It has been nearly 3 years since the Medal of Honour series made it's debut on the PC with Medal of Honour: Allied Assault. Powered by an aging Quake III engine, Allied Assault introduced us to the gruesome battles of Europe in World War II whilst providing a slight storyline to keep things rolling. The only problem was the fact that, for the most part, it lacked realism. Almost every mission found you roaming Nazi-owned territory by yourself. It was almost like Rambo of WWII as you would single-handedly take down squads of Hitler's men.
With its lack of realism aside, Medal of Honour: Allied Assault quickly paved the road for future WWII shooters. The most notable of these is Call of Duty which, when released last year, quickly became a crowd favorite. If you have read our Call of Duty reviews than you will know that our main point for loving the game is it's dedication to intense action. Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault does not necessarily excel in this area, but it does greatly build upon its predecessor's lack of realism. In fact, Pacific Assault may be the most realistic WWII shooter we have ever played. The European battles through ruined Russian cities and open countryside are now a thing of the past as you say 'hello' to the pacific theater. The game opens up with the battle of Tarawa Atoll where the Americans are attacking this Japanese-owned island. A cutscene opens with you and your fellow soldiers heading towards the beach. Actually, throughout the game you will run into many cutscenes that allow the story to move forward. Cutscenes are somewhat rare in WWII shooters, but they look very good here.
The Story
You play as a marine named Tommy Conlin. Right from the start of the game you are forced into this battle at Tarawa Atoll with your 3 best friends fighting alongside you. Only moments after getting ashore, you are knocked out by a shell landing near your position. Obviously the nearby blast puts Tommy in quite a shock, and he starts having some flashbacks of all the events that led up to this point. As you may have already guessed, almost the whole course of the game takes place in these flashbacks. Starting in the beginning of the flashbacks you will find yourself going through some basic training at boot camp where you will meet your 3 new friends. The story is told very well straight from the start, and you will soon find that you have a strong connection with these men whilst in battle. After some grueling exercises in boot camp, you are then assigned to the tropical spot of Pearl Harbour.
Before your tour of Pearl Harbour is over, Japanese fighters make their way over the harbour. Right away bullets are bouncing all over from these fighters as they come from everywhere and try to strafe anything moving on the ground. You have to quickly make your way to a PT boat where you can man the gun and make your way to the larger ships in order to protect them. This mission is the highlight of the whole game. The Pearl Harbour mission in Pacific Assault compares to the D-Day mission in Allied Assault . Meaning that this is the most intense an insane mission in the game. You watch as large American vessels capsize and sailors are screaming for their lives in the water. Near the end of the mission you must go aboard one of the ships in order to help rescue some sailors and defend the ship against more oncoming fighters. When the fighters finally break off and retreat, it's time for a counterattack boys.
Your new friends were not at Pearl Harbour with you, but they did experience their own hell in other battles, and now they rejoin you to fight in the island-hopping crusade across the Pacific. Your travels will take you across Japanese-occupied islands such as Guadalcanal, Makin Atoll, Tarawa and more. These battles take place over the course of a few years, so you can see your character grow in skill and rank. The only problem is that these battles can somewhat be repetitive.
Gameplay
There are some great moments during missions where you have to defend a whole airfield, or take out some enemy armour with artillery. However, it's the 'in-between' missions that can get tiring. Most of these smaller missions (which lead up to the greater ones) involve some of the same stuff over and over again but with slightly different surroundings: most of which include invading Japanese camps in dense forests. In fact you will spend so much time in large forests that it begins to feel like Vietnam. Luckily Tarawa is more of a desert island. Even though it does tend to get repetitive with the invading villages and moving onto the next one type of gameplay, the rest of the game somewhat makes up for this fault.
There are thankfully a number of elements that split up the repetitiveness. How many single-player WWII shooters actually allow you to fly a plane? During one mission in Pacific Assault you will see yourself taking a break and a nice joyride with your fellow fighter pilots. Unfortunately the Japanese want to ruin your fun and intercept you. You start this mission sitting in the gunner position of a fighter plane as the plane moves on a rail system. When your pilot is injured he bails out, so it is up to you to take control of the plane and bring her in. After destroying a few enemy positions, fighters and torpedoing an enemy carrier and sub, you can finally land the plane. Not bad for a soldier who has never flown before. This mission is one of the most fun in the whole game since it provides a much desired change in the gameplay, but the plane does take some getting used to. There are also a few other missions that see you manning the gun on a PT boat or even some hidden objectives that you don't need to complete.
When it comes to your objectives, Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault is one of the first WWII shooters to provide you with optional objectives that may decide the fates of your fellow soldiers. One such example took place when we were defending our airbase at night from an oncoming Japanese onslaught. Our heavy machine gunners were placed up front and were quickly running out of ammo. One of our soldiers, this being his job, quickly ran over to them with an ammo box to replenish their supply. Half way there he got injured by an enemy bullet. In the midst of the battle, I ran up to him in order to help him out. He told me that it was more important to get the ammo to the gunners in order to hold the line. So I picked up the ammo box, delivered it to the heavy gunners, and came back to rescue the injured soldier by carrying him to the medical tent.
This particular moment awarded me with a Hero Moment for saving the life of the soldier and an award for risking my life to deliver that ammo box. At any point, you can access the main menu to see your different hero moments or awards. Upon clicking on the hero moments you will either be asked to play that portion of the game over again, or a flashback of that moment will be played in audio form. This isn't exactly a very important portion of the game, but it still allows you to determine the outcome of certain events within the missions to a certain extent.
Another aspect of the game that may have you growing closer with your squad mates is the ability to issue commands. You are capable of issuing up to four commands to all of the soldiers in your squad during the heat of combat. These commands include attack, fall back, advance or rally to your position. Your soldiers can only follow these commands if they are in close proximity to you. Otherwise they will not be able to hear what it is you are saying. These commands can change the strength of the battle as both your squad and the enemy have their own moral level. For example, if I would tell my squad to fall back, then the Japanese squad would move in faster and more fierce. However, if we kill the enemy's squadron leader or kill enough of their squadron members, than they will either retreat or run straight towards you with death on their minds.
Luckily your squad mates are normally quick to respond to your commands thanks to the great AI used here. They will always take effective cover when fired upon as do your enemies. Fortunately they also know when to heal their squad mates. This is another aspect of the gameplay that adds to the realism. You will find that health packs are quite scarce and most of the time the only way to be healed is by calling over your Corpsman. He will heal you as fast he can to get you back in the battle. Sometimes you will be required to bandage yourself in order to stop bleeding after being stabbed or shot. If your health drops to around zero, then you'll fall straight to the ground with a blurry view. One of two things can happen at this moment: either your Corpsman will come over to heal you, or a Japanese soldier will reach you first and slaughter you.
Physics, graphics and multiplayer modes
Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault also strikes itself as being one of the first WWII shooters to use ragdoll physics thanks to the great Havok physics system. Not only do various objects fly around the environment, but you can shoot the valves off propane tanks and watch them go flying on the ground. Actually the Pearl Harbour mission requires you to take an axe an cut the valve off a tank in order to blow open a door. The physics is not a major part of this game, but it does add to the realism.
There are good things to be said about the graphics, and than there are bad things. Firstly, we will start with the good. Pacific Assault contains the best graphics our of any WWII shooter to date. The water effects look crisp and clear, and the character models and animations are definitely topnotch. So obviously the graphics top anything that the ancient, yet so often used, Quake III engine can put out. However, the bad part is that these great graphics come at an unwelcome price: performance loss.
The performance in Pacific Assault , even on top-of-the-line rigs, can be a bit jumpy at times. It just doesn't seem like the engine has been fully optimized here. Then again this really shouldn't be surprising when you take a look at the minimum system requirements for the game. A minimum of 512MB of RAM is pretty crazy. Hopefully you have 1GB when running this beast. Another common annoyance is the fact that the graphics menu appears in Windows as a configuration screen, and it appears every time you start up the game. By not having the graphics menu in the game like every other PC game, Pacific Assault almost feels like a console-port. As in any WWII shooter, the sound effects are great. You can hear every bullet ricocheting and the voiceovers are of a high quality. Also, the sound will cutout to resemble a 'shellshock' effect when standing near an explosion. Everything we have come to expect from the typical sound effects of any WWII shooter.
If the 10 hour or so single-player campaign is not peaking your interest anymore, then you can battle it out online. Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault contains three different multiplayer modes. Besides the traditional Team Deathmatch and Free-For-All, there is also the new Invader mode. Invader mode is essentially an objective-based mode where two teams battle it out. One team is on offense while the other is on defense, and both teams are given their own specific objectives. Multiplayer also includes four different classes of soldiers to choose from. These are infantry, who have the highest health and largest selection of weapons; the corpsman, who heals his teammates with his medical supplies; the combat engineer, who can plant explosives and mines and can remove enemy mines faster than anyone else; and finally the ammo technician, who can carry ammo boxes in order to restock machine guns and fellow players. The ammo technicians can also carry twice as many guns as anybody else. If, for some reason or another, you don't enjoy your class after spawning in, then you can pick up the backpack of one of your fallen soldiers to switch to his class.
Conclusion
Overall, Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault stands out as one of the best WWII shooters around. This area of shooters is quite competitive especially with the Call of Duty series earning top honours. However, even though WWII shooters are very much played out and are getting very old, Pacific Assault still manages to add some new features. The hero moments and hidden objectives really give the game a more open-ended style of gameplay. Not to mention the fact that it also has the most advanced graphics, AI, and physics of any WWII shooter. It's story may be old, and the gameplay mechanics may be repetitive, but if you just can't get enough of WWII shooters, then Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault is just for you.
With its lack of realism aside, Medal of Honour: Allied Assault quickly paved the road for future WWII shooters. The most notable of these is Call of Duty which, when released last year, quickly became a crowd favorite. If you have read our Call of Duty reviews than you will know that our main point for loving the game is it's dedication to intense action. Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault does not necessarily excel in this area, but it does greatly build upon its predecessor's lack of realism. In fact, Pacific Assault may be the most realistic WWII shooter we have ever played. The European battles through ruined Russian cities and open countryside are now a thing of the past as you say 'hello' to the pacific theater. The game opens up with the battle of Tarawa Atoll where the Americans are attacking this Japanese-owned island. A cutscene opens with you and your fellow soldiers heading towards the beach. Actually, throughout the game you will run into many cutscenes that allow the story to move forward. Cutscenes are somewhat rare in WWII shooters, but they look very good here.
The Story
You play as a marine named Tommy Conlin. Right from the start of the game you are forced into this battle at Tarawa Atoll with your 3 best friends fighting alongside you. Only moments after getting ashore, you are knocked out by a shell landing near your position. Obviously the nearby blast puts Tommy in quite a shock, and he starts having some flashbacks of all the events that led up to this point. As you may have already guessed, almost the whole course of the game takes place in these flashbacks. Starting in the beginning of the flashbacks you will find yourself going through some basic training at boot camp where you will meet your 3 new friends. The story is told very well straight from the start, and you will soon find that you have a strong connection with these men whilst in battle. After some grueling exercises in boot camp, you are then assigned to the tropical spot of Pearl Harbour.
Before your tour of Pearl Harbour is over, Japanese fighters make their way over the harbour. Right away bullets are bouncing all over from these fighters as they come from everywhere and try to strafe anything moving on the ground. You have to quickly make your way to a PT boat where you can man the gun and make your way to the larger ships in order to protect them. This mission is the highlight of the whole game. The Pearl Harbour mission in Pacific Assault compares to the D-Day mission in Allied Assault . Meaning that this is the most intense an insane mission in the game. You watch as large American vessels capsize and sailors are screaming for their lives in the water. Near the end of the mission you must go aboard one of the ships in order to help rescue some sailors and defend the ship against more oncoming fighters. When the fighters finally break off and retreat, it's time for a counterattack boys.
Your new friends were not at Pearl Harbour with you, but they did experience their own hell in other battles, and now they rejoin you to fight in the island-hopping crusade across the Pacific. Your travels will take you across Japanese-occupied islands such as Guadalcanal, Makin Atoll, Tarawa and more. These battles take place over the course of a few years, so you can see your character grow in skill and rank. The only problem is that these battles can somewhat be repetitive.
Gameplay
There are some great moments during missions where you have to defend a whole airfield, or take out some enemy armour with artillery. However, it's the 'in-between' missions that can get tiring. Most of these smaller missions (which lead up to the greater ones) involve some of the same stuff over and over again but with slightly different surroundings: most of which include invading Japanese camps in dense forests. In fact you will spend so much time in large forests that it begins to feel like Vietnam. Luckily Tarawa is more of a desert island. Even though it does tend to get repetitive with the invading villages and moving onto the next one type of gameplay, the rest of the game somewhat makes up for this fault.
There are thankfully a number of elements that split up the repetitiveness. How many single-player WWII shooters actually allow you to fly a plane? During one mission in Pacific Assault you will see yourself taking a break and a nice joyride with your fellow fighter pilots. Unfortunately the Japanese want to ruin your fun and intercept you. You start this mission sitting in the gunner position of a fighter plane as the plane moves on a rail system. When your pilot is injured he bails out, so it is up to you to take control of the plane and bring her in. After destroying a few enemy positions, fighters and torpedoing an enemy carrier and sub, you can finally land the plane. Not bad for a soldier who has never flown before. This mission is one of the most fun in the whole game since it provides a much desired change in the gameplay, but the plane does take some getting used to. There are also a few other missions that see you manning the gun on a PT boat or even some hidden objectives that you don't need to complete.
When it comes to your objectives, Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault is one of the first WWII shooters to provide you with optional objectives that may decide the fates of your fellow soldiers. One such example took place when we were defending our airbase at night from an oncoming Japanese onslaught. Our heavy machine gunners were placed up front and were quickly running out of ammo. One of our soldiers, this being his job, quickly ran over to them with an ammo box to replenish their supply. Half way there he got injured by an enemy bullet. In the midst of the battle, I ran up to him in order to help him out. He told me that it was more important to get the ammo to the gunners in order to hold the line. So I picked up the ammo box, delivered it to the heavy gunners, and came back to rescue the injured soldier by carrying him to the medical tent.
This particular moment awarded me with a Hero Moment for saving the life of the soldier and an award for risking my life to deliver that ammo box. At any point, you can access the main menu to see your different hero moments or awards. Upon clicking on the hero moments you will either be asked to play that portion of the game over again, or a flashback of that moment will be played in audio form. This isn't exactly a very important portion of the game, but it still allows you to determine the outcome of certain events within the missions to a certain extent.
Another aspect of the game that may have you growing closer with your squad mates is the ability to issue commands. You are capable of issuing up to four commands to all of the soldiers in your squad during the heat of combat. These commands include attack, fall back, advance or rally to your position. Your soldiers can only follow these commands if they are in close proximity to you. Otherwise they will not be able to hear what it is you are saying. These commands can change the strength of the battle as both your squad and the enemy have their own moral level. For example, if I would tell my squad to fall back, then the Japanese squad would move in faster and more fierce. However, if we kill the enemy's squadron leader or kill enough of their squadron members, than they will either retreat or run straight towards you with death on their minds.
Luckily your squad mates are normally quick to respond to your commands thanks to the great AI used here. They will always take effective cover when fired upon as do your enemies. Fortunately they also know when to heal their squad mates. This is another aspect of the gameplay that adds to the realism. You will find that health packs are quite scarce and most of the time the only way to be healed is by calling over your Corpsman. He will heal you as fast he can to get you back in the battle. Sometimes you will be required to bandage yourself in order to stop bleeding after being stabbed or shot. If your health drops to around zero, then you'll fall straight to the ground with a blurry view. One of two things can happen at this moment: either your Corpsman will come over to heal you, or a Japanese soldier will reach you first and slaughter you.
Physics, graphics and multiplayer modes
Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault also strikes itself as being one of the first WWII shooters to use ragdoll physics thanks to the great Havok physics system. Not only do various objects fly around the environment, but you can shoot the valves off propane tanks and watch them go flying on the ground. Actually the Pearl Harbour mission requires you to take an axe an cut the valve off a tank in order to blow open a door. The physics is not a major part of this game, but it does add to the realism.
There are good things to be said about the graphics, and than there are bad things. Firstly, we will start with the good. Pacific Assault contains the best graphics our of any WWII shooter to date. The water effects look crisp and clear, and the character models and animations are definitely topnotch. So obviously the graphics top anything that the ancient, yet so often used, Quake III engine can put out. However, the bad part is that these great graphics come at an unwelcome price: performance loss.
The performance in Pacific Assault , even on top-of-the-line rigs, can be a bit jumpy at times. It just doesn't seem like the engine has been fully optimized here. Then again this really shouldn't be surprising when you take a look at the minimum system requirements for the game. A minimum of 512MB of RAM is pretty crazy. Hopefully you have 1GB when running this beast. Another common annoyance is the fact that the graphics menu appears in Windows as a configuration screen, and it appears every time you start up the game. By not having the graphics menu in the game like every other PC game, Pacific Assault almost feels like a console-port. As in any WWII shooter, the sound effects are great. You can hear every bullet ricocheting and the voiceovers are of a high quality. Also, the sound will cutout to resemble a 'shellshock' effect when standing near an explosion. Everything we have come to expect from the typical sound effects of any WWII shooter.
If the 10 hour or so single-player campaign is not peaking your interest anymore, then you can battle it out online. Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault contains three different multiplayer modes. Besides the traditional Team Deathmatch and Free-For-All, there is also the new Invader mode. Invader mode is essentially an objective-based mode where two teams battle it out. One team is on offense while the other is on defense, and both teams are given their own specific objectives. Multiplayer also includes four different classes of soldiers to choose from. These are infantry, who have the highest health and largest selection of weapons; the corpsman, who heals his teammates with his medical supplies; the combat engineer, who can plant explosives and mines and can remove enemy mines faster than anyone else; and finally the ammo technician, who can carry ammo boxes in order to restock machine guns and fellow players. The ammo technicians can also carry twice as many guns as anybody else. If, for some reason or another, you don't enjoy your class after spawning in, then you can pick up the backpack of one of your fallen soldiers to switch to his class.
Conclusion
Overall, Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault stands out as one of the best WWII shooters around. This area of shooters is quite competitive especially with the Call of Duty series earning top honours. However, even though WWII shooters are very much played out and are getting very old, Pacific Assault still manages to add some new features. The hero moments and hidden objectives really give the game a more open-ended style of gameplay. Not to mention the fact that it also has the most advanced graphics, AI, and physics of any WWII shooter. It's story may be old, and the gameplay mechanics may be repetitive, but if you just can't get enough of WWII shooters, then Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault is just for you.
