesive storyline and well, this truly did signal the end of the franchise.
 
Because past this point, the Police Quest saga evolved into something far more by the numbers since the next sequel was a real time strategy game and the third entry was nothing more than a first person shooter where procedure was merely an echo and I am aware that a SWAT 4 came out as well, one that was tied to the franchise’s illustrious past by featuring Sonny Bonds, but I didn’t even bother playing it. Because my love of this saga ended here, simply because it was obvious the franchise had nothing special left to give and that’s okay. Because nothing lasts forever, and I can always go back and play those first four fantastic games when I’m in need of a little trip down memory lane.    

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