I recently got my hands upon a copy of Medal of Honor Warfighter, and dove straight into it; being a long time fan of the Medal Of Honour (MOH) series, I was curious to see where they would head in this modern age of shooters and if they still had what it takes to make that little pleasure centre in my brain tingle. So without further ado..
The game uses Battlefield 3‘s Frostbite2 engine, and has full right to boast about its graphics capabilities. When the game starts up, you are prompted to install the HD pack onto your console, for smoother operation. Highly recommended; it makes the game run smoothly and helps avoid any potential glitching or load issues.
The ability of the engine is certainly shown off, through a variety of locations encompassing just about every possible location where you could imagine a firefight breaking out (sadly there was no volcano lair, neither was there an ocean/space lab) and varies up the pace nicely between indoor and outdoor settings.
Where the game lets itself down slightly in the execution of set pieces; you’ll be running along mowing down hordes of enemies and then you’ll get radioed that Joe Bloggs is under fire and needs backup. Next thing you know, there’s a convenient tower or balcony and you just happen to have this sniper rifle handy.
It’s a little awkward, but holds together well. When you actually do transition to “the sniping section” of a level, they are extremely well done, admittedly the best I’ve seen in a long time. Why, you ask? Simple. The bullets obey the laws of gravity, and aiming has motion from you soldier. Easily fixed, you can hold the left stick to temporarily hold you breath to get those shots lined up easier, and leading up over a target isn’t a problem at all. It actually FEELS like what sniping actually is; calculations and math, instead of just pointing a motionless crosshair over a skull and pulling a trigger to win.
Another thing Medal of Honor: Warfighter does extremely well, is how they’ve broken up the constant running and shooting people in the face (never gets old really). Vehicle levels! When this shock was first thrust upon me, I recoiled in horror and just grit my teeth and prepared to just get it over and done with. Tear the band-aid off fast, you know? On a side note, I love it when I go into games dreading something, and get proven wrong. It’s just so satisfying.
When I started the pursuit chase and some other vehicle parts, including a very innovative stealth section, I was pleasantly surprised at how well the controls were and how smoothly it all went. Gone was the typical “your character drives with his elbows while under the influence of God knows what” and it was GREAT.
There’s a lot more I could go on about the single player, such as the fact that you never seem to need to worry about weapons or ammo; you simply approach a fire team buddy and he fully replenishes your supply. Which is awesome, because you never had to swap out your awesome guns, but also detracts from the difficulty a bit, this mechanic is still included in the multiplayer, but in a modified version, which I think is vastly superior.
In the multiplayer, when you “activate” your fire team buddy, you fill ammo, but only start a regeneration of health, so needless to say, it doesn’t work in combat or dangerous situations. Even then, you’ll have to wait out of combat to receive the full benefits. This, along with the fact that you can choose to spawn off of you buddy, add a strong sense of camaraderie and encourage you to work as a pair bouncing off each other, and when you play with a decent partner, or better yet, someone you actually know, it’s extremely satisfying.
There are several different modes of multiplayer, but by far the most fun, in my opinion, is the classic attack and defend, where one team has to set and defend the three explosives and the other team simply stop them. It’s fast and fun, and revives elements that I haven’t enjoyed this much since the old Counter-Strike days.
My one gripe with the multiplayer, is how they’ve set up the individual countries and their respective soldiers. Jumping in at the base level, it seems a little unbalanced and a bit unfair, especially if you were wanting to play as one of the smaller nations represented, but it’s not a huge issue ultimately; everyone dies within a half clip of rounds, if that.
I must confess, I went online, as I was curious as to what people were saying about Warfighter. I really did not expect the hate and vitriol that people were spewing online about it.
It is a different game, slightly more strategic, seeing as how you die so easily, that requires you to think about what you are going to do, and especially in multiplayer, cooperate with your buddy. Evidently some people just have problems doing so.
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Give it a go, its definitely worth it, if only for the excellent multiplayer fun!
For more EA check out our review of Need For Speed Most Wanted 2012. Mr Port likes when a game treats him rough, check out his list of 3 games that do difficulty a little differently.
