My Time With the Medal of Honor BETA

So with the Medal of Honor BETA coming to a close tonight, it's finally time to throw up a preview now that I can pull myself away from it.

At a first glance, I can see many people taking this as just another run of the mill first person shooter following in the wake of Call of Duty and taking a lot away from its pals in Bad Company at Dice. It is a very good blend of the two games with a couple of twists that I find much more approachable and much more balanced for an online shooter. So let's dive in with a few bullet point comparisons that I hope will show you why Medal of Honor deserves some attention this year.
 *Controls/FeelThe default settings for the controls will be familiar to anyone who has picked up a call of duty game except for a few minor exceptions.  Instead of having two grenade buttons, lethal and non-lethal, your left bumper is the class perks button and you don't have the ability to go prone for sniping.  They did mention that the single player will have prone as well as a cover and lean mechanic, but the way the Frostbite engine is set up for Battlefield, it just is not present for online.  I didn't find that to be a bad thing, but it could be a nice touch for the Mission mode online.  The shooting to me feels a little looser than CoD but not as loose as Bad Company; a good middle ground.  The nice thing however, is the perfect balance between the two series.  Battlefield had really good shooting from the hip and Call of Duty had a tight iron sights, and Medal of Honor feels right on both sides.

*Class/Perks
Now this is where some people might start getting concerned.  The way they set up perks in this game is all class based.  You have 3 classes in the game; Rifleman, Special Ops, and Sniper - each set up with their own specific perk.  Hitting the left bumper in-game will activate each perk, and I feel that each one provides an appropriate set up to the situation.  Your Rifleman, great for combating any situation has the "nube-tube" grenade launcher attatchment witha few shots to help you clear the area.  The Spec Ops, great for close quarters with sub-machine guns and shotguns, also has a rocket launcher for taking out either a room of baddies or an APC trying to clear you guys out.  And last but not least, the Sniper class has C4.  I found it awesome to attatchet that to the APC and blow it up, but also you could use it just like in CoD and use it to cover your sniper position.  So, not as customizable and robust as CoD, but I feel that the class based idea evens out the playing field and is a much more balanced experience.  The other thing I noticed was that you can get team perks by scoring enough points in the match.  An easy example is that you could score enough points and the whole team would get higher armor.  Now, I didnt see much of this because I notcied it so late, but it seems like a neat idea.

*Killstreaks
This will also feel dated, but I also think that they are trying to level the playing field with this as well.  Im not sure how Bad Company did it for lack of time, but I do know that everybody and their mother is in love with the customizable killstreaks in Modern Warfare 2.  The way Medal of Honor does it is very set.  Every X amount of kills, you get the option of two separte killstreak rewards.  For example, when you get three kills in a row, you have the option of using a UAV or droping morter fire on an area.  The way the latter works is in the same light as Battlefield where you use your binoculars to set the area of attack instead of a map pulling back where you place the target.  So its neat that you have to see the target and it feels more realistic, but I think its going to take some getting used to for people in the CoD line of thinking.  Overal your going to love or hate this setup, but like I said, it seems like a balancing act.

*Game Modes
In the BETA they only gave you two game modes; Combat Mission and Team Deathmatch.  Obviously, Team Deathmatch is exactly what you expect, but Combat Mission is what the game is all about.  If you have Played Bad Company 2's Rush mode, you know what to expect.  The major difference to me is that Medal of Honor just seems much more focused and not as one sided.  When I played the Rush mode in BC2, I felt the vehicles hurt the experience and in MoH the APC you get is helpful in certain situations but it's not great overall.  Also, the Americans are the only ones that get the APC while the baddies get all of the defensible areas with mounted machine guns and all of that.  So once again, a balance.  But the idea of Combat Mission is to fight/defend certain points depending on your side.  As the Americans, you will fight through a road block, secure the hill where their mounted guns are, take their anti-aircraft guns and all of that to send in the jets to take down the base.  The way you win as the baddies is by getting 100 kills on the attacking team before they take your positions.  As a side not as well, the levels are broken up into areas so you can't get ahead or fall back early to try and camp out or anything like that.

*Leveling
This I actually prefer.  When leveling in Medal of Honor, its all based on what class you are using.  If you mainly snipe, you will level up in your sniping class unlocking rangefinders, new rifles, suppressors, and all of that.  I personally don't like the idea of unlocking all sorts of attatchments by doing crazy challenges that don't nessessarily do with what im unlocking.  It's just a simple straight forward set-up based on what you use.  You don't have to use your shotguns to unlock one-tip ammo for your M-16.  I understand that people like the robustness of all of the unlocks and challenges, and I know the unlocking of the killstreaks through exp is a big draw, but for the casual guys or even the people not JUST playing CoD this approach will be nice.  Plus when you level up, you get a sweet beard.

*Graphics
I believe the graphics are very nice in Medal of Honor.  A lot more detail and finese to the environments but the character models are not as strong as Call of Duty.  Also, the 30 Fps compared to 60 Fps might not make it look as sharp, and that could also be why CoD doesn't look as solid in detail for the levels, but overal I think both games look great its just really going to be about what you prefer; the wider vistas with more detail or the smaller spots with more going on in them.  One thing that I think BC2 and espessially MoH do well is the effects.  When bullets are impacting the area there is a great effect of the smoke and chunks flying about.  When the airstrikes are hitting, bullets flying, grenades going off, all of that - the game looks fantastic.  Dice wanted this to also play into the game where it would hinder your view but also give the proper look and weight to the game; I believe they hit it home with it.

I believe that MoH has really good potential to stand out this holiday season, but what is holding it back is the fact that it doesn't set itself too far from it's roots. The building blocks of the game are set in two very solid camps and my time with this BETA has been solid.  I hope that more poeple pick this game up as it is very well done and they see the effort that EA has put into this game on bringing it into the new generation.

-Eddie