No One-Level Wonder (Medal of Honor: Frontline (PS2))

Member Name: tom1clare

Product:	Medal of Honor: Frontline (PS2)
Date:	07/05/07 (125 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Pretty and well-realised locations, enjoyable, excellent design, great sound

Disadvantages: Slightly shorter than previous MOH games, collision detection troubles

Advertising games on television remains a risky business for many publishers due to the costs, which means that despite the rise in the popularity of gaming in recent years, the luxury is generally limited to the biggest money-spinning franchises such as the FIFA's and Grand Theft Auto's, though there were a small handful of others in the early part of the decade that captured the imagination somewhat. Gran Turismo 3 produced a collective 'wow' from gamers as it showed off its lovely, shiny graphics, whilst Medal Of Honor: Frontline was rather more striking; it simply depicted its opening level, whereby the player gets to experience the Normandy beach landings in gaming form (as EA put it: “You don't play. You volunteer”). My sister (and no doubt others) thought it slightly distasteful at the time, though few games could claim to have so cinematic an opening as Frontline – it was like a scene straight out of Saving Private Ryan.

It's amazing to think that the original Medal Of Honor was first released as long ago as 1999 – it only feels like five minutes ago that EA's low-profile Nazi-blaster first captivated PlayStation audiences and proved conclusively that Sony's old grey box could, in fact, competently handle first-person shoot 'em ups.

It was undoubtedly the best FPS on the format (though Quake 2 aside, there was hardly an abundance of competition) and when EA realised they were on to a winning formula, they cranked the production levels somewhat, delivering a PSOne sequel in the form of Medal Of Honor: Underground in 2000 and four further entries have since graced the PS2, including Frontline; the first of them, released in 2002.

So the advert lived long in the memory, but hype can be a deceptive thing. Scores in the gaming press fluctuated wildly from the respectably good to the absolutely stratospheric (98% in Play springs to mind). The beach landing level was, in many cases, given as much attention as the rest of the game combined, but aside the fact that it’s a superb showcase of graphics and spectacle, it is an otherwise short and unremarkable level in terms of its gameplay content, though I've played games long enough to know that one level neither makes nor breaks a title. The nicely-diverting introduction is backed up by 18 more substantial levels that were attributed rather less praise than they perhaps deserved, and they collectively make for a classy game and a worthy sequel.

MOH: Frontline is very much a continuation of the themes employed in the PSOne games – you become reacquainted with Jimmy Patterson from the original game and, assuming control of the one-man-army of a US soldier, must tackle a range of operations set in World War 2, each featuring their own distinctive locales and mission objectives but all essentially working around the theme of shooting Nazis.

Its trademark World War 2 setting is once again fantastically atmospheric, and not just because of its environment design – the music and sound effects are absolutely first-rate too. Hauntingly beautiful orchestral scores populate the menu screens, whilst the up-tempo jingles used in the game proper serve admirably to crank up the tension, setting the nerves on end as you creep along behind enemy lines. It's at its most effective when you're straining to hear Nazis yelling instructions and alerts in the distance, as you try desperately to pick out hostile figures on the horizon, often with bullets whistling past.

Frontline marks a minor but pleasing progression for the series – it doesn't reinvent the wheel in the gameplay stakes (those familiar with the previous games will feel instantly at home), but the odd new additions here and there are mostly welcome ones.

One example of this is the handy hint function whereby, at the touch of a button, the player can be given brief tips from HQ as to what course of action to take next, meaning it cuts out a large amount of the guesswork and aimless wondering that has characterized games of this ilk in the past. This no-nonsense attitude is further emphasised by the simplicity of the level objectives – whilst in Underground, the player had to select their camera and line-up the desired object to take its picture, Frontline only asks that you face the target and press X. Likewise, the popular undercover sections make only a brief reappearance and though more would have been nice, the fluency of the action runs almost unabated.

Frontline's levels are noticeably lengthier than those of its predecessors, which can be something of a mixed blessing due to the lack of a checkpoint feature, though some sequences border on the epic. At varying points in the game, you'll have to charge across an armoured train; infiltrate, destroy and escape from a submarine (wouldn't be Medal of Honor without a submarine section); pass over a heavily guarded bridge wired with explosives, and ride a mine-cart whilst taking out nearby enemies with the aid of explosive barrels.

The core appeal of the series distinctive style remains as compelling as it did upon its original release – with the weapons being a chief area of superiority when compared to similar games of the time. The eighteen weapons featured in Frontline are all authentic World War 2 artillery, meaning you get to experience the joys of M1 Garand rifles; MP40 sub-machine guns; shotguns and the dreaded Panzershreck rocket launchers, as well as a variety of grenades. The ability to take German weaponry from fallen enemies is great and allows a good comparison between weapons, with accuracy, damage and the crucial reload times all varying substantially. Because many of the antiquated weapons on show take longer to reload than your average FPS guns, Frontline effectively challenges you to think about you next move, where you are going to take cover and how many enemies you can take down before having to retreat.

The A.I is a bit of mixed-bag. On the plus side, the Nazis are fairly intelligent and quick to react when they spot you. Their actions are pleasantly varied and keep the player on their toes – some may simply charge at you, whilst others seek cover or an alarm to activate, though if they are hunting in groups they may attempt to be especially sneaky and lure you out by throwing grenades – and will even throw your own grenades back at you if given the chance.

Less impressive however is the extremely suspect collision detection. Firstly, there's the irritation of shooting whilst strafing, where it becomes apparent that bullets don't always seem to connect with the target when you're firing on the move. Then there's the grey area of headshots - sometimes they kill the enemy, and on other occasions they don't. Most irksome of all however concerns the use of the zoom function on the sniper rifles; you can line-up an enemy easily, but there are times when you’ll fire upon them and it’s like the bullets simply don't register at all – perhaps an oversight in the programming, but it means that you are sometimes forced into moving your character closer to a potentially dangerous section of ground before the game recognizes the enemy as being 'in play', thus you won't always be able to take advantage of forward planning.

Unlike its predecessors, Frontline occasionally allows you to fight alongside some allied soldiers. It isn't a bad idea, though the A.I certainly needs a bit of work if it is to be used effectively in future – some colleagues are near-indestructible and can withstand tonnes of bullets, whilst others die quickly and yet choose to ignore any conventional forms of cover, standing right out in the open and often hampering your targeting range for good measure. Also, due to an oversight in the grading system of Frontline (which requires you kill at least 95% of the enemies on a level to have a chance of getting a Gold Star), certain missions in which you are aided by troops become extremely hard to attain a top grade in, because of the fact that your allies are killing the soldiers that you need to reach the required percentage.

Still, visually it's very nice. The little details that take place around you within the environments are really impressive; highlights include infiltrating a Nazi pub, where you can watch German's chatting at the bar, singing, and you can even instigate a brawl by knocking over beer. Other instances of such detail include one ally getting his parachute caught on a windmill, whilst there are numerous examples of enemy soldiers sleeping, relaxing or chatting with others. It suffers from the odd bit of slow-down when the action starts to hot up, though for the most part, remains smooth enough to allow easy manoeuvring even with very high levels of detail. The only real gripe is the limited draw-distance, which means zooming in on a faraway piece of scenery with a sniper rifle will be met by a wall of fog.

There are eighteen levels in all spread across six missions, with a slightly unpredictable difficulty curve seeing the odd difficult mission interspersed with ones easy enough to storm through first time – though fortunately the early levels at least are not overly taxing. Generally, the levels are quite large, and the great majority of them last for more than 25 minutes each. There is, as ever, the option to tackle three different difficulty levels, though the only real replay value comes in the form of getting Gold Star gradings in the individual levels – attaining these will see you awarded with some service medals, as well as various cheats as well. One of the chief criticisms levelled at Frontline is its lack of a multiplayer mode, which admittedly is unusual for a game of this ilk. In truth though, it isn’t a massive loss as Medal Of Honor has never been a match for the likes of TimeSplitters when it comes to deathmatch setups – although a co-op campaign would have been great, especially considering how excellent the design of the levels is.

Medal Of Honor: Frontline remains one of the best one-player shoot ‘em ups available for the PlayStation2 and, all things considered, hasn’t aged at all badly. Due to its popularity on release and the number of sequels that were intended to supersede it, it is now relatively cheap to buy – I got a second-hand copy for just under a fiver, and that was from a store rather than from the Internet. Ultimately, an impressive evolution for the Medal Of Honor franchise and, thanks to its lack of gore, a decent FPS for all ages to try. A close second to the brilliant PSOne original.

Summary: The American's rewrite WW2 history again. They were still late!