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CT Special Forces is a fairly unique platform/shooter game with many familiar elements reminiscent of existing games. In CT Special Forces, the player takes control of one of three elite warriors: an urban combat specialist, a jungle warfare expert, or an attack helicopter pilot. Players take these men into combat across four levels each with three separate (and lengthy) areas to battle across. Mission goals include hostage rescue, the capture of important enemy leaders, and, of course, elimination of all who would oppose peace. Besides the side-scrolling platform/shooter levels, scattered throughout CT Special Forces' levels are downwards-scrolling flight/shooter levels as well as sniping missions.

The core of CT Special Forces is its side-scrolling levels. Unfortunately, these are not terribly good. There are generally only four types of foes you run into: Running guy with gun, standing guy with gun, guy with sniper rifle/mortar, and guy with car. They are very sporadic and are not terribly aggressive. Combat involves just dodging the bullets until you get an opening and blasting your opponents. The existence of different ammunition-dependant weapons doesn’t add as much variety as one would think. You burn through the machine guns in moments, the flamethrower has a range of about 2 feet and can’t be used while moving, and the missiles are so rare that you see them maybe 4 times in the whole game. On top of all this, the areas where you have to stand still and blast your way past a stationary object are needlessly time consuming.

The Helicopter levels manage to be the most frustrating and pointless aspect of CT Special Forces. You attack other helicopters with your guns and attack tanks and S.A.M. launchers with bombs. The problem? You can’t possibly shoot at enemy choppers without being shot in turn, and the bombs have a forward range of zero, forcing you to sit on top of the target when you release. To top it off, there is absolutely NO incentive to destroy any of the targets; no points, no required number of kills to clear, no nothing! I found it easier to just focus on not being shot than to try and kill anything.

Of the three modes of play, the sniper missions are the most fun. Players are required to shoot down a certain number of terrorists and rescue all the hostages, all while being shot at and within a certain allotted time. Unfortunately, these pleasant distractions from the main game are sparse, and no more inventive or challenging than any of the hundreds of flash games like it on the Internet.

It is impossible for a game’s visuals to make up for mediocre gameplay, but Hip Interactive tried their hardest to make CT Special Forces an exception to this rule. All of the character animations in each game mode of CT Special Forces are fluid and detailed. Shells eject from magazines, soldiers slump to the ground when shot and explosions are easily on par with any of the Metal Slug games. Also, despite being a platform game, the environments and backgrounds manage to remain diverse and fit the theme of each level nicely.

Unlike its graphics, however, CT Special Forces' sounds and controls are rudimentary at best. Tanks, helicopters, AK-47s, MP5s and Miniguns all use the same gunshot sound. The death cries of your enemies feel like they came from games over a decade old. And the game’s music is just noise in the background to fill the gaps between gunshots. CT Special Forces controls are sharp and responsive, but with a platform/shooter, they can’t help be anything but.

Despite having very appealing visuals and a unique gameplay approach, CT Special Forces is just another mediocre platform/shooter out of dozens on the shelf of your local game retailer. For the die-hard fans of the genre, wait for CT Special Forces 2 CT Special Forces 2 and skip this failed attempt at emulating Metal Slug.