REVIEW: Firefighting Simulator - The Squad


Title	Firefighting Simulator – The Squad
Developer	Chronos Unterhaltungssoftware
Publisher	astragon Entertainment
Release Date	November 17th, 2020
Genre	Simulation
Platform	PC
Age Rating	N/A
Official Website

I started firefighting as a junior firefighter at the age of 15 way back in 1989 and retired from firefighting at the age of 43. I grew up playing games on the Atari, like Pac-Man, and Donkey Kong, and I have progressed into playing Steam games on my PC .I have been searching for years for a realistic firefighting game or simulator and, until I saw this game, I haven’t really found anything realistic enough. Sure, there was the game on the Wii way back when, but come on, that game was boring and didn’t have very many interactive qualities.

Firefighting is, in my opinion, very unpredictable. You don’t know what will happen next, and no two calls are alike, just like in this game. Sure, if you progress through the calls, you will find some of the houses are similar and set up the same, but, I don’t think any situation on each call is the same. I enjoyed driving to the scene, getting to use the air horn and the sirens. That was fun, even though the camera angles were tough and made it hard to see the cars in front of you sometimes. I felt as though I was fighting with that throughout driving. I also still can not figure out how to configure my steering wheel to the game without it acting weird. So please, by all means, if anyone knows how to do this, let me know in the comments below.

Once you arrive on scene, there is a spot marked for you to park, and with no “stop” button, you end up moving back and forward a few times to get into the correct position. In my personal opinion, I would like the option as to where to park the rig if I wanted the truck right in front of the house or building.

Next, one of the firefighters on your crew will do a 360-degree check, which is, again, something always done for a real fire. I would always grab a crowbar and go to the front door, and any other doors, to make sure they were open. With that task done, I would command the green or tan crew member to make the save and then go around busting out windows while looking for victims. Sometimes, you need to make your way around the houses to open the back door or try and shut off the electricity to the house, depending on the type of fire you are dealing with. Once I did this, I would run back to the rig and have the green and tan crew members grab hand lines so they could go back in and fight some fire. While they were doing that, I would double check for any victims and once this was achieved it will say all victims rescued, and then you can grab a hand line and help fight the fire, or “quench it,” as the game says.

Controlling the crew members is sometimes a daunting task, as they will stand there in your way doing nothing. You can move them and point them to a victim or to the fire, as long as they have a hand line. If they have an extinguisher, you can forget about it. I never did get them to use one correctly.

A problem I had is using the ladder truck and the tower truck controls. It was hard to use them, maybe with more practice I will get better at it, but I do have over 50 hours in so far. For now, I mainly use the engine. I feel as though the rigs were set up pretty well, but, I would like, maybe, the option to set up or customize your rig and set them up how you would like to. And, while were on that subject, maybe even paint your own rig and customize it how you would like hint hint maybe add a Federal Q and an air horn. (that would be awesome!)

As far as the visuals go, the rigs are pretty realistic as far as turning corners and swerving thru traffic. The fire itself is also realistic. The sounds of the truck are pretty on par with what you would expect. The siren and air horn remind me of electronic sirens, I’d like to hear a Federal Q and air horn. While there is no background music, the fire itself does make noise similar to real fires with the popping and cracking sound of wood and windows.

The main problem I have with the game, as a whole, is the map they provide with new tasks and ones already done. It is very hard to know which tasks are already done and which ones need to be done. And again, this is just my opinion, maybe give a list of new tasks and what tasks need to be done to move onto the next fire.

I finished the game in less than 40 something hours (I have redone some maps and spent 10 or more hours doing that as well), and I would have liked to see more calls to respond to. Maybe throw in a curveball or two like traffic accidents and gas leaks, hazmat incidents, and stuff like that, and I would gladly keep playing. Overall, this is a very good game and I will definitely keep playing until the next one comes out, or maybe more calls are added to this one. Either way, I have been very entertained by the game and appreciate the opportunity to review it and offer my opinions.

Thank you to anyone that reads this as this is my first official review/opinion piece for oprainfall. And also a shout-out to oprainfall for giving me this opportunity to do this. Last but not least thank you to Publisher Astragon Entertainment and developer Chronos Unterhaltungssoftware for their hard work to provide this game.