Reviews// Medal of Honor: Airborne (PS3)

I mention the AI isn't really intelligent. Well, your fellow comrades (or should I say buddies - there's no damn Pinkos here) don't exactly work with you. They appear to be fighting the good fight, but don't really cover you or stick with you. Plus they're far too keen to do that stupid "going over the top" manoeuvre when certain death could be avoided with a little patience. What they bring to the game is a damned fine service in terms of drawing fire and giving away the enemy's position. If you ever lose your bearings, just look for fellow soldiers and aim where their guns are pointing.

Taking cover from enemy fire is essential, and it's here where the game's "peek and lean" control system is vital; and also where it works like a charm. Instead of bobbing up and down using stand and crouch, or sticking to a wall to have a gander around the corner, entering Aim mode enables you to control precisely how much you crouch, stand or lean out.

Campaign mode is certainly not a vast endeavour - I managed to complete all operations in four modest sittings, and I tend to take the gently, gently approach rather than sprinting around. However, this was in the game's "casual" (easy) setting, and the multiplayer modes extend this, with death match and team-based "objective" games available online.

Visually it looks a bit rough around the edges, quite literally. The jaggies are out in force with no obvious anti-aliasing to tame them. However, immersed in the game you won't even notice this shortcoming, and soon you're marvelling at the finely detailed bomb sites and munitions factories and, the Campaign mode's final set piece, the formidable Flakturm. Boasting a magnificent viewing distance, being able to pick off targets located on the far side of town drastically changes the gameplay, especially when you think back to the days of original MoH, where firing at ghostly silhouettes in the all pervading "fog" was the norm.

In Airborne, climbing to the top of a church tower rewards you with a fabulous view of the operation zone which, should you find yourself in the company of a sniper rifle, also makes for an entertaining bout of fish/barrel shooting.

Zooming in and out using the sniper scope, there's rarely any pop-up evident and the level of detail is always high without any serious slow down. However, there are instances of severe stutter. When exiting the aircraft or destroying large targets, the are big stop-start moments. This doesn't seem to a be a issue with "too much going on", as there are many occasions when the screen is filled with several dozen soldiers and no slow down occurs.

As you progress, leaving a trail of burning wreckage in your wake, the columns of boiling smoke that fill the sky beat the socks off the "cotton wool ball" smoke that many games settle for. In fact, there are only two disappointing visuals; fallen bodies disappear, sanitising evidence of the huge loss of life from a series that has tried very hard to capture the horror of war. There's also the grenade blast, which looks more like a slow motion splash of water than a renting blast of shrapnel.

The surround audio fills the air with the whizzing and pinging of enemy fire and distant chatter of weapons, giving clues to the source and level of threat without having to poke your head above the parapet. You buddies give helpful comments, like "watch your fire" when you accidentally mistake them for enemy, or shout encouragement when you take down a sniper or complete and objective.

SPOnG score: 85%

Conclusion
Don't let the "Airborne" suffix distract you; this is a balls out, ground-based shooter that, while at first seems to be a by-the-numbers addition to the Medal of Honor series, shines in its move away from linear gameplay. Like EA does so well, it's a small but positive adjustment. Believable animation, frenetic fire fights, stunningly realised environments and immensely enjoyable gameplay puts it back in the frame after having is crown borrowed by That Other WWII Shooter.