Customer Reviews

Company of Heroes

5 star:		(42)
4 star:		(16)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

This game is brilliant.

First a little history. I am a 43 year old gamer (and bad speller)who has been around since pong. I have gone the route of Pong, ColecoVision, Commodore 64, Atari ST and then the PC since the 386. Other than FPS (just not my thing, plus I suck) I have played all the different type of games many many times.

Even though these are my initial impressions of the game so far this is easily the most fun I personally have had with a RTS game since Total Annihilation. I have played the Age of Empires, Warcrafts, Starcraft, Rise of Nations, Dawn of War etc etc. All these games were different yet they had the same "feel" about them. COH feels new and that is something that the RTS genre really needed. The bar has been raised to a staggering height.

Why do I enjoy COH over these other RTS games.

1. Strategy: Flanking, Machine guns covering arcs, armor facing, etc. COH has real strategies that make you think instead of how fast you can click around the battlefield(more on this later). The battlefield is destructible which also adds a level of strategy. The brick wall that feeds enemy troops towards a choke point is great until that tank rolls through it giving the enemy another point of access. Wait until you come back to a great defensive point while you were busy at another area and see off-board artillery devistate your position.

2. Atmosphere: The atmosphere in COH's is awesome. The voices (warning crude language), graphics, etc. Every little detail is done to a new level of perfection.

3. A.I.: The A.I. is very good. Your troops will find cover if possible (unlike the report from a previous reviewer). If you have mortar teams back and a rifle company come upon enemy units they will automatically start bombarding that location. the computer player on normal is a very tough opponent for someone at my level in the skirmish mode (I have yet to bet him).

4. Resources: Resources are done like Relics pervious game Dawn of War with a added level of complexity. You have to take over points on the battlefield which will supply you with one of the three types of resources required. What is different is that each point is in a sector and these sectors must be joined back to your base (by being adjacent to another friendly sector). It is possible to lose a sector which will isolate some of your other sectors and their resource income. This adds even more strategy to the game.

5. Map: The map in the game is outstanding. It shows the sectors your troop locations with a symbol what they are, if they are pinned, suppressed, in combat. A excellent way to have a snapshot of what is happening.

Is this game perfect no but what is. Although some might find this game easy I (like most) find it very hard. Even with the advance A.I. I always feel like I am out of control and need to be at 20 places at once. The good thing is that you can pause the game, go through your troops giving them orders, gather your wits and then let all hell break loose again. I have not played online but at my speed I would probably get massacred. Even tough I think the language fits the game perfectly I agree with some that you should have the option of turning it off if you have kids around. I was also underwelmed with the first mission of storming the beach. I know they were trying to ease you into the game but i think they missed the marked and was more confused after the mission than I was before I started.

I highly recommend that you purchase this game, support Relic as they deserve it. Give yourself a treat pick up Company of Heroes.

First let me say other reviewers mentioned this is a difficult game to play and win because of all the action. It is difficult until you realize two very important things:

1) You can give orders to your units while the game is paused! This makes the game almost like a turn-based game. If you try to play without pausing it does become a very tough click-fest.

2) Relic themselves published a 'cheat' that allows you to adjust the game speed from its default of '10' all the way down to '1'. So if you do not like pausing you can simply slow the game in general.

So having said that how is Company of Heroes (CoH)? First the graphics are outstanding. They are almost equal to that of a FPS game of just a few years ago. You can fully rotate and zoom the view. Like Relic's previous 'Dawn of War' title you cannot zoom out very far but they did include an 'operational' map view that shows the overall battlefield with unit icons. This helps alleviate the problem with the inability to zoom out.

Sound is very well done. Weapons sound correct and the various audio clues of what is going on are vital. The units do swear, which is unnecessary and really adds little to the game, but it is humorous the first few times you hear it.

Game play is very similar to `Dawn of War' and most RTS games. What CoH does well is it includes the objective resource system from DoW but expands it to include four different resource objectives: fuel, munitions, gas, and area. Combinations of the four allow you to build and improve your units. In addition, as you capture resources you gain control of an area. It is also possible to cut off an area and thus lose the resources from it. This simple system encourages not only attacking but also higher level options such as flanking. This is unique to a RTS title and is very well done and works even better.

CoH is not a wargame but a RTS game with a bit of wargame feel to it. The game plays much like a normal RTS game. The unit choices are interesting and mostly historical. Most of what you would expect in a WW2 title are here. You can even call in artillery, airstrikes, paradrops, and other support functions. Engagement ranges are ridiculously short and this hurts some of simulation feel as vehicles and heavy weapons are not able to stand off as far as they should. But, again, this is a RTS title not a wargame.

The biggest complaint with the game is the AI. The enemy AI does a very good job overall especially for a RTS game. But the friendly AI reactions have some real brain dead moments that will either cause you a lot of grief or force you to micromanage more than you would wish. For example, an enemy tank will move up and fire on your infantry squad and wipe it out while a friendly tank of yours sits just half a screen away doing nothing about it. I've lost buildings to infantry attacks while my own infantry sat by and watched. Units will also make some silly moves. Tanks will sometimes ram each other and rarely try to flank each other or seek nearby cover.

But overall the limits of the AI and few other quibbles are overshadowed by the great game play and overall great `feel' of the game. It provides the most tactical and combined arms options of any RTS game to date and for that it succeeds and for that any RTS fan should pick up `Company of Heroes'.

This little masterpieceis everything you want in a real-time strategy. I wasn't a fan of RTS before this gem came out--now I can't wait for the expansion pack that will offer more maps to play single player skirmishes... and perhaps even, weeeeee... a map editor!

The graphics are simply out of this world. I found myself watching a streetfight between the axis and allies and noticing that down there on the cobblestones was a broken piano. It's beautiful little touches like this that makes a game so remarkable. In fact there is all types of debris in the game, all types of house models, so much stuff that I can't wait to see each next map. The game is simply a delight to look at.

The AI really does run for cover, especially when there is a tank or a big gun shooting at them. If not--if they feel confident enough that they can take their adversary--they will stand boldy where they are, not bothering to take cover. I think, dare I say it, each little man has his own personality and will take cover when choosing to do so.

The campain is fun to watch. The game works like a first person shooter, but when the story stops and you get dropped into it, it pulls you back so that you can view the entire battlefield and have control over everything.

I can't belive how fun this game is. I never thought I'd get into a video game like this again, especially an RTS. The only reason why I gave it a less than perfect score was because they didn't provide a map editor. With a map editor, it would have been perfect.

And another thing... Why can't the allies or axis build trenches??? ... I want trenches!

Do yourself a favor and buy this game. It's worth every penny and more.

Company of Heroes is the latest real time strategy game from Relic who are known for their excellent Dawn of War RTS titles set in the Warhammer universe.

In Company of Heroes Relic takes a more realistic approach to the RTS genre. Set during WWII CoH follows Able and Fox Companies from their landing on the beaches of Normandy through their closing of the Falaise pocket.

In CoH the gameplay has been adapted and enhanced from Relic's Dawn of War games. Instead of capturing generic control points on the map just for resources and territory, instead in CoH capturing points gives you control over that territory and in addition provides a population cap increase and generates more manpower. Manpower along with fuel and ammunition are the three resources that you will use to supply your army. While you gain manpower by capturing any control point there are specific control points that generate fuel and ammunition. Obtaining and defending those points successfully is a major part of the game.

Because of this gameplay mechanic, playing the game defensively is usually not a very successful tactic. The game rewards players that move in and capture territory. During the campaign as you capture territory and destroy the enemy you receive special command upgrades that allow you to obtain more advanced units, build units more quickly and call in air and artillery support among other things. These special abilities still cost you resources to use though and the person that has resources to use them when necessary will be the winner in an engagement.

The AI on both sides of the game is able to handle itself fairly well. Your soldiers are usually very intelligent about taking cover, but they still require micro-management to use their special abilities. All infantry units have special abilities that can tip the balance of an encounter in their favor, but without your guidance these abilities will never get used.

The vehicle AI is generally good with the exception of some pathfinding problems and an annoying tendency for vehicles to present their lighter armored backside to enemies at inopportune times. In tight combat situations micromanaging which armor side is shown to enemy gunners is critical and at the same time you'll need to maneuver your armor to flank the enemy and catch them from the rear. At certain points the enemy AI is very good at keeping their armor effectively positioned and at other times they ignore facing completely and present an easy target. Sometimes this is the difference between facing a green or veteran unit, but at other times the AI just seems to give up their back.

Another issue with vehicle AI is that vehicles when ordered to directly attack another vehicle like to run right up on that vehicle and collide with them rather than come to a stop at a distance and fire. This can be problematic when the enemy you attack is grouped to the rear of other enemies and your unit ends up presenting their rear armor to the other enemies.

The enemy AI can be challenging and in some scenarios overwhelming. The scenarios in general vary in difficulty that way, but usually the challenge is in finding the right mix of units and support to utilize. Each scenario presents primary goals to complete and a secondary goal which will earn the player a medal for outstanding performance. These secondary goals often involve inflicting additional casualties on the enemy or avoiding excessive losses on your side.

While there are only fifteen scenarios to complete these are packed with details and can often last for several hours as each scenario will have multiple goals embedded in it. For instance you might be tasked with capturing a town from the axis and then afterwards you must hold it for a period of time against a counterattack. The aforementioned secondary goals also add performance challenges that will make you rethink how effective you were in completing the scenario.

The graphic engine makes use of as much hardware as you can present. The units are well crafted and scaled, the terrain is detailed and the destructible environments are well done. Being able to reduce buildings and obstacles to rubble adds to the gameplay experience immensely.

Running on two year old hardware my play experience was limited by my Radeon 9800 Pro AGP graphics card with a measly 128mb of RAM and limited support for the latest technologies. In addition I'm running an Athlon 64 3200 with 1GB of RAM. While the game recommended running at 1024x768 with most of the more advanced settings turned down I found that even at that resolution I was getting a good amount of slowdown in large scale battles. I ended up lowering the resolution to 800x600 to keep things moving smoothly. I found the graphic presentation to be quite good even without being able to turn up the juice.

If you haven't bought/upgraded your machine recently with PCI Express and one of the newer video cards then you'll probably have the same experience I did in terms of performance as this game requires a lot of computer power in every area. Loading a scenario for the first time can take up to a minute on my machine even with a 10000 RPM SATA drive.

That said, once you are in the scenario there are no loading screens and save game loads within the same scenario are much quicker than the initial load. It's worth the wait.

The sound in the game is immersive. The explosions and weapon fire will rock you if you have a subwoofer attached to your sound system. The units will call out and alert you when they are under attack and in general respond appropriately depending on their status in a battle or otherwise. As one poster noted there is a bunch of harsh language mixed in, but I didn't find it to be out of place.

The campaign story itself is well put together, but certainly doesn't approach something like Starcraft in terms of tying the story and the scenarios together. This didn't detract from the gameplay, but I wasn't really drawn into the campaign story very much.

Overall, I found Company of Heroes to be a satisfying game in most aspects with only minor quibbles and very few obvious flaws or bugs in the initially delivered product. Unfortunately, now I think I think it's put me in mind to upgrade my computer.

A very quick review since I haven't played the entire game yet.

First: this is a real fast paced game. You very quickly feel "out-of-control" and trying to keep your head cool is a very hard thing to achieve. Not unlike real war I guess!

Second: it is indeed a great game. It looks spectacular and the one thing you can't help but notice is how well polished it is. Yet another fine product from the fine folks at Relic.

A buying advice: get the regular edition, not the special edition: I got the special edition and the only difference is a small printed "real map" of D-Day, 10 little cards, a slim metalic box, and an extra CD with mostly text info and very little in the ways of content! I feel like I've been cheated.

If you haven't bought Company of Heroes yet, you're probably thinking another World War II strategy game is about as fresh and exciting as the next Kelly Clarkson clone on American Idol Season 42.

But in this case believe the hype - this game is easily in the running for best strategy game of the year. The graphics put many first person shooters to shame, the music and voiceacting is top notch, and the gameplay is easy to learn but hard to master. Best of all the emphasis is on outmanuevering and killing the enemy, not harvesting mulberry bushes and wood.

Pros
1. Absolutely beautiful graphics - I dare you to zoom in to ground level and try to tell the difference between COH and Call of Duty. Let me also mention the fully destructable world (tanks can plow through hedgerows, artillery can blow up buildings, etc).

2. A streamlined economy that makes sense. There are only three resources, with manpower being the most abundant, munitions being semi-abundant, and fuel being the precious "gold" source. By capturing strategic points on the board you increase your rates of resources. You can build upgrades that improve your resource rate but there is no need to actually sit and mine resources once you capture a point.


3. Emphasis on tactical decisions, not "ZOMG Zerg rush!" In the thick of battle you have to build obstacles and emplacements with your engineers, ensure your infantry troops are in cover, try to outmanuever enemy tanks for a killing rear blow, and use special abilities like throw grenades or satchel charges. There's no such thing as gathering a million units, right clicking towards the enemy lines and hoping for the best - your massive hordes will get mowed down by just 1 or 2 well-placed bunkers. Resupply of new units is also pretty slow compared to many games - meaning every unit from the lowliest grunt to the big Pershing and Tiger tanks matters.

4. A great deal of historical accuracy without bogging down in "Grognardism." The units all look wonderfully realistic and most major vehicles and weapons from the invasion of Normandy are in the game. You can even add historically accurate upgrades such as bulldozer blades to Shermans for busting through hedgerows, etc. Vehicles that were incredibly rare for the European theater are correspondingly hard to deploy in the game - so there's no worry about being bulldozed by the "L33T" all-Tiger tank company. On the flipside, the game doesn't go into stupid historic detail that would confuse/frustrate many players.

5. The best single player campaign I've played since Warcraft 3. Ok, there is the "Saving Private Ryan" melodrama and the obligatory storming Normandy Beach opening. That being said, the campaign is excellent. The cutscene movies are great and the objectives for each mission are incredibly challenging. In the second mission I had to gather a company of paratroopers that had gotten cut off after the Normandy airdrop, raid a nearby ammo depot for heavy anti-tank guns, then set up an ambush as an armor column of Germans arrived. Fail at any step along the way (don't rescue enough paratroopers, dont capture the guns) and you will have no way of achieving the final objective.

5. Top-notch music, sound, and voice acting. The music is by Jeremy Soule - 'nough said. If you don't know Jeremy's work, let's just say I rank his work in Company of Heroes on par with any big budget Hollywood soundtrack. The sound effects are all well done but what shines are the voice-acting. The chatter is often hilarious with grunts saying "close enough for govt work" or "if I see another f'ing sandbag" when you have them build structures. In a firefight you'll hear them scream obscenities and "eat my pineapple you f'ing Kraut." And yes the F-bomb is frequently uttered - which to me is a refreshing change from the "boy howdy we're pinned down" politically correct voiceovers you find in way too many games these days.


Cons

1. Steep learning curve - even on easy the AI can give new players a run for their money and the hard AI is downright diabolical. This is the first game where I've seen the computer do really sneaky things like set up ambushes or use snipers to pick off lone patrols. Needless to say, PVP is incredibly brutal for noobs (which I fully consider myself).

2. System hog and poor multiplayer connectivity - This game's requirements are among the most demanding of any PC game out there. Even with a pimped-out gaming rig you can expect long load times, although the game itself runs smoothly once you're in a mission. Make sure you have close to the recommended specs (3 Ghz processor, 1 Gig RAM, latest video card or two) before buying.

Also, the multiplayer servers run by Relic are currently lag city. Expect to get dropped from more than one multiplayer match.

3. Adult content - This isn't really a con for me but it could be if you're buying this game for your 12-year-old grandson. The violence is pretty realistic and so's the language. However, COH is a perfectly acceptable title for anyone in their mid-teens and older.

4. It's based closely on the 40K Dawn of War engine. Once again, I liked the 40K series and I've found COH to have made large improvements in most areas (especially graphics). But some people don't like the Dawn of War franchise so here's fair warning that the gameplay is pretty similar.


In conclusion, Company of Heroes is a must-buy for any strategy gamer or even WW-II enthusiasts (I've had several friends who are hardcore shooter fans warm up to COH because it's such an excellent historical title). Considering I burned out on Starcraft, Warcraft, Command and Conquer, and Age of Empires in my early 20s, only a tremendous game like Company of Heroes could get me excited about the RTS genre again.

this game is great!
I have played many many hours verse friends in college, and will continue so until the next CoH.

The good:
The graphics are the best part. The textures make extremely low polygon units and vehicles look almost photorealistic; it also adds the feeling of history on weapons and buildings. Bump maps make helmets and sandbags have depth instead of a flat texture look. The effects are simply amazing. There is nothing worse than seeing your veteran tanks all ready to go get destroyed by an artillary barrage. And there is also nothing cooler than watching your guys fire a bunch of rockets at faraway units.
The sound is the next best part. You can hear muffled sniper rifles firing, or enemy artilary attacks before you loose many units. Machine gun fire from across the map is that low thumping sound you hear from realistic war movies.
The next best and sometimes worst part is the AI. Your guys will take cover when attacked, and wont do anything when nearby enemies are around which is both great and self defeating. I can usually send my guys somewhere to attack an enemy and leave them be for a while, which is always good.
Dawn of War, Relics next best game has a mode you can set your guys to that lets them know they can attack nearby units, but only so far. That is one of the things missing in this game that I would have liked to see.
Your guys will also do some weird things like not do what you say or keep running into things, but it is easily forgivable. The computer AI is also very predictable and linear.
The learning curve is very low. I'm not a huge fan of RTS, but I love this game. If you like Warhammer, Command and Conquer or Blitzkreig, then this is a great game.

Now, the bad:
Besides AI, the voice acting is pretty bad. They practically the same stuff which is great for about 5 minutes. Your shermans will complain that they are being attacked, even by units that do NO damage to them. And it also seems like your allied engineers dont like their job..."this isnt what I signed up for", etc.
There is 0, repeat ZERO support from Relic. Okay, well, maybe a little, but there are no map mods or other downloadable content (which make 2 sides and only a handful of maps boring after a while), and if you ask for help, they give you answers that dont fix the problem.
The requirements are pretty steep, but I can play very low textures, no shadows, etc on a mid to low end system (p4 2.6Ghz, ati 9600xt 128, 1 gig ram).
Also, while the single player was pretty fun, the storyline was boring and didnt serve a purpose for me.
The animation is not great, like you see all kinds of clipping and skipping in walk cycles, but I didnt really care.

Its still an awsome game. I cant wait for the next one.

Packed with great content but be prepared to work for your victories.

This is only my third tour into the world of RTS games and I have to say that I am very impressed with both the game content and the playability of this latest entry. Company of Heroes is a WW-II based real time strategy game set in Western Europe in the Summer of 1944. The game is subdivided into 3 areas of content; single-player campaign, single-player skirmish against the computer, and multi-player. There is also a short tutorial available to teach new players the basics of gameplay.

The GUI is very similar to other recent THQ games, any players familiar with the Dawn of War series will find the user interface intuitive. Most combat units spawn from fixed structures at the price of available resource points. Units may be selected via the mouse from a graphical panel in the corner of the screen or from the use of hotkeys. The mouse can be used to scroll across the map (only about 5% of the map is shown at any one time), rotate views, and zoom in to see the detail but most of the time the action is so hot and heavy that there isn't time to change views and the default view is adequate more than 90% of the time. There is also a tactical map available that displays a top-down view of the entire field of battle and units can be directed from this view but no new units can be selected from here.

Resource points are classified as personnel, ammo, or fuel. Resource points are normally accumulated by holding territory and building improvements. Additional combat units and resource points can be brought onto the field by airborne drops or by capturing key buildings or points. Additional specialized skills and units can also be selected by choosing a specific military doctrine or discipline but selection of a doctrine automatically locks a player into a specific tree of available improvements to the gameplay.

Combat units vary from the engineers and light infantry to heavy tanks and mobile artillery units. Air support is also available in the form of reconnaissance aircraft, fighter/bomber strafing runs, off-map artillery and even V2 rockets for players in Skirmish mode playing Axis. New structural units can also be brought onto the field in the form of new buildings or defensive improvements such as sandbags, barbed wire fences, etc. Two defensive skills that are notably missing are the ability to dig foxholes or trenches.

The single-player campaign is focused on completing missions set in locations of actual battles fought in WW-II. Each mission has different objectives. One shortcoming to the single-player campaign is that the whole campaign is played entirely from the point of view of the Allied forces and the missions are all based on the months immediately following the Allied landing in Normandy. The campaign menu screen was clearly designed with expansion packs in mind so expect to see upcoming releases for future campaings. In addition to completing each mission's primary objectives there is the opportunity to complete secondary objectives for medals and other badges of honor but these medals do not add any extra capabilities to the game.

The skirmish mode allows one to play against the computer either 1:1 or fighting with or against up to 3 additional AI players on a fixed map with the goal of capturing and holding key positions. Each skirmish game can typically take 30-60 minutes depending on the skill level of the player and the AI. Here is where your computer really needs to be up to snuff in terms of video processing power because the 4:4 maps can have up to 50 different units in play and this will really slow down computers that do not have up-to-date video cards, and CPUs.

Multi-player is also supported for Skirmish games and users can create and download custom maps from a number of community supported websites.

Players must adopt a very strong offensive strategy to succeed in most games in Company of Heroes. Players cannot afford to dig in too deeply because there are too many ways the opponent can wipe out defenses very quickly. I learned this the hard way when I tried to sandbag and mine a key set of bridges in Carentan only to see my hard work wiped out in seconds by an off-map artillery barrage. One should also note that the differences between Axis and Allied forces are more than just the colors of their uniforms and the names of the tanks. Each side has unique paths to unique unit improvements so don't expect that being an expert at Allied skirmish will make you equivalently skilled as an Axis commander.

There are a few bugs in this game, mostly related to the start of short movies between missions. I had several instances where missions would not start, pending a software queue to begin a movie. After rebooting, the movie and mission played fine so I do not think this was a limitation of my hardware. One should also download the 1.4 patch immediately after installing the game because there is a bug in the 1.3 patch that allows vehicles to drive right through barbed wire and tank traps as if they weren't there (among other bug fixes and improvements, mostly for multi-player).

One feature heavily touted in this game is the visceral detail during combat. This is especially apparent during explosions. Bodies fly, vehicles and buildings burn, buildings can even be reduced to rubble given enough firepower during attack. Tanks will drive right through most walls so get used to thinking outside of the lines in this game.

There are 4 different difficulty levels available for all missions and one can switch between difficulty levels during the campaing. At higher difficulty levels playing against the computer expect to work very hard for victory. Other experienced RTS gamers have reported that this game requires less micromanagement than many other games of this genre. Fortunately, one can pause games against the AI and still scroll the map. This is a valuable safety net for newbies not quite ready for the true "real time" experience.

Overall, the game content and replay value make this game a great addition especially for players new to RTS.

I'm glad I read some of the reviews of this game before buying or I would have been pretty disappointed. Don't get me wrong; this is a great game for its genre. The graphics are phenomenal even at the lower settings and the gameplay is intense and challenging (extremely challenging, in fact).

My issue with Company of Heroes is that it is almost a direct rip off of the Dawn of War engine. In fact, this essentially is Dawn of War with WW II skins. If you really liked Dawn of War this is good news. If you were looking for the groundbreaking game hinted at in all the early Company of Heroes hype you may be disappointed.

Having read many of the early gaming magazine and online reviews, there were very few indications that CoH was so closely tied to Dawn of War. I can't say I read enough gaming reviews to give a truly thorough accounting, but I get the sense that there was a bit of deliberate manipulation going on to make this look like something more than it actually is.

Bottom Line: Buy Company of Heroes because its a great twist on DoW and for the great graphics. If you're expecting something new and exciting, keep waiting. Don't sweat the systems requirements if you have at least a 2.0 Mhz chip, 1 gig of RAM, and a 256 graphics card.

First, I'd like to say that I'm not the biggest fan of Real Time Strategy, where you have to move quickly to get everything done. I play a few, but prefer strategy, simulation, and role-playing games. I buy 5-10 games per year, normally highly rated, and play them until I'm bored, I finish them, or I reach too difficult of a stage.

This game, frankly, is the best game I've seen in 2-3 years. Graphics are stunning on my new IBM Thinkpad with a mid-level graphics card. Sound is great, the dialogue is original, and sounds realistic. I can't believe it NEVER gets old, as it always changes (it seems very real to life).

If you never play RTS games, it WILL take you some time to learn this game. But it will reward you with 20 good hours of solid, fun, non-repetitive gameplay.

From the opening scene of landing on the beach of Normandy, through the remaining 15 missions, it's an incredible experience.

I give this 5 stars, without hesitation.