Homefront is looking pretty damn good based on early impressions and information leaked onto the web. But for about $10 (or $7 from www.ozgameshop.com and free postage) you can easily get your hands on developer Kaos Studios previous game, an underappreciated little gem called Frontlines.

And no, it’s not a game about armies of fleas and ticks going to war on the dwindling resources of a dogs back surrounded by a deadly chemical cloud of Frontline, although that’s not a bad metaphor for what the games actually about. Also that’s a pretty damn good idea for a game; the ticks could be mobile command stations! Come on Ubisoft, my resume’s in your files, I’m crapping nuggets of gold here!

With enough people playing the action can get pretty intense

It’s the end of the world; resources have dwindled to crisis limits. To enrich the remaining years of earths last generations an incredible peace and tranquillity has settled over the earth…

Just kidding! We’re going to spend all our time killing each other over the last barrels of crude while everyone starves to death. Yay, humanism! It’s the western nations in the blue corner (us) against the mysterious and cruel eastern nations in the red corner (them). The winner gets to drive their sports car around then starve to death, the loser just gets to starve.

Much like Battlefield a skilled vehicle user can be nightmare, an unskilled pilot just a big loud target

The game plays very similar to a futuristic version of Battlefield 2. Combat is class based with familiar sniper and special forces class types mixing it up with more interesting classes like drone troops who can control mini remote helicopters and tanks that can be used for scouting and marking enemies in the field or offensive tasks like dropping explosives. Watching futuristic soldiers firing wildly at toy helicopters can be pretty damn amusing. There are plenty of vehicles to play with too including jeeps, tanks, boats, helicopters and jets.

The real stand out feature of Frontlines is the frontline mechanic. An actual line down the middle of your minimap cutting across the objectives that need to be captured or destroyed to advance it. This keeps the combat tight and focused and moving the frontline forwards unlocks handy things like new vehicle spawns for the leading team.

The mini remote controlled weapons in Frontlines are oodles of fun, just remember you're a sitting duck when you're using them

There were once dedicated servers that allowed as many as 50 players to lock horns oline. But I’m unsure if they’re still around. Private hosting is the fallback option but this only allows for about 20 players in a game. Not that this is a big deal, you’re unlikely to find enough people for a good game online tonight. I bought the game at release and the poor support for online play among players was an early death bell for Frontlines.

Thankfully the game has a surprisingly robust single player campaign that has all the same elements of the multiplayer. There’s some good missions in there and good fun to be had.

Go! Get the choppa! Oh wait, suddenly this extraction isn't looking so hopeful

I’m not even going to try and argue Frontlines is the equal of a Call of Duty or Bad Company 2 (better than Medal of Honour though), because it’s just not. It’s an older game made by some dedicated individuals on a small budget. But it’s definitely a game worth playing if you’re a fan of the genre and hey… seven, measly, dollars. My daily train fare is more than that!