Gaming Men of War

http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/pc/2009/03/28/men-of-war-review/1

Pack your rifle, because we're off to war! From Russian developer Best Way comes this ultra-detailed and super tactical WW2 RTS, and we're reporting from the front lines to see if this Russian import could be a diamond in the rough, or just a turd in plain sight.

 

Wow, that game looks great. Might be one I pick up later this week.

 

Sounds like an awesome game, although if Harry found it hard I imagine I'll find it next to impossible

 

looks good

 

Hmm! Have you not ever played Soldiers: Heroes of WW2 or Faces Of War. They were both made by Best Way and had the direct control of units etc.. I picked both games up for around a £10 each.

 

That looks awesome, I'm definitely going to grab that over summer. Are the German and US campaigns as good as the Russian ones?

 

Played both to completion, and referenced both in the review! Direct Control rocks, and I'm a bit miffed that Relic are kind of ripping it off in the upcoming Company of Heroes: Tales of Valour. We'll have to wait and see if it makes the transition intact.

**EDIT** At least, I thought I'd referenced both - seems the edit ninjas have been at work!

In fact, i just recently bought Soldier: Heroes of WW2 on steam for a bit of old skool fun - still just as good (and just as tough!) as I recall!

 

Not a single word of multiplayer? Does that go to say there is no MP? So far I haven't found a good enough SP to make me buy a game, it's all about the MP... In CoH that's been pretty superb (at times, anyway, when the system has worked for a couple of hours between the downtimes and FUBB patches).

Also ripping off Direct Control? Well I don't know when Men of War has come out/been in the news, but I remember reading months ago about the CoH:ToV having it.

 

Soldiers: Heroes of WW2, the predecessor of Men of War released in 2004 pioneered the direct control used in Men of War. The Men of War direct control scheme is almost a direct port of the original thus Best Way invented direct control, not Relic. COH in many ways was a good game but it was arguably outdated compared to SHOWW2 even before it was released in all its engine capabilities with the exception of graphics. SHOWW2 featured an even more advanced environment destruction system than COH's with immaculate unit AI all two years before COH's release. Unfortunately the game was slandered for being ridden with bugs and having a near impossible difficulty. Men of War is the true successor to SHOWW2 and without the bugs. Faces of War was another game developed by the same company a year ago but deviated from the style of play of SHOWW2. Men of War features a highly upgraded version of SHOWW2's original physics engine and even better unit AI along with good enough graphics to bring it to acceptable standards for today's games. True the lighting model is very basic, but the models probably actually sport a higher number of polygons compared to COH. If you zoom in on some of the tanks in COH, which are all present in Men of War, you will find the Men of War counterparts actually have more detail and where many parts of the tanks in COH are shown on the skin, they are actually modeled in the Men of War counterparts. For example looking at the Tiger 1 in COH, you can see top of the rear exhausts are almost entirely skinned while in Men of War, these are actually modeled and stick out. Combined with the sheer number of object present on the battlefield and the details of each map, most will not find the graphics lacking.

As for MP, there is MP in the game. The game has some 30 highly detailed maps with several game types which all basically pits players against each other giving each player a certain number of points to call in units of their choice.

If you ever see someone who knows how to play SHOWW2 or Men of War play Men of War, you will be amazed by the game. However if you love arcade style RTS such as COH, I would not recommend you buying the game as you will likely find the control scheme impossibly complex, the missions impossibly difficult, and overall be very annoyed playing the game.

 

Woah epic response, thank you!

I'm a bit of a history-geek myself (sniff, does the "bit" smell like BS?) and at the idea-level appreciate the idea of a game with realistic models and more-realistic combat (than, say CoH), BUT. The thing that I'm so worried about is that on an absolute scale, is the gameplay as smooth and pleasant as in arcade-sorta things? I mean can you really sink into the game and enjoy playing it, or is it the simulator-sort of orgasmic experience of having tons of abilities available... Maybe it's just me again, but that's the worry I have.

 

Wouldn't be wonderfull, amazing, fantastig and LOT better if FO3 looked like this game than oblivion with guns?

 

Just got this game... Dang! It's really hard! I pulled all my hair (left) in second Russian mission, the one that the germans were invading the facilities! I was like "what? where? when? who?" when i saw so many red triangles in the mini map and so many cyan triangles that i control.. geez... Twas nuts!