Medal of Honor: Frontline

The Good

MOA:F looks, feels, and (especially) sounds like its three predecessors on the PS1 and PC. It's a very well put together game, with solid level design and fairly good graphics (nice explosions). The authentic WWII sound effects add a lot of ambiance to the game.

The missions are well paced, and your objectives are generally clear; you don't spend a lot of time wandering around confused, wondering where to go next. There is a very helpful feature that allows you to access hints about your current objectives by pressing the 'Select' button. This doubtlessly saved me a few hours of wandering around in frustration on some levels.

**The Bad**

This is NOT the PC 'Medal of Honor: Allied Assault', nor is it even really the original PS1 MOH games. The controls are absolutely awful, almost to the point of making the game completely unplayable. There are numerous different control schemes to choose from, and even an option to customize the controls to your liking. This is all for not, however, as the aiming is always imprecise and sluggish, regardless of what controller setup you choose. There is no way to adjust the sensitivity of your aiming mechanism, and it is consistently difficult to aim at even the closest of targets. Many times did I unload a whole clip at a Nazi at point-blank range, only to miss and miss and miss due to poor control. The targeting reticle moves around too quickly and sloppily, except when in sniper mode, in which case it moves painfully slowly.

The graphics, while nice, aren't anything to write home about. The AI, both enemy and friendly, is spotty. Your squadmates will often lag behind and stand around while you move forward into combat. Nazis often just stand there and let you shoot them again and again, without running or taking cover.

There is no in-mission save, which inevitably leads to the unwanted repetition of boring and tedious sections of the game. Multiplayer in previous MOH games has always been every shade of boring, and it was wisely left out this time.

**The Bottom Line**

I have yet to play a truly good FPS for the PS2, and this one certainly breaks no new ground. While MOH:F has a lot of flaws, it will probably scratch the itch of gamers who don't have a PC or an Xbox, the platforms where the quality FPSs seem to all be landing lately. Rent it first though, because the controls really ARE that bad.

The Good
Your total hero and mine James Patterson makes his return in this game with six missions ablazing. There’s nice World War 2 references to Operation Market Garden and Flying Wing Technology and you’re in the thick of the fighting. Making the fight interesting are machine gun positions you break through and seize, a couple of instances where you go undercover and you get to fight your first ever boss in the series - Sturmgeist. Lastly you’ve got a new welcoming music album from none other than Michael Giacchino. That is all you need to know about the highlights of the game.

The Bad
Graphically the game is hardly any better than the first two PSX entries in the series, with uninteresting, dull colored textures. Frame rate seems to stutter when you fire your automatics full blast or when there’s too much activity going on. Movement is clunky and the camera seems to slide like a remote controlled car, so it doesn’t seem like the perspective of an actual person. Also a sniper scope has a nasty habit of zooming out every time you fire a shot. It’s as if Patterson is stumbling from carrying all those weapons. And speaking of weapons, you don’t really get anything new like the Sauer 38H and Suomi KP/-31, just the usual American and German arms you saw in the last three games.

Presentation has apparently downgraded from the game’s predecessors. The OSS office is just a plain desk with personal items. The mission briefings include lazily used cutscenes ripped straight from the game instead of photos and painted artwork. Also those mission briefings seem to act as it Patterson keeps leaving Germany back to London and then returning to his mission where he left off, which doesn’t make a lot of sense seeing as he’s deep in Nazi-controlled territory, 1000 miles from the British coast.

And what do the six missions throw in your face? Well, the first mission is more or less a repeat of what Mike Powell did in Omaha Beach in Allied Assault. Tight spaces like inside a submarine and small houses make shootouts awkward, due to the slow aiming. Adding to this, the rail shooting parts such as the mine cart ruin the free movement you would be accustomed to.

The Bottom Line
This game doesn’t really live up to its title name. The only frontline proper you ever got was in the first mission. This one should have been called “Medal of Honor: Covert Operations” or something. It’s hardly a match for the Allied Assault series as what it’s got falls below expectations and on a newer console too. It feels like EA got too much inspiration from movies and not enough from real-life events or factual history and wasn’t using the full capabilities of the PS2. Your sole reason to play this one is to play more MOH levels. In the end, it’s just a mediocre midquel to the original PS1 game.

The Good
+ Customisable controls
+ Excellent presentation
+ Great soundtrack
+ Adequate graphics


The Bad
- Clunky, stiff controls
- Some cryptic mission objectives
- Unstable framerate
- Finicky hit detection


The Bottom Line
Presentation: 90/100
The introduction is excellent, as well as that the first level is a part of D-Day, and can sometimes feel like as if you are part of the battle.

Graphics: 80/100
The graphics are adequate, as well as much of the level designs, but the framerate can sometimes drop if the action gets very hectic.

Audio: 87/100
The gunshots are realistic, and the voice-acting is passable. But what stands out in the sound department is the excellent soundtrack. This game also supports Dolby Surround.

Controls: 55/100
Medal of Honor: Frontline is a decent game, but could've been better if the developers ironed out some control issues. The controls is one of them; while having the ability to customise almost any button is a great idea, but being forced to use an imprecise aiming sensitivity is not, turning and looking can be either too slow or too fast, and also there's no auto-aiming or a sensitivity adjuster to remedy this issue. To add insult to the injury, you have to be pinpoint accurate, and aiming in general is stiff and unfriendly. The controls is a mixed bag with no auto-aiming, and with the imprecise aiming which is compensated by customisable controls.

Difficulty: Easy but technically frustrating
The game on easy is generally very easy, while hard is fairly difficult, especially when you're fidgeting around with the aiming. Getting shot is not as easy to tell as it was in the previous games; in the original Medal of Honor, the screen would violently shake, indicating that you're taking damage, but here, the screen makes a small screen jerk that's almost unnoticeable.

Gameplay: 80/100
The main gameplay is great, but leaves room for improvement. The AI is adequate, the level designs are good, but there are certain issues in gameplay, such as how it's sometime hard to tell if you are taking damage or not. While that there's no blood anywhere in the game, the enemies sure like to put a show to their rather long death animations, but it can turn redundant as some animations can become delayed. The rate of fire for most weapons are reasonable (eg. Colt .45, MP40), but some are questionable (Silenced Pistol).

Overall: 79/100
Medal of Honor: Frontline is a decent game, but its weaknesses, such as the crippled control can affect the gameplay. If you can overlook these flaws, you'll have a lot of fun with the game.

Score: 79/100