Published by Microsoft
Reviewed by iceVic on 9/26/00

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First Impressions:

Graphics:

An engine that functions: Allegiance is a beautiful game. The ships all have a sleek look to them and the colored lighting appears accurately with weapon firing and signal lights. More importantly, Allegiance's graphic engine is designed to handle large area combat without losing frame rate or causing slowdowns. With dozens of players and stationary objects on the same screen, Allegiance still runs smoothly. It is indeed designed with functionality in mind. The game's wormholes look especially good and life-like. Whirlpoolesque and slowly revolving, players who enter it will be treated with a "warping effect" like in Star Trek, very engaging.

Colorful feat: Even though Allegiance has a fictional setting, most of its storyline and side stories are seriously constructed. But in the actual world of Allegiance, many ships are too brightly colored and that takes a bit of seriousness out of the gameplay. Maybe that is what intended by the developers, but I find it contrasting with the game's setting.

Sound/Music:

Allegiance's sound effects are good and functional, but not too impressive. Weapon fire can be accurately reflected by positional-capable sound systems, but I find most of them too generic. Energy weapons have their generic sound found in many games, and ammo based weapons too are suffering from the over-used "auto cannon" sound. Compare to Freespace 2's sound effects, Allegiance is just average.

Allegiance's music is CD-based and in menu only, so playing music will have the CD playing forever and cause minor "pauses" when a track has to be repeated. During the game, the music won't be available. Even though players can only hear the music in game menus, it is still appropriately done and fits the theme.

Gameplay:

C&C in Space

Game Basics: Allegiance is a Command and Conquer-type strategy game set in space. There would be a commander to oversee the entire operation for each team from a top down view of the entire battlefield, and players can get into scouts to reveal enemy ships and activities in first person ship view. More importantly, each game map consists a net of connected systems that can be traveled to via space wormholes called alephs. When the game starts, each team finds itself in its home system. By traveling through the alephs, more systems are revealed, and eventually that leads to the discovery and engagement of the two teams.

For each system, there are different types of asteroids that can be harvested or have structures built upon them. By harvesting the resource rich Helium3 asteroids using AI controlled miners, a commander can accumulate credits to build space stations or shipyards on other asteroids. At the beginning of the each game, "scout" is the only ship type available, but by constructing different space stations or research facilities, a commander can advance on the technology tree to discover more powerful crafts and weapons for players to use. Different winning conditions can be set for territorial control, financial domination, or clear-cut total destruction of the opposing team.

Mayday! I am lagged: Server-side lag is another issue that happened more often in the free zone than the Allegiance Zone. Sometimes the server's signals seem to be way delayed so that none of the players can play the game properly. Players might find themselves back to the location where they were minutes ago, only to realize their recent progress were only client-sided. Thankfully, this doesn't happen too often.

Enjoyment:

In order for a player to enjoy Allegiance, that player should have a good connection to the Internet since it is a multiplayer-only game. Players with noisy phone lines would experience lag (pauses during gameplay because of interrupts during data transmission) on in the game and that can bring some not so enjoyable experiences. Before buying this game, gamers should play some other free multiplayer action games to see if their line is clear of line noise caused lag. If there is line noise, contact the local phone company to have the problem checked (FCC require phone companies to maintain a certain level of line quality for their customers).

On the other hand, other player's dedication to their team can affect the total enjoyment. Incompetent commanders sometimes can leave the field pilots without good advice or guidance; team members might disobey order to reinforce a heated engagement. But if playing with a group of responsible and experienced players, very rewarding gaming experiences can be enjoyed and much fun and joy can be found within. Memorable moments such as a skillful bomber turret gunner who shot down multiple enemy crafts while the pilot perform tricky maneuvers to ensure a successful bombing run, or crew of a cruiser yell out "YEEE HAH" after winning a head to head gunnery engagement against an enemy capital ship are all priceless. Group efforts can be felt and cherished during the playing of Allegiance. Also, pilot interaction is not as much compare to other online only games such as Everquest, since Allegiance is solely a mission based action game and it is no different than other online action games. So if players want to enjoy relaxing social meetings, this game is not for you.

Bottom line: game enjoyment depends on the people who play the game and the quality of players' Internet connection, and action fans would certainly enjoy it.

Multiplayer:

Teamwork: Allegiance is truly a team-oriented multiplayer game. Seasoned team members would fly in different types of ships in groups to enhance their survivability and firepower. In many games there are fake offensive and flanking maneuvers, all put together by good teamwork and a competent commander. Simple voice message can be triggered by short key commands or be typed to designated recipients (to the entire capital ship where the player is commanding a turret, to that player's team, system where located, or to all players). Bombers and capital ships have multiple turret mounts that can let players control them to fend off multiple targets and let the pilot concentrate on flying. Also, winning and losing is highly dependent on the commander's ability to unify a loose line of pilots into an assault spearhead, as that person is the sole overseer that can view the entire map with C&C style top down view and assign players to perform duties with simple point and click interface. With incompetent commanders team members would certainly fight by their own instincts like a pack of loose cannons, but a good commander can pull off multi-front assault via different wormhole entries and calculated ambushes by giving field pilots more direct orders. Taking part in a well-organized assault is certainly enjoyable.

Special Note: Allegiance is multiplayer only, as its single-player portion only consists of training tutorials.

Overall Impression:

Allegiance to whom: Allegiance is a fine game indeed, it is a social experience and can be fun for hours or just minutes in short games. But by creating a good gaming environment and team interactivity, the factions which team members must pledge allegiance to are too similar and are outshined by the bond between field pilots and the commander. Most of the time, players experience the feeling of pledging allegiance to none of the factions but fighting for the team's immediate commander.

The maps where the conflicts take part are randomly generated and too self contained. There are only asteroid rocks, wormholes, and vast space. There isn't any planets or civilian territories to enhance the feeling of fighting for any factions or a larger conflict on the background. This empty feeling exists even on the Allegiance zone, where scripted events are launched constantly. They too have a "self-contained" feel and are like individual tournaments instead of part of a larger conflict.

Notes: Allegiance's enjoyment highly depends on the Internet connection players have. A 56k with minimum line noise can perform just as well for a player as a cable modem. Also, this is a space strategy multiplayer game, and a good commander is essential to one's enjoyment.

Marketing Efforts Towards Women:

Allegiance's marketing effort has been neutral toward both men and women. In many of the game's advertisements, ships are presented in space combat with faceless pilots. In fact there is few pilots shown in the game other than the spacecrafts they fly. (see top graphic to the right) Interestingly, I found a number of female players playing Allegiance (or a number of male players playing under female names and voices) online. Basically, Allegiance is a game that markets itself toward the general space-opera audience, who want to become wing commanders themselves.

Cheats, Hints & URLs:

Note: for more information, check out www.planetallegiance.com and Allegiance's official site, www.microsoft.com/games/allegiance/home.htm.