The Medal of Honour (MOH) series has had its ups and downs over its history. When it first came out, it was the highest rated First Person Shooter (FPS) game on the Playstation and remained so throughout the original Playstation’s life. It then made its Playstation 2 debut with Medal of Honour: Frontline, which contained the very memorable D-Day mission and again it still remains one of highest rated shooters on the console. However, it all went downhill with the Medal of Honor games that followed Frontline and ever since the MOH's reputation has suffered; but perhaps the latest offering in the series can help get the game back on track as a quality WWII shooter. In Medal of Honour: Airborne players take control of Boyd Travers, a private in the 82nd Airborne Division. EA have used the Airborne backdrop to their advantage and have managed to create a number of features and perks unseen in other WWII games.

Gameplay:

After a very short training mission on how to use the parachute, the game kicks off with a mission briefing from Travers point of view and then it is straight into the action. The way each mission starts off is pretty good as the briefings are short but they are a lot fresher than just a list of objectives which some games have used in the past. It also gets better as once the mission begins proper. As a paratrooper the player must jump from an airplane before each mission, this isn't just for effect because the player has complete control over where to land and start the mission from. The mission is set in a specific location, e.g. A village but instead of a linear, corridor type level the player has the freedom to go anywhere in the battle zone. As soon as the jump is made, the orchestral score kicks in and you have to pick your landing spot wisely. It’s best to avoid landing right in the middle of a pack of enemy soldiers, however there is a few selected 'Skill drop' locations which require a lot more accuracy with the landing but give the player an advantage in terms of location. Players will have the usual selection of WWII era weapons at their disposal; however Airborne has a neat reward system in place where weapons can be upgraded three times. The upgrades improve certain characteristics of the gun, for example larger magazine capacity or increased zoom. A picture of the gun that the player has equipped is pictured on the bottom right of the screen and will start to fill up with the more kills you get, so it’s more of a 'kill meter'. Once it is full, the upgrade is applied and for a short while you become invincible and the game slows down, at this point unlimited ammo is also awarded so make the most of it, if not just to kill enemies then for the cool slow motion action of the gun recoiling. Each of the guns has its own stats for things like range, damage etc. and it is all pretty standard with rifles having more accuracy and damage and machine guns having the opposite in exchange for rate of fire. One negative point in regards to the weapons is that many of the automatic guns have ridiculous amounts of recoil which can make hitting even a stationary enemy fairly tricky. Another frustrating point is hit detection; when playing through the game you will no doubt find yourselves shouting at the TV, claiming you scored a hit when it didn't register as one which is frustrating at best. The combat in the game is exciting and fun, even though most of the time it’s the same sort of enemy. There is some variety as you progress through the game as you will encounter enemies with different ratings. Some of the enemies in the later parts of the game can take a hefty amount of lead and unfortunately sometimes more than one headshot to take down. They also have a few surprises in terms of weaponry as well. Headshots seem to give very satisfying kills, not just because for most enemies it’s a one shot kill, but if an enemy is wearing a helmet a well placed shot will be rewarded with a nice 'ting' sound, not a big feature of the game but one which will no doubt make you smile a few times. Thanks to the level design, most of the time there is a number of options to tackle objectives and combat situations in the game, staying back and sniping or getting closer to the action and moving around cover with an SMG. There will also be moments in the game where it seems sensible to make a hand to hand kill and bash an enemy to death, however if you miss be prepared to take some damage because the AI can get pretty fierce. In general, the AI is fairly impressive and gets notably harder as the game progresses as they make more use of grenades to keep you moving. If you decide to land in a hot spot and botch up a landing, expect to be punished or if you don't make proper use of cover, it’s unlikely you will come away with full health. Thankfully making good use of cover isn't too much of a chore because the game has an excellent control scheme which makes taking cover and popping up to shoot very intuitive. Taking a crouched position and aiming down the iron sights will allow the player to lean from side to side using the left thumb stick, but also allows for vertical movement. Instead of going behind a pile of sandbags and clicking the thumb stick to crouch and then clicking again to stand and shoot, all that is needed is a less complicated push of the thumbstick, this is a lot harder to put into words than it is to actually do, but its an excellent feature of the game and one which will be welcomed if adopted by future FPS games. It might not seem natural at first but it will soon become second nature. In some games, the save system has been notoriously bad which can put people right off the game and spoil the experience, in Medal of Honor Airborne, it is unfortunately like this. After each objective is completed in the level, the game will save, however if you die and respawn, you have to fight the enemies again – even though the objective has still been completed. This can get fairly annoying, to say the least and when taking into account the other what might seem minor inconveniences in the game, they add up and the experience just isn't as fluid as it should have been.

Graphics:

MOH: Airborne is also very nice to look at however at times it would seem the HDR is a bit overdone but in general the lighting is very good with some well done reflections. The detail on the character models and the weapons is reasonable; however one problem with character models is that at a distance it can sometimes be hard to distinguish between allied and enemy soldiers. The levels look brilliant from the point you leave the plane and look just as good when playing through the level, from broken and bombed buildings to gritty trench fighting environments in the countryside; although being a WWII game expect to see some recognizable environments (Utah beach this time round, not Omaha). When you take in to account the amount of action that can be happening on screen and with no slowdowns it’s an impressive achievement. The only niggle is that sometimes after respawning the textures can take a while to fully load, so for about half a minute your running about and everything is in low resolution, although it doesn't harm the gameplay and is seen in a lot of games so it shouldn't be such a big shock.

Sound:

The first Medal of Honor game had a superb soundtrack, probably one of the best orchestral scores in gaming history and it really helps to capture the mood of the game, whether its somber music after incurring heavy loses in a particular historic battle or a more frantic track for a more triumphant part of the game. The sounds of battle are also just as good, if you are stuck behind cover it is obvious if an enemy is shooting at you thanks to the sound of bullets whizzing by and debris being blown in the air. The voice acting in the game is nothing special, but it is hardly present, only as the real time mission briefings and a few comments from the narrator commending the players’ actions as well the typical generic orders and insults that come from other friendly characters.

Longevity:

The multiplayer side of the game allows matches for up to 12 players. That might seem a little less than the other big FPS games out there but in a full server there is always someone close by to kill and it is never dull. There are several maps and only a few game modes although it lacks a lobby feature and playing with friends is harder than it should be. It’s good fun parachuting into the map, being able to see where your team mates are and of course it’s a snipers dream as you can pretty much land anywhere.

Overall:

Medal of Honor: Airborne is great fun while it lasts, however the single player mode is short and it’s doubtful the multiplayer mode will keep the majority of gamers hooked for a long time. It is a little misleading to say the single player is short, it can be completed in a short amount of time but the game offers a lot of replay value. Playing the game on the hardest setting will no doubt take up quite a few gaming hours, especially the second half of the game and the dodgy checkpoint system but the upgraded weapons should prove helpful. Although achievements will never make or break a game, EA seem to have done a good job with them in terms of completing the game on harder difficulties, getting better ratings for missions, upgrading weapons and how skillfully enemies are killed. WWII games have an instant bias against them, even before they are released because so many people believe it is a worn out genre, but with Infinity Ward taking the Call of Duty series into modern day setting and the disappointing Hour of Victory; it seems WWII gaming fans will have to settle for MOH: Airborne for the time being. That definitely is not a bad thing as even though many of the locations in the game will look familiar and all the guns have been included in games dozens of times previously, the non-linear feel of the game and the excellent gameplay as well as the many satisfying perks that the game has make this a solid shooter, for fans of the genre at least.