The nice thing about the game is that, it can be run under Windows 3.x, Windows 95, and DOS. The whole thing is made up of four CD's. The first CD consists of the training that you have to take before going out on a real mission in town. When you will start your first mission, you will be asked to change CDs.
As you start playing the game for the first time, you will have three options: Start a New Career, Continue a Previous Career and change a series of options through the Control Panel. If you have any saved games then you can go ahead and choose a previous career. When joining the SWAT, an interactive movie will be presented in which two high rank officers will give you a briefing about what they expect from SWAT. During this briefing, useful information about the SWAT will be provided and you must listen carefully until it's finished. Try to press the Escape key to see what happens when you want to bypass the briefing!
You might start wondering what SWAT is all about... SWAT stands for Special Weapon and Tactics and is a special platoon made up of sixty police officers. This platoon, created in 1984 for the occasion of the Olympic Games, is a special force in which the members represent one percent of the Los Angeles's Police Force. In order to become a member of this elite group, you must follow the rules and act with other members as a team.
After the briefing, you will have a chance to investigate the room by clicking on items such as the billboard, TV and blackboard. If you click on the TV, then you can watch previously recorded interviews of other police officers. There is not much to read on the billboard, but on the blackboard there are several items of interest that can be read one by one. They give the information that every police officer needs to know. If, after a while, you get bored of reading, you can leave the room. There are three places where you can go and if you click on the wrong place, you will see a friend in an interactive movie warning you about where you should and shouldn't go.
It is in the Small Arms Range that you will learn how to shoot. If you investigate the first room carefully, you will discover the weapons you will use during the training and the different missions. It is vital to know what to use at what time. If you do not scrutinize the weapons carefully before going to training then you will be in trouble when the commander tells you to pull out a specific weapon for training purposes. More than that, it is not just the weapons that differ but also the bullets. For some riffles there are two types of bullets that are used differently, so you should be able to make a distinction between the two of them.
In the same place, you can also shoot at standing targets, but when you go to the Combat Range training, you must fire at moving targets which is of course harder and much more fun. You will have to be quick when shooting at moving targets as there is also the issue of reloading weapons. When practising with these guns, you are told by the commander to change weapons. If you want to quit it will be up to you. So when you feel that the training you have received is enough, then go for it and leave or you will be stuck in there and shoot forever. The next place to go as you exit is the Assaulter Briefing.
After all the necessary training is done, then you can go out on a real mission. Your first mission will have you dealing with a mad woman who appears to have gone crazy and is now armed with a gun. The goal of this mission is to sneak into the house and disarm the woman before she hurts or kills someone.
The interface of Police Quest SWAT no longer allows you to talk, examine objects, or give items like the previous episodes of the series. You only have a default arrow cursor, an inventory, the hand signal panel and movement cursors. The inventory contains your weapons and ammunition, your badge, etc... and it scrolls horizontally when you have more than four objects. The Hand Signals panel lets you communicate with your team mates with eight hand signals such as Hold, Look, Hurry and Stop. In the Room Entry panel, you will find the "Slicing the pie" command. This maneuver is used when you want to safely enter a room or round a corner. If you move your cursor over a place where you can use this command, the cursor will indicate you can do the move.
As you progress in the game and succeed in the various missions, you will qualify for promotions that will lead you to successively become an assaulter, a sniper and finally an element leader. Only then, will you be able to give orders through the LASH interface to your team and elaborate a strategy to solve the crisis.
486 DX-33 MHz or higher,
Min 8Mb memory,
MS-DOS 5.0 or later,
Hard drive required with 15MB free space,
Double speed CD-ROM drive or faster,
256 colors SVGA video graphic card,
Microsoft mouse and 100% compatibles.
All sound cards under Windows
100% Soundblaster; Pro Audio Spectrum; MS Sound System and compatible sound
cards for MS-DOS.
Windows 95 & Windows 3.1 compatible.
Technical Support: 206-644-4343
Fax: 206-644-7697
BBS Support: 206-644-0112
Hint Line: 1-900-370-5583 $.75 per minute
Canadian Hint Line: 1-900-451-3356 $1.25 per minute
Web site: www.sierra.com
See developers
In Europe:
In UK:
Sierra On-Line UK.,
4 Brewery Court, Theale,
Reading, Berkshire RG7 5AJ.
Technical Support: +44-(0)1734-303171
Fax: +44-(0)1734-303362
BBS: +44-(0)1734-304-227
Hintlines:
Coktel Vision,
Parc Tertiaire de Meudon,
Immeuble Le Newton,
25, rue Jeanne Braconnier,
92366 Meudon La Foret.
Technical Support: +33-1-46014650
Fax Support: +33-1-46317172
BBS: +33-1-46324290
Hintline - France only: 3668-4650 2.19FF per minute
In Germany:
Sierra-Coktel Deutschland,
Robert-Bosch. 32,
63303 Dreieich.
Technical Support: +49-6103-994040
Fax Support: +49-6103-994035
Hintline - Germany only: 0190-515616 0.23DM per 12 seconds.
In Spain:
Sierra-Coktel Espana,
Calle Tomas Redondo 11F,
Edificio Indo Building, Luarca,
28033 Madrid.
Overall: 86%
