The market for military shooters is a lucrative one and it was only a matter of time that the franchise that spawned the genre would eventually suit up and get back into action. From Danger Close Games and EA comes Medal of Honor, with all the modern trimmings you’d expect in a post-Modern Warfare world. Does the franchise still have what it takes to take on the Call of Duty juggernaut?
It might be unfair to compare the two, but the reality is, these games were born from the same heavily scripted, linear, but utterly spectacular campaign design mold. Any criticism of the game would be a criticism of the gameplay template itself.
You play as a branch of para-militaristic “Tier 1” operators who clean up before the cavalry arrives (at least that’s my impression). The game never really explains anything to you, but as the old adage goes: show, not tell. You jump in the boots of several soldiers from different squads (in true CoD fashion) and fight through battles from multiple perspectives. It’s very cool to jump from one set of eyes to another, but it does so at the expense of any one character. In true military fashion, you’re a mute grunt who merely follows orders. This keeps the pace moving, as you go through the motions, following NPC directives to hold your shot until countdown or planting charges on high-value targets. Aside from brief spurts of vehicle action, you spend much of your time shooting Al-Qaeda in the face.
As always, the conflict takes center stage (despite how scattershot it is) and the characters are left to the wayside. It makes the few CG sequences that are in the game less meaningful and the interplay between armchair general and on-the-field officer isn’t anything new. Everything comes together in the end on one final rescue mission.
A key advantage MoH holds over its brethren is the omission of invisible trigger lines. There are no grandstands that require you to cross an invisible line to stop infinite respawns and the frequency of grenades is considerably lessened. The grand stands still exist, but they’re timed instead.
You’ll take a ride on ATV’s, control the guns on attack choppers, and play with all sorts of different toys. You can crouch, sprint, and prone, switch firing rates, toggle, NVG’s, and melee. It checks off all the prerequisites for a “military shooter.”
The graphics demonstrate some nice lighting but the brown towns of the Middle East aren’t that interesting, despite some interesting forays into the snowy mountains. The particle effects are muted in the explosions but the terrain is detailed.
The soundtrack features some very nice tracks and all the sound effects draw up the necessary tension. You’ll get familiar with the voice-acting, which isn’t bad at all.
The game features a Tier 1 mode where players can replay the game under time constraints and points are awarded for kills. As always, there’s the multiplayer option that lifts the CoD template with awards and play progression. The limited map selection may quickly tire players out.
Medal of Honor may not dazzle, but it’s a solid game with sound mechanics. Some see mediocrity as a mark of failure, but the game doesn’t make rookie mistakes. It calls into question whether developers should aspire to flawed masterpieces, or perfect mediocrity.
