Medal of Honor (Tier 1) Review – PC

There have been mixed reviews about the new Medal of Honor game. My first reaction was to dismiss all the negative feedback as subjective outlook from buzz-killing journalists, only because I had really been looking forward to this title. No offense to those who reviewed it but at the time I felt I could offer more on it since I have played nearly every “real-world” first person shooter war game title released till date. Thins includes the Call of Duty franchise, Medal of Honor franchise, Operation Flashpoint series and other unimpressive ones. To my utter dismay by the time I finished the single-player campaign, I couldn’t agree more on some of the insight provided by the other reviewers from IGN, Gamespot etc.

Electronic Arts
I picked up the highly anticipated Medal of Honor in Australia the day it was launched, i.e. Oct 14. After what seemed like an eternity to install I finally got a piece of the action. Unlike other titles in this genre (blatant comparison to Modern Warfare 2) this game puts you directly in the boots of a Tier 1 operator. The single-player campaign only took about 3.5 hours to complete and ended somewhat abruptly. I can understand the philosophy behind the gameplay, that EA and Danger Close wanted people to experience what it was like to be one the elite among US Defence Forces. Having said that although the missions seem linked and have some cliched controversial hollywood-like themes such as “the general sitting 9000 miles away and calling the shots” and the men on the ground “dealing with it the way they deem suitable”. What does stand out in the game is the research on the degree of realism in the missions and the character outfits. You might even be able to see such real-life footage on youtube of soldiers pinned down under heavy enemy fire only to be relieved by a 2000lb JDAM slammed onto the fortification. Yeah! 3 cheers for close-air support. We are oscar mike for review …

Theme / Story: 3/5

The game does indeed have a good theme to it and the missions complement this to a large extent. The premise is to give players a “feel” for what it’s like to be on ground as the “scalpel” of the coalition forces. So you end up running around the valley for 2 days clearing up insurgent camps and securing high value targets. It therefore does not have a very strong storyline because that would perhaps just distract the players from the “real” job.

Characterization: 1/5

The Tier 1 chaps look badass. PERIOD. But you can’t really identify with any of them since they all look very similar. The Rangers, although elite (commando equivalent) looked a notch above regular infantry units. Compare this to Battlefield: Bad Company and Call of Duty, where you can really identify with the main characters. Danger Close may have done substantive research on Tier1 “comms” and dress-up and general appearance but all of this falls short because the characters aren’t distinct enough. On top of that they ended up naming the player’s character, in keeping with the Call of Duty tradition (recall Soap), something as ridiculous as “Rabbit” when all the others around you have cool names like Voodoo and Dusty.

Graphics & Sound: 3/5

The open terrain is simply breathtaking, especially when you get to admire it in the “Gunfighters” helicopter gunship mission. Most weapon and uniform textures are highly detailed too. The models on the other hand seemed a bit out of place with secondary weapons attached to the main body of the model as if it were stuck there with glue. Although the dust-storm and blizzards add to the fog of war, they tend to be glitchy and stragely disappear at times, only to reappear a fraction of a second later. The explosions seems like something our of the first release of Duke Nukem in terms of the graphical quality. No doubt the destruction left behind from a 105mm howitzer strike from the “Spooky” (AC130) or a guided bomb seems to have been represented well. Bu overall it feels like someone at QA really messed up.

Gameplay: 3/5

The gameplay is extremely sluggish. When attempting to run it feels like the speed of position translation in space is just not as fast as the secondary movement observed while running, translated, that means it feels like you’re running fast but you just don’t move fast enough through the game. Even though this isn’t a run-and-gun game like MW2, there seems to be a disconnect between the visual element and movement. The missions, on the other hand have a great setting, but fall short on the execution since taking down the opfor quite literally is a whack-a-mole session. Weapons no doubt do pack a punch but with cheaply available ammo (just request a team member when you’re about to run out) you can fire to your heart’s content. Knowing how the weapons deliver their lethality helps too e.g. MG’s become useless if you’re not firing in bursts, assault weapons also work best in controlled bursts over a longer range and take down tangos with ease in close combat when fired with no restraint. The best of all was the visual delivery of the M82A1 with an IR scope, when that thing does off you know it’s going to hurt the opfor on the other end. The gunfighters’ (apache gunship) mission was really immersive but too easy due to the firepower available. The only time you feel the pressure to direct the right firepower to the right target is in the Bagram Airbase mission, even though it begins to feel like an arcade-like shoot-up after the first minute or so. The quad-bikes used by AFO wolfpack, although a great inclusion, again disappointed me with a poor execution of physics.

Overall Experience: 2.5/5

Despite all the hype created by the “MoH Experience” videos, the beta multiplayer and the teaser trailers the game, in my personal opinion, failed to deliver what it promised. Although some may argue that such gameplay has it’s place on the shelf, might I add that I agree with that line of thought, the execution of it all falls short in creating anything even close to a spectacular experience. Having said that, I must add, that the game has definitely reaffirmed my deepest respect for the men on-ground, especially the SpecOps teams.

NOTE:
This review is based on the single-player campaign only, multiplayer could not be tested at the time because for some bizarre reasons I couldn’t be connected with any of the 3000+ players online. Wonder if this is a problem for players in Australia due to a dearth of available servers.