Medal Of Honor: Frontline Game Review

I decided to re-post a couple old reviews I did from consolegameworld.com. They base their grades on a 100% scale. I gave the game an 85% Which would be a 4 out of 5 stars or an 8.5 out of 10. Here's the first:

Medal Of Honor: Frontline

One thing that is noticeable in games these days is the realism that can be achieved with the ground- breaking graphics, animation, and sound. This is certainly evident in Electronic Arts’ Medal of Honor: Frontline. You play the role of an American G.I. named Jimmy Patterson and are immediately thrust into a fierce opening combat sequence putting you on the beach, on D-Day, fighting for your life against overwhelming German forces. With the game’s first person perspective gameplay, the level of realism is very potent and I have to say that the first time I played this game I was shocked, confused, and scared. I guess this is what soldiers might have actually felt landing on the beach on D-Day, seeing their friends and fellow soldiers shot and blown into the air by enemy fire. It’s all here in this game. The sounds, the atmosphere, it is even quite disturbing at times. The rumble feature on the controller makes the feeling even more realistic. This game is very much an experience.

Your goal in this game is to play though its numerous and sometimes lengthy missions. These assignments range between all out war, troop support, and a lot of sneaking around. Many missions have you fighting alongside a couple of computer controlled soldiers who actually are quite capable fighters. I would have to say that the solo missions, especially those which enable you to utilize a sniper rifle, are the most engaging and entertaining. This game really drew me in and I became very absorbed while playing it. I really felt like I was on those missions and would try everything possible to stay alive and complete my assignment. Upon completion of a level, you are awarded a medal if you successfully achieve your objectives and do so at a high level. This requires accurate shooting, a close to full health meter, and a high number of enemies eliminated. These criteria are displayed on a stat-screen after each mission and gold, silver, and bronze medals are awarded accordingly.

As you progress though different missions, certain weapons are made available for use. You will learn that certain weapons are better than others depending on the situation and in general.The sniper rifle is by far the best weapon of the game. You will be able to use a couple different versions of this weapon as the game progresses. I became very proficient with this weapon and I would advise that you do the same if you want to get far in this game. The ability to look at enemies through the rifle’s scope makes hitting targets much easier. It takes practice to get good at using the rifle though, but when you have it down, you will do well in this game. Other weapons such as grenades are very useful when you need to get out of a tough situation, which becomes frequent in the game’s later levels. I recommend using rifles and pistols, especially those which can be equipped with a silencer. The other weapons in the game, with the exception of the shotgun, tend to be very inaccurate and require frequent reloading. The machine guns are the worst. At times I found myself shooting directly at an adversary at point-blank range and missing. The controls are somewhat customizable and work well for this game. I became so used to them it’s difficult for me to play other first-person games without the same control system. I’m still a fan of using the right and left shoulder buttons for strafing and you are able to do so in this game. Hold down the Z button and you’re looking through your sniper rifle scope. You can then move the control stick or zoom in and out with the control pad to position your crosshairs.

Overall I liked the control very much. The gameplay of this game is very immersive, even more so if you turn down the game’s not so inspiring soundtrack so you can hear the great sound effects for added realism. The music is OK, but I couldn’t stand the high pitched singing going on while accessing the menu screen. In general, I think it’s better to turn the music down when you play games of this nature so you can hear if there’s a bad guy sneaking up on you from around the corner. The voice acting is great. The graphics on the other hand could have been better. I’ve played both the PS2 and GameCube versions of Frontline and I was hoping that the GameCube graphics would be a little better because they generally are. However, I was somewhat disappointed regarding the graphics of the game. They’re good, but there are many other games out there that far surpass them. The 3D level and background modeling looks a bit thin and is transparent and overly polygonal at times. The people and characters look very good on the other hand, and the animation is very good as well.

I really liked seeing so many of the different German uniforms represented in the many different terrains of the game. Enemy soldiers react differently depending on how and where their bodies are shot. Shoot a guy in the foot, he hops; in the leg, he hurts bad; in the head, well, you get the idea.

The biggest problem with this game, and also the main contributing factor as to why I did not give this game a higher mark, is its bug problem. This game is full of bugs! I don’t know who did the testing for this title, but they weren’t thorough enough. I’m an aggressive player. If there are bugs in a game, I tend to find them or cause them by my manner of playing. Unfortunately, bugs tend to happen in the middle of a difficult mission, causing you to replay it from the beginning which can be frustrating. The main problem seems to be with solidity of objects. This game is especially weak in that department. I could write a small section regarding the bugs in this game, however, I’ll briefly indulge you here. In one mission, I had infiltrated a German U-boat base and was on an upper level deck firing down at enemies on the lower level surrounding a submarine in an enclosed pool. As I was shooting down at them, I was leaning against a handrail on the walkway and shooting over it. Due to a bug, I somehow passed through the rail and fell into the submarine docking pool which there was no way out of. While in the pool I could walk though the submarine as if it were transparent and the enemy soldiers could continue shooting at me. As there was no way out of the somewhat deep pool, I had to reset the game. In another instance, I was running across a street in a side-stepping strafing manner throwing hand grenades at a tank. There were hedges running along the sides of the street which were part of the background and were to serve as impassable barriers on either side of the street. Due to a bug, I somehow became stuck in one of these hedges. I defeated the tank, but alas, could not defeat the hedge. I became a permanent part of it. I tried everything to escape it, but it held me tight like a newborn babe. Anyway, you get the idea. If it wasn’t occurrences like this, it was one of my allies running straight into a wall until a tank repeatedly shot him to death.

An added bonus to the game is the multiplayer feature which enables up to four players the chance to duke it out WWII-style. Many multiple terrains and environments such as factories and buildings are selectable, as well as various weapon sets featuring different groups of weapons for play. This mode is pretty cool, though it can be difficult at times to see when the screen is split into four sections for the four player vs. mode. Also, all players must be somewhat equal in ability to ensure a worthy challenge.

The most positive aspect of this game is it’s replay value. I love playing missions over and over. The game becomes more fun as you progress and get better at shooting. It’s also great knowing where enemies will be hiding so you can take them out quick and easy. The ability to replay all past missions is great. The difficulty of this game is close to perfect. You will have to be quite proficient with the GameCube controller, or at least learn to be, to be good at this game though. Also, this game is very violent. There is no blood, but some people are very disturbed when they see me shoot a sleeping Nazi in the head with my sniper rifle. Remember, the game looks very real, but we all know it’s just a game.

I really like the concept behind the Medal of Honor series and many, as well as myself, are looking forward to the new upcoming fall 2003 release titled Medal of Honor: Rising Sun. In this next adventure, the player will find himself fighting Japanese forces in the dark jungles of the south pacific and Pearl Harbor. Hopefully, Electronic Arts will have their bugs exterminated by then and will improve on their graphics a bit. Overall, I really like Medal of Honor: Frontline and I would recommend buying this game and showing it to your war veteran fathers, or military friends. They will get a kick out of it.

Reviewed by Brian Ill.