Watching games companies step around tense political issues is akin to watching an elephant trying to sleep on a hammock made out of cling wrap. If they aren't wiping skyscrapers out of Spider Man games, they're inventing the cheesiest premise and bad guys so they don't offend anyone.

That's why despite their middle-of-the-road gameplay, the Conflict... series have always been welcome. Here was a series that said "screw your tree hugging hippy crap, we're gonna kill us boys some Eye-Raqis." Well it did, back in the day. Now it too has fallen prey to "lurid b-grade scenario"-osis as well, and not just because the name was changed from the much more inspiring "Global Terror" to "Global Storm".

Try this on for size. Your once stalwart team of gulf war vets are now going up against Nazis based out of South America. The swine! It's a safe punt cos everyone hates Nazis, yo. Nazis and drug dealers, the ever dependable, guilt free solution to all your bad guy needs. And Taureans of course.

It's good in a way, because if there was some thoughtful scenario constructed based on real time affairs, it might have given one pause to consider buying this game. But the silly plot just makes it easier to pinpoint the many faults with the game.

For starters, it remains a console game ported to PC. It's blindingly obvious, mainly because Eidos' developers, Pivotal Games, really didn't make much of an effort to clean its act up. From a control standpoint, it's way too simple. Not elegant simple, just simple to do stuff with a mouse that would normally be more challenging with a controller. So it is easier.

When you see the game in action, squad at the ready, you could be mistaken for thinking "wow... this looks like Full Spectrum Warrior, only better and more interactive". Wrong. Yes, you have a lot more freedom of action, but any tactical claims you think the game might have quickly degenerate in a welter of arcadey bloodshed and carnage. Your squad are there, and do a decent job of diverting fire, but in reality, they become background decoration, as the game encourages you to tunnel vision Rambo your way through engagements. Because the mouse makes aiming a lot more precise, this is quite easy to do. Grr.

Troop AI - despite developers brags to the contrary - is nothing special. It's not as unsubtle as say, Serious Sam folks running straight toward you, but it's not far off. And at least the baddies in Croteam's cult classic do it with some style. Your own troops are passive way too often, and unless you're willing to hold their hand and issue a constant stream of instructions (and maybe encouragement... perhaps that's what I was missing) they seem quite content to hang around in your general vicinity and soak up a few bullets. Kind of like your teammates in Battlefield 2.

Okay, so Conflict: Global Storm doesn't have any massive showstopping errors or bugs in it. And yes, it doesn't look so bad you need a pooper scooper handy. But it's uninspired and dated gameplay, and the worst kind of console port - the one where it's shovelled out as an afterthought. Too easy for PC gamers. Too dumb for tactical gamers. Too pointless for fast action players. Too bad.