Graphics:

Warhawk looks pretty amazing on a HD TV. I play on a 42" Plasma HDTV and the detail is pretty awesome. The games level designs are nice and polished. And as I stated before they are huge. Warhawk has some of the best water effects on the Playstation 3 (or any system at that). You can see every ripple and wave as you fly over it with your Warhawk and when the sun just hits it and reflects off of it you’ll be pretty much be saying "damn that looks good". The skies in Warhawk look good as well. In some spots there are dense clouds that you can fly into and take cover, making it harder for someone on the ground to spot you. Each level is covered in detail... from bushes and shrub to bridges, hills and valleys. The game is lush in environmental detail. Some spots do look a bit plain though. I was not too crazy about the sky map. Some parts look good, but the fog below the city gives me N64 flashbacks of Turok. You can pretty much go anywhere you want on each level. At a point you will hit a "danger zone" which is the end of the map and your life will suck away and you’ll die if you do not return to the safe zone. I did find that there are some spots that you cannot land your Warhawk and get out. But they are basically high up on mountain tops. Textures look very good as well. There are a good use of brown and orange colors in the game though. It gives the feeling of rust and darkness on some levels. Vehicles also look good and are designed pretty slick. Gaining higher levels and having the options to re-edit your Warhawk’s paintjob is fun. Some of the new paintjobs simply kick ass. I have a new paint job that has large painted teeth (almost like shark teeth) on the front of my Warhawk. Once you hop into the Warhawk while playing online the paint job automatically changes to the one you have edited.

While Warhawk does look great on a HD set, the game looks "ok" on a standard TV. You will see a huge loss in terms of detail but if you are stuck on playing your Playstation 3 on a standard TV it will not hamper you while you are playing. It basically just will not look as good. From what I understand Warhawk runs at 720p on a HDTV. I also have a bit to say about the games characters. The start off character design is my only gripe about the game. The characters in Warhawk are of cartoon quality. They look good and and animate good as well. But when you start out on Warhawk you only have a choice of one design per race. And I just did not like the way your character looked. You wear some really cheesy samuri get-up that makes you look like a space-aged village people reject. Thankfully once you level up you gain access to more costumes and looks for your character. Warhawk moves at a nice, fixed framerate as well. I have played with up to 31 other players online and I have not experienced any framerate drop or lag at all. Everything moves as smooth as silk online.  Overall the graphics in Warhawk look great. It has it’s own style and I will say that the graphics are different and unique. It does not show the true power of the Playstation 3 system but it still does the job and manages to give you some nice eye candy in some spots, especially if you are playing the game on a HDTV. Playing the game with 31 other players online is proof of that... its pretty fun and wild to watch.

Music and Sound:

While there really is not much to say about the music for a game thats pretty much just online, the little bit of music that does play in th egame is pretty good. Warhawk features a pumping war score that reminds me something along the lines of Saving Private Ryan or music from games like Call of Duty 3 and Medal of Honor Airborne. The sounds of the game are also top-notch. When you hop into a Warhawk the engine roars and pumps. Vehicles and weapons sound like their real-life counterparts. Your Warhawk has muiltiple sounds. When you are in hover mode it sounds like a harrier jet. Once you put on the engines you are blasting through the sky with deep roaring thunderous sounds.

There are no voices or voice-acting in the game, basically the only voices that you will hear are the ones of your team mates. This is where I have kind of a problem. In order to speak on your headsets you have to hold down the L3 Button. I have found that this kind of makes each match silent. Because either nobody wants to push the button or they just do not know that you have to push the button. The problem lies on when you are moving around or flying in a Warhawk. You use the right analog stick to move, and when your in the heat of battle and your ass is on fire from a missle from the ground the last thing you are thinking is having to push that damn button to speak and call out for help from your team mates. I am hoping that the developers fix this down the road. Either move the button or just take it out and have people able to speak freely without holding down a damn button. I know this is not my only gripe because I read the forums over at the official playstation site and other people are complaining about it.  Overall the sounds and music in Warhawk is solid. From what I understand the developers are working on a 1.1 and a 1.2 patch for the game. They are working hard to fix some of the issues I talked about. Hopefully they will fix the voice chat problem as well.

The Bottom Line:

I have to shake my head at how this game has recieved little press and mediocre review scores. I am deep in this game, loving every minute of it online. Warhawk may not be as deep as Halo 3 online but it has it’s own little goodies that will keep you interested. The graphics are very good and the gameplay is off the charts. Having the ability to pretty much do whatever you wish to do and use what weapon you want to at any time is pretty cool. Warhawk also has some intense battles with up to 32 players online at once. Not too shabby if you ask me...

If you own a Playstation 3 you need to own Warhawk. It is a must-have title for the system...

[Review by Sean Foster]