Airborne fun! (Medal of Honor: Airborne (PC))

Member Name: agewills

Product:	Medal of Honor: Airborne (PC)
Date:	16/09/09 (10 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: new elements to the WW2 genre

Disadvantages: its too short, the end is maddeningly hard

One can start a Medal of Honor review by saying two things. First off, Medal of Honor is very American. Always has been. You can tell that by the name, but its official, America won WW2, no one else. Secondly, following on from that, Medal of honor has always been the sort of First Person Shooter, where you typically play the one man army. The main character purports to be a normal human, but yet somehow cuts his way through hundreds if not thousands of enemies before the end of the game. To be fair though, alot of first person shooters were like this, even from the beginning, DOOM, Rise of the Triad, Wolfenstein, Half life, etc, etc. So it was acceptable. The best Medal of HOnors (although they would look rubbish if you played them now) were Medal Of Honor: Allied Assault
They made and released Medal Of Honor:Airborne, which is a good game. They have finally innovated. Even if it was only a simple one. Sure, you are still only American, sure you start out with an M1 Garand and a thompson and sure enough, America won the war, but still there's innovation.

Best and most mentioned is the sexy new parachuting element.
You can jump out of a plane and land.

Sure not a new concept and it has been done before, even in MOH games, but the difference here is, its less linear. In the past you would land where they wanted you too and follow your orders to a T in the order they wanted you too. In this game, you can land whereever (as long as its in range of your parachute) and the game will differ depending on that. Sort of. There are still objectives to be carried out, but you can do them in any order you like. There are also "Safe zones" Marked by green smoke grenades. If you land there, every time you will be sorround by AI driven teammates who will and can die but will "Help" you tackle the objectives. But it gets to the point where you dont care if they die or not. In fact its like that from the start, they are pretty useless and only act as good cannon fodder and a slight improvement on the loneliness. Alternatively, you can land on some roofs, or through a window or on a balcony. Do that though and you might land right next to or amoungst a gaggle of enemies intent on killing you. On later levels snipers will shoot you as you sail gayly down. Fortunatly, you are semi-invincible until you hit the ground and you can actually kick enemies as you fall, but are horribly vulnerable while trying to get your 'chute off. SO for noobs, the green safe zones are best.
Now to sum up the best bits.
- the parachute thing is nice. It adds sexy variety.

- the inclusion of more friendly AI bots is a good touch, if stolen from COD.
- you can upgrade EVERY weapon you pick up/use. Three upgrades for each. The more kills you get the quicker it upgrades, kill several enemies in quick succession and it upgrades faster as does a melee with it. This is top-notch as most of them are historically accurate like the Cotts Compensator for the Thompson which was designed to reduce recoil, it did this by venting muzzle flare upwards and thus stopping the gun kicking like a mule. I saw this very invention on the history channel weeks before the game was released, so i know its real. That and the pistol grip for the front to allow better accuracy and a 50 round barrel to replace the 20 shot mag. Nice touch eh? But you get the feeling that later on they ran out of ideas as nearly every rifles final upgrade is a grenade launcher attachment. *yawn* Sure i could hardly expect laser sights, but a nade launcher on a sniper rifle? what kind of madness is that? I'd have preferred a Ghuille suit and hessian cloth wrap for the gun. On the other side, there's no way you will upgrade all weapons on one play through so that adds replayability :D

- the level design is beautiful. On the Market Garden level, there are numerous houses which have clearly been bombed and blown to ship, houses with 4 floors which you can access and fight on. Land on a roof and fight your way down on or on the street and fight your way up.
- AI is top notch, enemies arent stupid, they will flank, hide and if you are beating them badly they will retreat. Also, they will run from nades and usually escape them, you can't just chuck nades willy nilly, you really do have to cook them first or you wont kill a thing. The bots will pound ten bells out of you if they get close enough too.

- later levels have snipers on them. YOu can spot them from a neat little reflection on their scope gleaming in the sunlight. On the downside, they can kill you with one shot.
The downsides.
- its too short
- it gets hard as hell near the end, you have to fight near invincible enemies weilding MG42's and Panzershreks and snipers who kill with one shot (even on normal difficulty)
- The weapon upgrades are limited and get dull.
- on later levels you find yourself alone and outnumbered again fighting as a one man army.


In conclusion, its worth it.

Summary: its worth it