Customer Reviews

Men of War

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Men of War is the third in a series of poorly-named WW2 real-time tactics games, following Soldiers: Heroes of WW2 and Faces of War. I say "tactics" rather than "strategy" because this is more of a sub-genre of games where you don't manage bases or worry much about resources; rather, the focus is on in-depth tactics and keeping your men alive while killing the enemy. I played Soldiers (the first game in this series) and found there to be a number of problems that kept me from enjoying it, particularly the finicky control scheme, horrible user interface, and gruesome difficulty that was more frustrating than gratifying. This time around, however, Best Way has got it right.

The main difference between this game and other WW2 strategy games such as, say, Company of Heroes, is that this is is an organic battlefield; it doesn't feel static, but dynamic. Every one of your soldiers has their own inventory, can sneak, or can be placed under AI auto-movement in order to cut down on your micromanaging. The game has both massive clashes with hundreds of soldiers, tanks, artillery howitzers, and special ops units, and stealthy night-mission commando raids where you surgically cut into your opposition.

To illustrate, one of my favorite missions begins with you sneaking four Russian commandos around behind German lines, placing bombs on guns and sweeping minefields. There are more guns than can be destroyed, so you have to think ahead and decide which guns, whether machinegun nests, mortars, howitzers, or anti-tank cannons, must be destroyed for the battle that will follow when the sun rises. When you're ready, the next morning's battle begins as you charge infantry across trenches, battle with tanks, and perform precision bombing runs. The mission continues as you fight through mountains, mined roads, and finally a German base; and it's totally up to you the player how to accomplish your goal.

There are some very rough edges, but they can be forgiven when you realize how fun the game is. The voice acting is the worst I have ever heard in my life (with the exception of one voice actor out of around twenty), the difficulty is pretty rough at first (though you can slow down the action to about one-third speed, which helps in single player), and there are a few unit animations that are shoddy, but overall this game has become my most-played in the last year. I would recommend this to anyone who likes RTS games, and even to many who don't.

As others have noted, this game has a few rough edges. However, it is the most engaging real time tactical game that I've ever played; indeed, in my opinion it is the most enjoyable tactical game to hit the PC since the original X-COM came out in 1994.

Men of War puts you in the shoes of Russian, American and German forces during the height of World War II. You may be thinking, based on this, that it's just another Company of Heroes ("CoH") clone. It is not. The focus, pace and structure of the two games are hugely different. While CoH is a real time strategy game with limited base building and unit recruitment, Men of War gives you some soldiers, and perhaps some heavy weapons and vehicles, and that's basically it - everything else in the mission you will have to find on the battlefield. Your men can drive every vehicle they find on the field, can use trucks to pull artillery weapons, can load either high explosive or armor piercing shells into the heavy guns. Tanks can drive through buildings and walls.

The detail here is incredible. From the realistic physics (the angle of impact an armor piercing shell hits a tank, and where it hits the tank, make a big difference, for example) to the fact that each and every soldier has his own inventory and weapon proficiencies, there's a lot to fiddle with, which is great. A lot of times, you will control only a small front in a much larger battle. I haven't ever seen such a large scale simulation of battle in a game of this type before.

Two other fantastic features are "direct control" - you can take direct control of each unit in the game (enormous fun with tanks) - and multiplayer coop, enabling you to play through the campaigns with your buddies online.

I could go on, but I won't. For the discerning strategy gamer, Men of War is a must buy. It's not for everybody - I have read some complaints from those expecting another CoH; there is almost an overwhelming amount to manage, and the game can be very difficult - but what the game does, it does extraordinarily well. I think it's a modern classic.

After reading a number of reviews that compared Men of War (MoW) to Company of Heroes (CoH), I bought this game with the mindset that it would involve much more realistic military strategy. I can say it most certainly does, but at a heavy price: fun.

If Company of Heroes is like playing a game of checkers, Men of War is a game of chess.

I've played my share of real-time strategy games, but to say MoW is 'for experts' and requires a 'lengthy learning curve' would be an understatement. To my dismay, there was no interactive tutorial mission. The instruction manual does not get into much detail, other than what each command does.

The concepts of the commands are not complicated, but there are a lot of them. A few of the commands I simply could not imagine using in a strategy game; like holster weapon, or melee attack. They may as well add 'Throw rocks'. Learning how and when to use each command effectively is much more involved compared to most RTS games. It'll take you a lot of time to figure out what the heck you're doing, before you can focus on any serious strategy.

While there is no building or resource management in MoW, the micro-management of your individual infantry and vehicles makes this game much more complicated than most. This drags the game play down to an absurdly slow crawl.

Some elements of micro-management I could appreciate. For example, controlling the stance of your infantry (e.g. standing, kneeling, prone) to affect their aim and protection is useful. And ordering soldiers to repair tread damage on your immobilized tank is much more realistic than 'zapping it' back to health with a magic wrench.

Other elements I found to be excessive. In the first mission, my one and only tank had to be repaired twice. That's fine. But near the end of the mission, my tank stopped dead. What could be wrong? Out of gas.. Worse yet, I could not locate a gas can anywhere. So my troops couldn't siphon fuel to refill the tank. This is called a 'realistic annoyance'. I'm sorry, but I'm not looking for a level of realism where my tank runs out of gas and my soldiers have to get out and walk. (Sadly, there is no 'Get out and push' command. My tank was abandoned.)

As far as the details of the game itself, the sound effects are mediocre, though the voice acting is okay. While many reviewers have praised the graphics, I maxed out all the settings and still found them to be very plain. Being able to crash a tank through the house two enemy soldiers are hiding behind should be fun, but the animations just aren't very exciting. Like its slower pace of game play, MoW lags behind CoH for graphics and sound.

This game is much slower and more detail-oriented than other RTS games, like CoH or World In Conflict. The emphasis is on thinking, not reacting, so be prepared to sacrifice excitement for realism. If you typically play first person shooters or fast-paced RTS games (e.g. Call of Duty, Command & Conquer), you'll want to steer clear of MoW.

If you're prepared to account for every element involved in deciding, planning, executing, and adjusting a battle plan on the field of combat (from sharing ammunition between soldiers, to planting bushes to camouflage your artillery) then this is the game for you. Patience is required.

Having played Soldiers: Heroes of WWII I kind of knew what to expect.

On the plus side, it's the same as it's predecessor where you strategically move your soldiers across the field and manage yor resources.

As it's been said, there is a whole lot of micromanaging as you can scavenge almost anything off of the battle field.

It's a lot of fun if you have the time to dedicate to even just one mission which could take almost an hr or more to complete.

My only complaints are that along with that micromanaging you have to know sometimes to click off of one unit before you move to another. ANother gripe is that Sometimes your objective comes a bit muddled and you may not know where to go or exactly where to set up and sometimes you may not have enough time to set your soldiers before you are attacked (but to be fair, this is war after all). This isn't a build and rush game like Company of Heroes. You may sometimes find yourself overwhelmingly outmatched and that in itself is the beuty of the game...outwitting the AI...which plays a mean game of kill the soldiers!

My biggest gripe overall is that for a new game, it has some very dated graphics and lacks a lot of detail and I am running this game with an overclocked video card and I thought it would have stood up to Company of Heroes in that department. Again to its credit, there are plenty of things to destroy in this game and the back ground is rarely ever static and yes, the voices are very cheesy

This game is a real challenge. Every bullet is modeled and you can't save yourself by merely outproducing your opponent. Every man, every shell matters. It makes for a steep learning curve, but is ultimately rewarding for those who can master it.

I bought this game digitally on a impulse buy because there was a half off sale... if i had knew the amount of fun that was in store i would have paid full price immediately!
It is different from regular Stradegy games, much more difficult in my opinion, but you can read about the specifics in other reviews, my point is simply that i was surprised by it. hard to get a hold of it at first, but once you play it for a couple hours it is great fun.
the multiplayer is kinda retarded, you need a gamespy account, and i hate gamespy...
but the lan play with friends is fun and adds a new competition to the gameplay.

my major complaint is the lack of a skimish mode or random situation genorator. after playing through the campaigns 10 times I could go for a random battle here or there with simple blowing up of enemies :)

all in all its a great game and would highly recommend it to a WWII game lover like me!

The best Real Time Strategy Game out there. Realistic modeling and physics means no power bars like COH. Made for adults and smarter kids. Some criticize the ability to micromanagement which is great for the expert but you don't have to do this in Multiplayer to still be good at it. The dozens of free game mods for this make it a long term playable game

..which isn't a bad thing! If your someone who has played through COH and looking for something similar, then stay far away. If, however, you have an open mind, patience and an ability for good tactical thinking, then i can think of no better way to test all those skills. It also helps if you have some time on your hands as this is an enormous game that could take weeks to finish.

Those of you who have played Commandos and Best Ways' previous titles of Soldiers: Heroes of World War 2 and Faces of War will know whats on hand here. Unlike Company of Heroes (which i love), where 70 percent of the game consists of winnable situations with you methodically working your way around the map, Men of War refuses to do that. The game never puts you in a situation where you can leisurely decimate your opponent with building bases and capturing resource points. On the contrary, you will be given a limited amount of troops for the job and it is up to you and your brain to figure out how to win your objectives. Many times, you are in unwinnable situations and the goal is just to hold the line long enough to buy time for an evacuatio or some other offscreen event to happen. Needless to say, micromanagement can be a bitch. Missions can take hours to play if you dont make all the right moves.

This approach is clearly not for everyone. I have to say that the Soviet Campaign (there are also German and Alied Campaigns too-which are no walk in the park either)has to be the most frantic, nervewracking strategy experience i've ever had (i never saw so many red dots on a map before).

Despite the difficulty, i allowed myself to learn the game and i must say it proved to be one of the most addicting games i have ever played.
Make sure you have a spare keyboard as there is the slight chance you may smash the one you have in sheer frustration.

Simply, Men of War is for gamers who have patience with their games.
Do not buy this game if you like everything written out for you and someone explaining to you whats going on in a step by step tutorial. This game pushes the gamer to both explore and discover the posiblities of the different weapons as well as units. To be fair, they do tell you how to move and the very simplistic stuff, but its up to you to realize the potential of a Tiger tank.

In terms of graphics, this game looks good, but takes too many system resources in my opinion. It can look better and still take the same resources it does. I am running an E8400 Dual Core, 6GB ddr2 ram and a GTX 260 216sp XFX eddition and get some lag with full bloom. Then again, the high bloom makes you sleepy.

As for gameplay, it is very similar to Company of Heroes but it has tons of new features including the direct control which allows you to aim the weapons of your units.

Contextually, this game is very historically accurate and the units actually speak their native languages, which is always a very satisfying factor in any game. The gritty feel of WWII is done justice, and the buildings look very accurate in terms of architecture at the time.

Finally, the best part of this game is the multiplayer. I personally bought it after watching some videos of players duking it out in a capture the flag point scenario which proved to be very tactical after a couple of games online.

End of the day, Men of War provides a rich environment, very historically accurate units and buildings, and a nice realistic experience for any gamer.

PS: Do not buy this game if you do not like RTS games.
PSS: Do not buy this game if you do not like to explore the strengths and weaknesses of in-game units.

- GamerDudester

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I try to keep this brief and to the point.
First I LOVE this game. I was getting totally bored with Company of Heroes, my buddies and I had sort of mastered Company of Heroes and the only thrill was the point about ¼ into the game were the tide might (just might) change and make it a little more difficult to win. Don't get me wrong COH is a great game but for me the time had come to move on.
Enter MOW and I fell in love. First off, it does require micromanagement. Sometimes the controls can be a little wacked, sometimes the AI doesn't do what you want it to do.
JOYS:
ability to steal stuff of dead guys and use it.
ability to use opponent resources against them (hijacked tanks and other vechiles)

sound effects - when your machine gunner opens up on a crowd of bad guys and you here the drum beat of the gun and the bullets ripping through flesh and walls and ...

Graphics - I am playing on a high end machine and OMG it is eye candy heaven. Explosions that will have you saying "That was so cool!!!" and it was your own stuff exploding.
Load times - this game appears to have a LOT more going on with it than most other RTS in terms of physics but it loads up extremely fast. And shuts down extremely fast
Stability - I am running on high end Vista 64bit and ... I am trying to think... it has never crashed on me... never had a problem with the game.
OK now the BAD Stuff
CONS:
Voice Acting is really really really bad. But this is such a minor point for when comparing it game play value and it is only during the cutscene where it is really bad, in game it not bad at all.
Multiplayer - once you in a game it is cool. But it is a pain in the butt to buddy up with people. I wish the Multiplayer lobby was a little cleaner and easier to manage.
Single player is Brutal - I mean brutal even on easy, you are going to get your ass handed to you. Some levels you are there is just a stream of bad guys - they just keep coming and coming and coming. It gets a little frustrating but when you do accomplish the mission it is rather rewarding to know you `finally' beat that level.
TIPS:
Allowing your team to move at the own will, they will move - sometimes not where you want them to go. So use hold move. I usually use free move when I have them running across the map, this way if they see any bad guys they will open fire but once there, I switch to hold move.
Sometimes it is better not to fire and stay hidden.
Don't forget to grab ammo and health packs off dead guys - nothing worse than getting into a firefight and realizing your guys are firing because they don't have any bang bangs.
Wishes:
They had a skirmish mode where you could play the computer on equal terms
Hope this helps - Oh there is a demo for the game, so be sure to check out the demo before you throw down you hard earn cash to see if you like the micromanagement aspect of it. For the voice acting just turn down the volume during the cut scenes ;)