Customer Reviews

Brothers in Arms Road to Hill 30 [Download]

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(12)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(12)

 

 

Ingredients:

Large cup Band of Brothers
Pinch of Command and Conquer
Generous slices of history
Garnish with authenticty

Second World War games are no stranger to the PC - indeed, the First-Person shooter market is positively swamped with them. Medal of Honor, still a fine game after all these years, gave us a crisp, detailed and immersive slice of being a part of the greatest war in history. Battlefield 1942 let us play around with planes, tanks and great big ships in an online sandbox. Recently, Call of Duty assaulted our senses with a vision of war at it's most visceral and crucially, developed the idea that you the player were far from alone on the battlefield. Computer controlled squad-mates charged into the fray along side you, a gratifying and certainly more authentic experience. Now, Brothers in Arms from UbiSoft takes it to the next level with it's implementation of full infantry combat where YOU call the shots. Played principally from a first-person perspective, Brothers in Arms clearly draws from the same graphical pool as it's forebears - gritty, lifelike animation, sound effects that will rattle your speakers and plenty of neat touches - dust, explosions, sun glare and weapon flashes all look and sound great, and WW2 buffs will be able to salivate over a wide range of accurately modeled weaponry. As in other games, Brothers allows the player to commandeer enemy weaponry and gun emplacements in order to give 'Fritz a taste of his own medicine. The player can also duck behind cover or lie prone, which in this mostly-realistic world of bullet damage can make all the difference between a live paratrooper and a letter home to mom. So far, so Call of Duty.

The ace-up-the-sleeve for this game comes in the form of your GI comrades. The player is typically accompanied by 2 computer controlled fire teams. In combat you can give orders and instructions to your troops using a simple, context-sensitive command system. Placing the command cursor, similar to aiming crosshairs, over the terrain instructs your troops to move to that position - once there, they are smart enough to find appropriate cover and begin to scout for enemy positions. Under attack, they automatically return fire, cover each other while reloading, and stay hidden and defended if the going gets really rough. The AI is leaps ahead of previous games, and it's a tremendously satisfying sight to watch your troops take care of themselves without you having to hold their hands. The 2 fire teams are split between a rifle squad, who are able to lay down supressing and covering fire with their M1 Garands and BAR, and an assault element, who, with grenades and machine guns are used to flank and destroy the enemy - a classic infantry tactic that the developers have researched in order to get it spot on. A typical engagement sees you the player supporting one of these 2 teams, which really allows you to play in your own style - budding commandos will enjoy rushing right down the enemy's throat, Thompson Sub blazing, while thinky types will relish the more strategic side of planning the attack.

In order to simulate the intense pre-mission preparation that paratroopers underwent, Ubi has implimented a unique command-map that can be opened during play. The area around the player can be viewed from an aerial vantage point, and partial zoom and rotation allows the player to plot their next move. The map terrain for each mission has been modelled from historical photographs, and the development team actually visited the battlefield to get a feel for how it must have looked. Best of all, each member of your team is based on a real soldier who fought in the campaign. It's at once rewarding and curiously spiritual to know that you are leading representations of real young men into the jaws of death, and when one of your guys goes down in the field, you better believe it tugs at your heart in a way very few games can achieve.

Like most modern games, Brothers in Arms requires a decent computer, with a gig or so of hard-drive space, a quality graphics card and plenty of free ram. However, you don't need a supercomputer to have a great time - my machine is a P4, 1.4, 9600 pro and 512meg of RAM, and this game remains smooth even when the fight gets close and personal. I highly recommend this game to anyone after a fresh take on an exciting genre; one that takes risks, pushes the envelope and offers a powerful, moving, and above all fun experience.

I was really looking forward to getting this game... the media blitz really had this game super-hyped and I was hoping for a rival to Call of Duty. Sadly, the hype was hardly deserved.

In terms of hardware reqs, this game is pretty forgiving. I'm playing on a P4 2.8 with 1 gig of RAM and an iNvidia FX5600 card with 256 MB of on board RAM. I've had very few glitches and the frame rate has been perfectly fine.

Game play is where this title fails. As others have noted, the game is horribly redundant and overly scripted. Every map, every mission, every engagement with the enemy is the same -- fix the Bad Guys with supressing fire, then move the assault team in for the kill. The first few times it was pretty cool: look at 'em go! Just like a real combat unit! After a short while, though, the whole process becomes boring.

I've also found the hit probability to be frustratingly low. You can stand 20 feet away from a German, get him in the sights of your M1 Garand, aim at center mass, and still miss with the first three rounds. I'm sorry... but I have an M1 Garand. It's a very accurate rifle and really shouldn't be missing its point of aim from 20 feet or 200 feet. You can fidget with the point of impact properties in the bia.ini file, but you shouldn't have the tweak the program like that.

The are only two good things about this game, in my opinion. First, it's an entirely new look (different maps, good character/weapon renditions, etc.). Second, the computer controlled team mates actually seem to exercise intelligent (if scripted) thought -- they'll move into a position and seek cover right away, they'll engage the enemy without being instructed to do so, etc.

I didn't find the language to be terribly offensive -- nothing worse than you'd hear in Band of Brothers. I have no doubt in my mind that many of the troops fighting in WW2 had potty mouths. If I had been there, I'm sure I would have, too.

Aside from the language, the "M" rating is largely unwarranted. The blood and gore that was so greatly hyped is hardly anything to write home about. In my mind, blood splatters are hardly what I'd consider over-the-top in terms of gore.

I'll finish playing the game (I'm on D-Day +5 at the moment), but I seriously doubt I'll play it much after I've completed it the first time. Call of Duty has far greater re-playability (if that's a word) and will continue to the the game by which all other WW2-era FPSs are measured.

I'll just get it out of the way. BIA, in my opinion, is the best World War II FPS ever. Sorry all you Call of Duty lovers (a group i include myself in), but COD doesn't hold a candle to the immersive, dynamic, more realistic, and at times disturbing gameplay of Brothers in Arms.

COD is a blast to play, that's for sure. The words "run and gun" come to mind in every level. COD is paced at warp speed and never lets up on the bullets and body count until you arrive in Berlin, and we love it. I can play through the whole game in a few hours and not be sick of it by the end. It has great environments, good voiceover work, and passable AI. Only problem is, BIA makes COD look like a kiddy carnival.

The sign for me that Brothers in Arms is a great World War II shooter is the mere fact that I can't play it for more than an hour and a half at a time. It's exhausting, emotionally and mentally. The game makes you see the disgusting side of war, and yet you can't stop coming back to it.

I've never been a huge fan of strategy based games, but BIA transcends the genre by seamlessly combining FP fun with squad-based maneuvering that is so intuitive on the PC to pick up, in no time you will be commanding a tank, your fire and assault teams like a seasoned veteran. It keeps you constantly thinking - your position, possible cover, optimal spots for suppressing fire, potential flanking maneuvers, guarding your own flank from the smart AI. It forces you to be deliberate, like in actual combat. Plan your moves, and execute them carefully. This leads to sharp bursts of excitement when you pull off a filthy flank on the Germans and wipe out a machine gun nest. I haven't experienced anything like it in any other video games to date.

BIA makes you work for every kill. I hear people complain about the aiming system all the time. I must say, it is not that bad, especially on the PC where aiming is even easier as compared to console games. Granted, you can't expect to hit anything with your thompson from 100 feet away if you spray and pray, and its not very accurate from that distance if you aim down the sights...so be smart about it. Yes, even the M1 Garand will miss sometimes from close distances, that's war. But patience is key for this game. If you want to pick off some enemies before trying to flank, find an optimal position, kneel down and squeeze off careful shots when a German pokes his head up too far. It will probably take a few minutes. I've hit Germans on the run shooting from the hip, so it's not that the weapons are grossly inaccurate, it's that they can be unpredictable.

The game environment is amazing. The look and feel of the French towns and countryside remind me of Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers - the grays and browns of old townhouses against the well detailed trees and sky make for a perfect game setting. Better have nice speakers for this one, all the gunfire, explosions, curses of your fellow brothers, yells of the enemy, and your own characters sturdy commands to his men will give your sound system a good workout.

BIA doesn't shy away from the graphic violence of war. Unlike COD and MOH which opt for the "blood puff" effect, where the soldier gets hit 4 times in the chest, falls down, gets up, and starts shooting you again, BIA is much more true to real life. Most times one shot will take the enemy down, and it is not without a gratifying spray of blood. Particularly disturbing is when a German is standing in front of a wall when he is shot and the blood splatters on the wall behind him. Bodies also tend to remain visible once killed, unlike the lovely "ghost" effect of previous games ("Wow I just killed 4,000 soldiers on my way out of this secret German submarine base and all the bodies are mysteriously missing!").

The fact that the game is based on real events and real people only sucks you into it more. You end up caring about the lives of your men, mainly because you realize you won't live without them, so they really do end up becoming your brothers in arms. You learn their specialties, personality types, a little about their lives back home, and it all serves to create one hell of an emotional roller coaster the whole time. Early on in the game, a mortar crew wiped out my fire team before I could even move them to safe cover. Extremely pissed off and upset that I let it happen, I whipped around the flank of the mortar crew and unloaded with my thompson before they could even react. Without stopping, I repeated the act on the second mortar team to complete the level. Only then did I unglue my face from the computer screen and let my breath out. Right there I knew the game was special.

If you like World War II shooters, buy this game. If you like strategic games, buy this game. If you are a World War II fanatic, buy this game. If you loved Band of Brothers, buy this game. I can't say enough about it. It doesn't even run that great on my outdated Radeon 9000 video card, with frame slowdowns every once in a while, but I don't care. I'll play this game anytime, and you better believe it has incredible replay value, with wide open levels, and several ways to approach each battle.

I'll say it just once more and then I'll shut up. I haven't had a gaming experience like Brothers in Arms ever before.

Overview: Excellent twist on the old FPS genre. Good use of a simple team based structure, but still fundamentally the same genre, and not the more advanced real time infantry based skirmishing simulation that many were hoping for.

Disclaimers: As of this review, I have played about half the game (patched to 1.02). I havent played it in multiplayer, which may make a big difference.



Like many others, I have become bored of the run of the mill first person shooter. The only thing that changes is the resolution of the 3D models and textures, and theme of the things you shoot.

Something a little more is needed. A bit more thought and a little more to do except play a fairground duck-shoot that is made a little more interesting by the wonders of 3D hardware.

The hype with Brothers in Arms (BIA) was that it modelled real infantry tactics. The general rules of engagement against an enemy can be summarized as 'find him, fix him, flank him, finish him'. BIA models these tactics by allowing you to fix (ie suppress) an enemy by force of fire so that they cannot or dare not shoot back. This allows your team to flank the enemy positions and finish him.

So, I was looking forward to a tactical battle, with both the enemy and my side using real tactics, trying to beat the other not just by having the best guns and highest health, but by real tactical fighting.

Unfortunately, BIA is an old style FPs rather than a real time first person tactical simulation.

The first issue is that the enemy do not use tactics at all - they are your standard dumb and scripted enemy of every other FPS. Only YOU can use real tactics. This means that levels play out the same every time, despite the promises from gearbox that the AI was so good that it would respond to different tactics in different ways. Well, yeah, they might shoot in different directions if you approach from a different direction, but they do not move to meet new threats, and generally dont do anything clever. Put simply, they just feel like standard FPS enemies, each glued to their own part of a heavily scripted and limited map.

The second problem is that the levels are the old 'room based map' affairs, rather than the wide expanses of terrain in something like Far Cry or Operation Flashpoint. Its one of those games where you can see large expanses of fields in either direction, but there is usually a fence or something that magically seems able to stop the strongest tank from getting to the other side. Because of the small map sizes, there isn't really that much in the way of tactical options, and the best flanking route is usally the only flanking option... usually you have to find it and then use it. Flanking is more a puzzle to be solved than a real tactical decision.

Finally, there is a problem with storyline vs gameplay. Gearbox have gone for gameplay (despite the promises of missions based on research of actual skirmishes, and 3D detail scanned from actual footage, the game still feels more fps than deep simulation... the real South of France didn't have tree stopping you moving more than 200 yeards from the start point for a start!.
Much of the cammaraderie of the conflict is lost by sticking to FPS conventions, although the game does try hard to lose some of the old cliches - there is no health packs, etc. But those conventions that are kept tend to kill all that painstaking research and pull you back into FPS-land... fallen soldiers miraciously recovering for the next level is possibly the biggest reality killer for storyline, because you have no emotional link to any of your team - they are just another cog in the puzzle solving that underpins progress. Perhaps not a big deal to some gamers, but for me the title of this game seemed to imply a more thoughtful and real to life interpretation.

But I've still given this game 5 stars, because as a FPS (which is what it really is) it is one of the better efforts out there. Its fun, it makes you think a little more than the average FPS, and the graphics are cool. The team mechanic is simpler than hoped, but it still works, particularly because you cannot complete all but the earliest levels without using your full team. Also, the game plays well out of the box, which gives it mega kudos over certain other games (HL2, I'm talking about you!)

For those that are happy with a good FPS with a bit of simplistic team work thrown in, buy it. Its one of the better games of the genre, and will certainly not look out of place if your game collection has other good FPS games in it (Halo, Half Life 2, Far Cry, and the other WW2 FPS offerings such as MOHH and Call Of Duty).

For those that were hoping for true tactical combat, where the enemy AI feels like a real, directed team, you need to stick with the aging Operation Flashpoint for a little longer.
OFPs graphics may be an aquired taste, and OFP2 may be years off, but theres nothing here that comes anywhere near it for enemy infantry based AI.



Specs:
Works well on my hardware, consisting of Radeon 9800 Pro (overclocked by 10%), standard XP2800 and 1Gig memory (on most modern games, 512Mb can create glitching - 1Gig seems to be the minimum these days). Smooth, playable frame rates at 1280x1024 with all the options on high, so its not a difficult game to play on reasonable hardware.

*** UPDATE 24 March 2005 ***
Having now completed the game, It is obvious that this is a well designed game and a great concept and attention to historic detail. Unfortunately, they picked a rather odd choice in game engine... they use the old Unreal engine (albeit heavily modifed to create better graphics). This makes the reason for all the shortcomings in my main review obvious - technology.

Still, I thoroughly enjoyed the game, its just that I was rather hoping for a slightly different, more tactical and freeroaming game with a less scripted enemy (that doesnt stick to predefined positions), larger levels (to allow a more freeform game rather than the room based one we have), and bigger firefights (the game seems limited in the maximum number of soldiers it can support, and big setpiece battles seem a little cut down from the historic descriptions I have seen in the game and on the web.

S

Just got the game, installed perfectly fine on my DVD player, went to start the game .... no go. The copy preventative encoding causes some DVD problems and the game will NOT allow one to play, even though the game installed on the same DVD!

Went to forums to see if there was a workaround, and YES, there is. Google searched "no CD" patch for BIA and went to a site where I downloaded and unpacked a revised BIA.exe file which I copied into my installed, updated (1.10) game and replaced the original BIA.exe. All is fine ... game starts and plays without the need to have the DVD inserted. Hope this helps!

The game has some merit with the squad based play, but I find myself agreeing with a previous post. After about D Day +5 it loses it's appeal. It's just too tedious and the weapons inept to continue. A lack of saved games and the use of "checkpoints" will have you loading the same map over and over again. There is no anticipation of what's next, just relieve that the previous checkpoint is over and hope it won't be more of the same. What adds to the frustration is the under powered weapons. Just how many direct hits from a Panzerfaust does it take to kill a tank? I imagine a rifle shot to the forehead would most times be fatal, not in this game. The theme that war is hell is heavily stressed at the expense of realistic ballistics.

There is no problem solving or real strategy involved, just jumping though the obvious hoops. At least in Call of Duty you could decide to deal with the infantry before taking out a tank. Where in this game, even those basic choices are eliminated. In the end this is a first person shooter/strategic game that accomplishes neither. Not that this game is in anyway technically inferior, both the graphics and sound are passable for a recent release and I have had no stability or installation problems. I would rather just play something that is actually fun instead.

If you have played all the other WW2 titles available, then your options are limited. If not, I would recommend the following games as well: Call of Duty, Medal of Honor, Codename: Panzers, Heroes of WW2 and Sudden Strike. Whether it's a first person shooter, squad based tactics or real time strategy, each of these games deliver individual elements that far surpasses what Brother in Arms could possibly combine.

It's funny how game magazines and critics are besides themselves with joy when reviewing this game, because I was so incredibly disappointed with the execution that I sold it back within a couple of weeks. The idea is simple: take the intensely realistic, scripted action of "Call of Duty", throw in some squad based action ("Full Spectrum Soldier"; "Republic Commando"), add some Spielberg-esque attempts at narration and drama, and voila, the most over-hyped and underwhelming WWII action/shooter in history!

The GOOD: Nice Graphics (though not up to "Far Cry", "Doom 3" or "Half-Life 2" standards or even close); the game does present some tense, gritty and realistic moments; the voice acting can be pretty good (though it can also be cheesy and bad).

The BAD: Lather, rinse repeat. Here is the game in a nutshell: you are walking around with your squad. You spot a german machine gun nest. You order your buddies to lay suppressing fire on them. You walk around the convenient hedge/building/car to surprise the idiotic enemy and you try to pump them full of lead. The game is fun for the first few missions because its strategic element is new, but once you realize that it's pretty much all the game has to offer... Well, let's just say I went back to playing HL2.

The aiming is another casualty of the "realism". In an attempt to make you feel like you were really in the French countryside hunting Nazis, your weapon will bob and weave (presumably to simulate "real" aiming), you have no crosshairs (though you can insert them through the options menu) and your rate of fire is slow. There seems to be two camps when it comes to this game: those who love its "realism" and accuse the haters of simply liking unrealistic shooters, and those who can see through the hype and cheesy gimmicks (and that's what this game's realism is, a gimmick) and see the flaws and tedium of this game.

The UGLY: For all its realistic tendencies, this game magically revives your squad mate after every gunfight. How convenient! The enemy AI is mentally retarded (gee, a flanking maneuver! Never would have expected that!) and the main narrator sounds like an idiot.

BOTTOM LINE: I'm not against realism, but this is still a game, and there are certain conventions that exist because they make games more enjoyable. Sometimes games try to do away with those conventions (save anywhere, good mouse-look aiming, etc) and they usually fail, because at the end of the day... we are still playing in front of a monitor with a mouse and keyboard. The idea isn't bad, but the repetitive nature of the gameplay really, really got to me.

I'm going to voice my biggest complaint about this game first, so that anyone thinking of buying BIA because it looks "realistic" or because it looks like a "simulation" might be deterred.

The major drawback to the game is actually one of the simpler things: You are forced to use bulletproof wooden fences (huh?), haybails, and tin barrels as legitimate cover for yourself and your squad. This is all in a game which claims to let you use "Real Military Tactics." Ridiculous stuff. The tutorial part of the game actually instructs you to use things like fences as defendable positions. Exactly what soldier did they consult for those great hints?

Basically, you cannot crawl on the ground or go prone, so using dips in the terrain is not too common. The rare gully and stone wall or rock is really your only option for "real" cover, but the game more or less expects you to use the haybails to hide behind when a German with an MP40 is shooting at you. I would LOVE to know what was going through the minds of the designers for Brothers In Arms when it comes to that portion of the game. Come on - you don't have to be a genius to note that an MG42 is going to tear a wooden fence to bits and pieces, so why would the majority of the cover provided be thin wood or tin? No soldier in his right mind would scramble to a fence when being fired on, unless it was his last and only place to try and hide.

The game was built on the Unreal Engine like America's Army, so it's at least up to par in that area. The sound effects are great and accurate, making it seem like you're in a movie (the rip rip rip of the MG42 is what it should be -- alarming). The visuals and firefights seem great as well, grenade explosions look like they should and the flak being fired into the sky by Germans in fields around you makes it very immersive.

As for commanding the squad, it is easy and is a great idea, but the tactics are always the same: pin down the enemy and then find the ONLY route on the map to flank the enemy, as there is usually only one route to do so. The game doesn't offer large, open terrain, but levels consisting more or less of corridor-like fields for you to navigate, much like Call Of Duty. That normally isn't a problem when it is disguised well, but regardless, it gets old.

This is probably not the definitive WW2 grunt game you were lookin' for.

for me this game was great, it had me in its grip for about a week until i beat it on easy and am struggling through the other difficulties. to me this game plays more like a movie or something when you have breaks in between levels and hear your character talk. one thing that was lacking was when a squad member was killed i didnt feel i knew him well enough to care about it. i also wouldnt really consider this game a shooter it is a totally unique game, i would say you have the option to shoot. i have gone through levels without shooting once and having my squads do all the work. this game is much like full spectrum warrior in the tactical sense where you have one squad hold down the enemy and the other team flank them, and you probably wont kill the enemy in a shoot out. i also have never played call of duty and hear that is the best ww2 game from friends so take that into account while reading my review

Brothers in Arms is truly remarkable on so many levels it's difficult to know where to begin, however I guess I should start by saying that this is an ADULT title and not for the wee ones in your clan. The language is saucy to say the least with the "mother of all swear words, the F-dash-dash-dash word" being sprinkled around in liberal doses, so liberal in fact that in the beginning of the game the language (was to say the least) a trifle off-putting even for a guy who on occasion has been known to throw expletives around like Julia Louis-Dryfus on a bender. That said however, it is war after all and I can't imagine nearly having my head taken off by a German machine gun without some form of colourful metaphor slipping through my clenched teeth. The violence is fairly intense as well, but nothing we haven't seen in games like Call of Duty or Splinter Cell. Those issues taken care of lets get down to the nitty gritty of this outstanding title.

The game play is riveting as you are quickly called upon to lead a fire-team through the Normandy countryside. The action ramps up gradually enough to allow you time to acclimate to your weapons and commands without getting taken down in every open street. Ordering your team to direct fire on specific targets, to re-group or go to a location is fantastically executed; a simple right click of the mouse illuminates an onscreen icon, one for "go to a location" or "concentrate fire". The amazing bit of danger here however is being swallowed up by the fog of war as bullets zip over your head, while you're screaming orders to your comrades, in fact it's easy to get sucked so tightly into the action that you're lost with a deadly case of tunnel vision, and there in lies the vane of gold that runs through Brothers in Arms. Unlike any other combat game ever produced, you start to take it very personal when you've sent your boys on a fools mission just to have them gunned down in the middle of the street, you're in charge and you feel like it and frankly when someone gets killed because you've cracked under the pressure it p#@%es you off in a big way! You're responsible and it's easy to start thinking that maybe it's up to you to win every battle on your own so the kids under your command can go home in one piece, but that doesn't work either, this is a team based experience and you have to act as a tightly knitted team or get wiped out in the process.

On first blush the graphics seemed to stumble a bit but after 30 seconds who's noticing anything but the blazing flash from that MG down the street anyway? Compared to Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory (being a 10 graphically) Brothers in Arms offers a solid 8, but the way the levels are designed and the way the action moves, the images sometimes feel too real as German soldiers leap over a split rail fence cast against the horizon, it's a deadly mistake and one you'll take full advantage of but remember not to be caught in the same position yourself or face the dire consequences. Brothers also takes you behind the iron sites of your weapon, no crosshairs here, you stick you're M-1 under your chin and squeeze off a round, several rounds and guess what, sometimes you can't hit the broad side of a barn, that's because it's real, it's intense, war is imperfect and sometimes the guy on the other side of that hedgerow has a better aim than you do and you die.

Sound design is well executed, the snap of rifles cracking in the distance, or down tight alley ways is stunning and ear piercing and although 5.1 surround is stellar, wearing headphones offers a strange claustrophobic effect as you scramble with your rifle, crack-crack-cracking through the morning haze, you can hear your men screaming from somewhere behind you (or in the murky distance) that they don't have a shot or they're wounded, and the German's call out from behind sand bags... Bother in Arms is one wild ride indeed!

Performance is top notch on my system (Compaq Presario 8000T, Pentium 4 - 3.20E GHz processor, XP Home Edition, Radeon 9800, 1 GB DDR / PC3200 Ram, 160GB 7200 rpm Hard Drive) with every thing pushed to the firewall, no lag, no slow down just hours of white-knuckle thrills.

Brothers in Arms might be just a video game, but hopefully it's the closet our kids will ever get to real combat... if only we could fight all our battles from our desktops.