Once the favourite child of the powerhouse that is Electronic Arts, the classic Medal of Honor series now resembles a beaten down old hag who has seen one winter too many. Hitting its peak amid the early to mid noughties' wave of popularity for WW2 games, it is worth remembering that in their day these works were gaining a wider audience than the other, lesser known entity Call of Duty. Oh how things change. In recent times, it has struggled to catch up and indeed hold its own against the giants of the modern FPS genre; Call Of Duty and EA's newest foray into this market - the Battlefield series. Here we are going to take you on a walk down memory lane to relive the franchise in all its glory.
8. Medal Of Honor: Airborne
Ranking the lowest on the list is this effort from 2007. The first MoH game to be released on the seventh generation of consoles, the main problem this game has is that it struggles to make use of the new opportunities the hardware provides. Truth be told, it feels more like a slightly dolled-up PS2 game. A poor multiplayer mode was joined by an even worse single player storyline, which was as about generic as it gets. You take the role of a member of the 82nd American Airborne division and fight in Italy, France, Holland and Germany. One thing that really sticks out about this game was the poor soundtrack. At this point, the series had been very consistent on the quality of its score, but on this occasion it was not up to standard. All the more surprising about this is the fact that it was composed by the normally-brilliant Michael Giacchino, who had already done stellar work on games such as Frontline and Rising Sun (more to come on those later). The game was, however, received well by critics. It holds a rating of 7.9 on IGN, for example. I will admit, however, that one interesting, if not very well executed element of the game was the ability to parachute into missions at the beginning of each new campaign. Basically, after choosing when to jump, the player could then steer the direction of the descent all the way down in order to begin the mission on their own terms. This was the series' last foray into the WW2 genre on the main consoles, and it was a poor way to check out.
A keen observer of gaming, television, film and football from the distant outpost of Ireland, Shane is studying Sports and Fitness and dreams of joining the Irish Army. Yes, that really does exist.
