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Unfortunately,
luck played a much larger role than I would have preferred,
mainly because I could barely see anything. Even with the brightness
on my television up as high as it could go (screenshots aren't adequate
representations as capture cards auto-correct brightness), I was
still being shot by unseen soldiers. I would have to hide and squint
to see a muzzle flash light up a soldier's body before I would know
where to shoot. To help alleviate problems - which I'm assuming
were more for the move to compensate for the lack of precision when
aiming with a controller- there is a targeting system that you can
toggle that shows red arrows around a unit when an enemy is hit.
The problem then becomes that the shot animations, aside from a
leg shot, either resemble death or are nonexistent. Since the game
doesn't use blood, it is really hard to get an indication of whether
or not an enemy has been hit and, if they have, if they are close
to death. The result of this is not just a waste of ammo, but also
being taken out of the experience. The mediocre graphics don't help
either, with drab textures making it difficult to distinguish a
unit from the surroundings.
All in all, the Soviet portion was fraught with problems of darkness,
aiming, and AI. The missions themselves were quite fun, though.
From storming pillboxes to taking down the German flag to fending
off a tank factory with a sniper rifle, then making a mad dash in
a tank to aid the chaotic offensive, the scale of city combat and
the peril of the resistance were conveyed well. The tank portion
was a bit more difficult than I had expected, mainly from the tank
controlling like a go-cart, and even though the massive tank battles
didn't feel as epic as they did in the original, they still weren't
bad. One mission I initially enjoyed involved shooting airplanes
before they took off. Interestingly enough, a few rounds from the
tank's cannon wouldn't destroy the grounded planes, but a few rounds
from the machine gun would. What's more, matters soon became aggravating
as I was getting hit by planes trying to take off because I could
not see them. Interestingly enough, a few rounds from the tank's
cannon wouldn't destroy the grounded planes, but a few rounds from
the machine gun would. Take a second to think about that. I could
not see a plane approaching me until it was too late. There is dark,
and there is too dark. I present to you: too dark. That was with
about three notches left to go until full brightness, which I adjusted
accordingly to try to avoid similar instances.
The British campaign fared better in the sight department, although
anything remotely resembling dusk and past made it just as difficult.
Surprisingly, unlike the original and its expansion, there was only
one vehicle portion in the British campaign, and it was the player
taking the gunner position on a jeep. The outdoor areas were actually
pleasant, and, aside from the ridiculous looking animations that
occur when a NPC is hurt in an explosion, it was fun riding up mountain
sides and watching both sides charge each other. Then, I hit a pretty
significant snag. I was supposed to save two gentlemen stuck in
a tower within a small temple ruin. The first time I made it up
the tower, they refused to come down. After being shot by enemy
reinforcements, I tried again and again and again. One time one
of the guys came down, but was killed; another time, both came down,
but one ran in circles in a corner, until a scripted bombing sequence
occurred, at which time we had just ran into the killing zone and
I was killed; another time, one guy stayed put and defended, while
another just ran off and got shot. To even get to these men I had
to kill a few dozen soldiers, and with the guns feeling like they
shoot out air instead of bullets, the entire area, which could've
been a pretty exciting shoot-out, turned out to be an extremely
frustrating experience.
Then it was the Americans' turn. It suffered the same problems,
and it wasn't all that different an experience from the others.
However, I did like hiding behind tanks and taking potshots at nearby
enemy troops and flushing out the surroundings of anti-tank personnel.
All campaigns combined took a little less than 10 hours, which isn't
terribly long. There is multiplayer, but not many folks seemed too
jazzed about playing it. Maybe that was because it felt tacked on;
the stilted running animation goes a long way in forming that opinion.
Consisting of Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, Search
& Destroy on eight maps, a few of which are pretty good, multiplayer
reaches the level of serviceable.
Call of Duty: Finest Hour did accomplish some things that
I really enjoyed. Large health packs can now be stored for later
use and also given to squad members; despite the fact that they
aren't the brightest bunch, I still liked keeping them around. Players
can also issue a basic command that prepares surrounding allies
to position themselves to rush a room when an order is given to
open the door. The locations, level designs and structures, as previously
mentioned, are quite good, and I actually preferred much of it over
the original. But there are also several smaller problems that need
addressing. One is that members of the squad have no problems blocking
doorways, making you go slow to push them out of the way, which
is never the preferred method of escape once a tank sets its sights
on the window you were just looking out of. Then there are the oddities,
like landmines disappearing after being dropped, and one level where
I would respawn dropping to the ground, immediately taking damage
before I could even take control. Also, this might have just been
my controller, but for some reason, when I used my type-s controller,
my soldier would fire without my pressing the fire button; it didn't
happen with my older controllers, but I played several other games
with the type-s to make sure, and the problem didn't occur in any
other game.
One aspect that did survive relatively unscathed is the audio. The
music is still good, as are the voice-overs. However, there was
a weird tendency for a sound to pop in shortly before speech, like
someone was pressing play on a cassette deck. Dennis Haysbert from
'24' does a decent job of narrating the events, though it
is a bit surprising to hear him at first.
Overall: 5.5/10
Assuming you are reading this on a PC, I would suggest trying the
original Call of Duty first. If, however, that isn't an option,
Call of Duty: Finest Hour would make a decent rental, but
nothing more and only if you are absolutely craving a WWII first-person
shooter. With a relatively short campaign and a limited multiplayer
experience, I cannot see much enjoyment coming from it after a few
days. It would've been a decent title if it had not had so many
problems, but in its current state, the reputation of the franchise
is tarnished a little. It isn't as epic or cinematic as the original,
nor is it the best first-person shooter on the Xbox; it is, however,
an acceptable substitute when the others have been played and boredom
is winning the day.
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