Check out our video review:
The first Soldier of Fortune is one of my favorite shooters. It’s not a flawless game but I enjoy its action movie feel and over-the-top violence and gore. Good stuff. The graphic violence is the real draw of Soldier of Fortune and I would say it carries the game. In my opinion, it really helps enhance the gunplay and without it, it would probably be an average shooter. Soldier of Fortune was successful and was followed up by a sequel which I think I’ve invested more time into over the years. I know I’ve played through Soldier of Fortune II numerous times before and remember enjoying it every time. The story puts the player back into the shoes of mercenary John Mullins as he engages terrorists linked to biological warfare.
Developed by Raven Software and published by Activision, Soldier of Fortune II: Double Helix was released for PC in May, 2002, and Xbox in June, 2003. For this review, I played the PC version. I did consult the game’s PCGamingWiki page before playing to see what I would need to do to get it running properly on a modern system. I downloaded and installed Sui’s Fix which allows for more resolutions, the field of view to scale properly, and comes with a HUD cropping fix. It should be noted the fix requires the Gold Edition which, as of this review, can be acquired from GOG and only works for single player.
The story of Soldier of Fortune II centers on biological warfare. The organization called The Shop sends John Mullins to Colombia to investigate a viral outbreak. He learns its connected to a terrorist organization called Prometheus and as he travels around the world trying to stop them, he learns that a mole inside The Shop may be feeding the terrorists information. Much like the first game, Soldier of Fortune II feels like an action movie in video game form and it’s the kind of movie I’m watching for the action and not the narrative. But I don’t hate the plot. My only major gripe with it is that the villains aren’t given enough attention and they’re not as cartoonishly evil as those in the previous game. In Soldier of Fortune, John and Hawk are portrayed as the take-no-prisoners type of heroes and the villains are portrayed as hammy evil scum. I like that contrast and Soldier of Fortune II just doesn’t do it in the same way.
Over the years, I’ve discovered that some people have a real hate boner for Soldier of Fortune II. I’ve always enjoyed this game but this time I went into it with a more let’s call it open mind. I can honestly say that this time I left it understanding some of the complaints but I still had fun. It does feel a little rushed, stealth is poorly implemented, and when compared to the first game, it definitely feels slower paced. My research tells me the game was designed to be more realistic and tactical and I’ve seen posts from players indicating the same thing. I think we need to define “tactical” because I do not consider Soldier of Fortune II to be a tactical shooter. The early Rainbow Six titles are tactical shooter. The first Ghost Recon is a tactical shooter. SWAT 3 and 4 are tactical shooters. Soldier of Fortune II is primarily a run and gun shooter.
As of this review, if you type “define tactical” in Google, it will come back with the following definition; relating to or constituting actions carefully planned to gain a specific military end. I think “carefully planned” is the key part of that definition and I can’t say I carefully planned anything in Soldier of Fortune II. No more planning than what I would do in any other run and gun shooter, anyway. I ran through the environments and blew away the bad guys that appeared. Sometimes I was given the option to take a stealthy approach but I can’t say there was a lot of planning involved. Much like the first game, you can outfit John with weapons and equipment before jumping into missions and more is unlocked as you progress through the story and some weapons can be equipped with attachments.
There’s all kinds of firepower in Soldier of Fortune II and the gunplay proves to be extremely satisfying thanks to the gore effects. You can once again blow off people’s heads and limbs, bodies will show visible wounds, people will scream and groan in agony as they die, some will choke and gurgle on what I assume is their own blood, blood will splatter on walls and surfaces, pools of blood will form under dead bodies, and blowing up bodies will often result in a mess of guts. All great stuff. The death animations are scripted and most look cool but bodies will often get stuck in weird poses.
Like the first game, Soldier of Fortune II comes with multiple difficulty levels and the one you choose will dictate certain things like the number of saves per mission or area and carrying capacity. You can also configure these options in the game’s custom difficulty level which is what I did after getting through the game’s forced stealth sequence in the beginning of the campaign. After that, I wanted unlimited saves.
As for the stealth sequence, you must navigate around a train station without being detected by enemies. It’s really not that challenging but there’s a very specific way to progress through the area and that’s my issue with it. How specific it is. To remain undetected in this scenario, you can avoid and kill enemies. The quietest weapon I had at this point was the knife. However, if you don’t kill the foes in one strike, the alarm goes off and you fail. If they see you, you fail. If you shoot them, you fail. It’s horrible trial and error but I can’t say it’s difficult. Just tedious. It’s not fun. Funnily enough, other than gunfire, the enemies don’t seem to be sensitive to other noises like you make running around behind them. In fact, the foes are positioned in very specific spots, facing very specific directions, and some walk along very specific paths so it’s not hard to see exactly what you need to do. You just need to make sure you drop them in one strike. Luckily, you’re never forced to be stealthy again. You will sometimes be given opportunities to sneak but I rarely got far with that approach. Still, it’s nice to have the option.
A couple of things I noticed pretty early on is that Soldier of Fortune II is slower paced and, in my experience, more challenging than the first game. Things do slow down to convey story beats, sometimes for significant stretches. There are sequences where John has to simply move from A to B and another where he follows someone, and these are followed by cut scenes. Luckily, the game doesn’t slow down too often. Much of the gameplay has you running and gunning and it’s often wise to approach areas with some caution, especially on higher difficulty levels. You’ll always be outnumbered and some enemies can drop you pretty quick if you’re not careful. Enemies can also be grenade happy which I found to be annoying during certain missions. Grenades will often land at your feet but the enemy AI isn’t the brightest and I found that they frequently blow themselves and each other up with their own grenades.
Soldier of Fortune II does see the return of the Personal Audio Detection Device (P.A.D.D.) which appears on the HUD and as far as I can tell, it serves the same purpose as before. It shows how much noise you’re making and once again, the Tutorial claims the more noise you make, the easier it is for enemies to find you. In the first game, that meant additional enemies spawning in and I took it as the explanation for the enemies that would sometimes appear behind me. I assume it’s the same thing here but I was loud for most of my playthrough and can honestly say I didn’t encounter too many instances where enemies spawned behind me. It definitely wasn’t as often as that of the first game at least. Interestingly enough, the P.A.D.D. could have actually been more useful here if the stealth was better implemented, if there was more to it. But as things are, I still think it’s unnecessary.
I would say the beginning of the game is the worst part of it. Soldier of Fortune II really shines when you’re running and gunning. Even with the slower-paced gameplay than its predecessor, I feel Soldier of Fortune II is still a good time, overall. But the beginning is where the forced stealth sequence is and where the Colombia areas are and several of those suck in my opinion. I don’t know if the areas are trying to encourage stealth but I tried sneaking at one point and failed so I resorted to blasting. The first set of areas in Colombia have you moving along paths populated with foes but the foliage can make it hard to see where enemies are and some sections don’t have a lot of options for cover so you’re just an easy target.
This is one mission where enemy grenades can be a problem mainly because you can’t easily see them if you’re not paying attention and all the gunfire can sometimes make it difficult to hear the sounds of them bouncing or hitting the ground. You also have to contend with enemies at gun emplacements, trip wires, and a helicopter at one point. Eventually, you meet up with friendly soldiers and must accompany them through the jungle and a rebel encampment. Outside of them taking their sweet ass time to move, I would say this is where things really start to pick up and the rest of the campaign is pretty great in my opinion. I normally like jungle-themed areas and missions in games but the Colombia mission here can be frustrating and I would even say it acts as a difficulty spike.
After those early Colombia areas, it was pretty much smooth sailing. I found the mission set at the airport in Switzerland, near the end of the game, to be tougher than most of the missions that came before it and even the one after it but I still found it more enjoyable than the Colombia mission. Soldier of Fortune II takes you to multiple locations around the world and in my opinion, it puts you in some pretty cool scenarios. You’ll infiltrate a mansion and shoot your way through it and this is one sequence where you’re given the option to sneak. There’s another mission later in the game where you have to fight your way through a hospital as enemies come rappelling down ropes and crashing through windows. You’ll also get to blast your way through a hotel in Prague, the streets of Hong Kong, and scuttle a cargo ship on the Atlantic Ocean. There are actual set pieces in the game, although they’re pretty basic. You’ll ride in a truck and defend it from attackers and gun down foes from a helicopter.
Just like the previous game, the environments appear to be designed in a way so they reflect realistic looking locations and settings. Each major location the game takes you to does look and feel different and missions consist of multiple areas separated by load points. You can use equipment like thermal and night vision goggles for better visibility in certain environments and you will have to interact with things and pick locks from time to time to progress. I did get lost or stuck a few times, unsure of what to do or where to go, and it was usually because I missed something. Other than those few instances, I can’t say it was ever hard to figure out how to proceed. The environments are populated with plenty of foes to shoot and the enemy models reflect the different factions you battle but all enemies seem to behave the same as far as I can tell. As I indicated earlier, the enemy AI isn’t always the brightest. They do the basics like run around, shoot, and throw grenades. You’ll spill a lot of blood and blow off a lot of limbs on your adventure in typical Soldier of Fortune fashion.
In addition to the campaign and multiplayer is the Random Mission Generator. It comes with multiple mission types to select from and you can configure different conditions like the location, time of day, difficulty, and if you want to play with a time limit and the option to select your own weapons and equipment. You can generate different seeds which translate to different map layouts but, unfortunately, they all kind of feel the same. Furthermore, the maps look bland with buildings, objects, and structures that are randomly placed about as expected from a mode like this but they typically look out of place. Not everything looks like it fits in.
The maps are always populated with enemies and a lot of areas are just empty space so you’re wide open much of the time and will often be attacked from multiple directions and if the mission is set at night it can be hard to locate snipers. Nevertheless, I do think the Random Mission Generator is a wonderful idea. The concept is cool. The mission types include assassination, infiltration, escape, and demolition and you are ranked at the end of each mission and can even earn awards. The Random Mission Generator can be fun if you enjoy Soldier of Fortune II’s brand of action and can get passed the fact that the entire mode feels unpolished and unfinished.
Visually, I think Soldier of Fortune II looks pretty good for its time. It appears to be aiming for a more realistic look than its predecessor and I would say it mostly succeeds. Character models are not as bulky and the gore effects, while excellent, don’t look as cartoony if that makes sense. The game features pretty good environmental variety but I do think some areas look a little bland, specifically certain areas in Colombia. Some of the enemy animations can also appear a little wonky from time to time. On the audio side, I think most of the weapons sound great and once again, I enjoyed listening to the groans and screams of dying enemies. I can’t say the music is anything special. The soundtrack does kind of add a cinematic quality to the action but I can’t say any of the tunes really stood out to me. On the technical side, the game ran fine and I encountered no major issues.
I’m actually a big fan of Soldier of Fortune II. I know there are some players out there that really dislike it and I think I might be in the minority that prefers it over the first game. But playing it now, I can understand why some are disappointed with it. It’s definitely not as polished as the first game and some ideas are clearly not fleshed out enough. Parts of the game do feel unfinished. But despite that, I still enjoy it. I love the action, I love the gore, and I love the tone and atmosphere. I love the action movie feel of it and the scenarios the game puts you in. The beginning of the campaign can be a little rough but I love the rest of it and the Random Mission Generator is a disappointment for me and that’s only because I really love the idea, the concept. It does add some replay value to the single player experience but it’s a shame it feels so bland and unpolished. As much as I enjoy Soldier of Fortune II, I definitely feel it should have spent more time in the oven. If the developers fleshed out some ideas more, fixed some of the oddities, and tweaked some things, I have no doubt it would have turned out even better.
I would absolutely recommend Soldier of Fortune II. It’s got issues but it’s not a terrible game. The action is fun and the violence is over-the-top. In today’s world, there’s a lot of violent and gory games to choose from but I still say there’s nothing quite like the first two Soldier of Fortune titles. At least not that I’ve played. It’s the combination of the action movie feel and graphic violence. Those two things gel great together and make for a very fun experience. That said, they’re not perfect games and Soldier of Fortune II does feel unpolished but if you can get passed that, I think you’ll have a great time with it. Definitely check it out.