Brothers in Arms: Road to Hill 30

this series looked really enticing to me, i've had my eye on this game for quite awhile and i finally started to play it. soo.....
Well, i can see what it's trying to do. It's trying to take tactical FPS and make it work easily with a controller / console. It's obvious.
Ok well i'm playing the PC version, and the general thought is unfortunately the controls really suck ass. The game is really clunky and not seamless to play.
The entire game barely feels like an FPS actually. Because its programmed in such a way that simply aiming and shooting at your enemy simply just DOESN'T WORK.
You need to use the 'suppression mechanic' where you order your guys to shoot at X area until the red circle turns gray, then you move the other guys (or you) around to flank and kill

See this is kind of the annoying problem. Instead of making up your own realistic tactic, and aiming your ironsights at a guys CLEAR head for a CLEAR headshot, and just because the games programming is saying "Nope! you're not flanked enough, not the right angle, didnt supress enough, therefore - This bullet misses" it sucks ASS.
The way the guns handle is utterly shit. like it makes me nauseaous playing this game I promise. You use your ironsights, and even while crouching it sways like he chugged a bottle of jack daniels. It's supposed to be realistic, but no, its just fucking annoying. You're like "I should be able to hit this guy! its not that hard! hes 20 feet away!" But no, you can't. You just cant.

Maybe one of the most boring, repetive FPS games i've ever played - and that's saying something. You have to do this boring fuck SUPPRESS, FLANK, every single time. every single enemy. every single gunfight. it just gets old and tedious - FAST. when you KNOW you should be able to hit the fucking guy with your own wits, but no, the game doesn't want you to. you NEED to do what the game wants you to.
Fuck. This. Sucks.

people praise the story and the writing but seriously its as cilched and boring as possible "Muh daddy" this "Muh family" "Muh brothers, they all i got lefts" what the fuck ever. zzzzzzzzzzzzzz. snore. you don't give a fuck about any of the characters, except maybe 1 or 2 of them but thats only because their name keeps being shouted every 10 seconds. But whatever, fuck story.

The missions where you have a tank in your squad is just pathetic. There is frequently little machinegun nests tucked away somewhere obscure, and its not such a thing where its like *Bullet gets shot, bullet goes through air, bullet makes contact with player*

No.

It's more like

*Player walked into cone of sight of AI controlled machinegun - Therefore - Instant death*

FUCK OFF. FUCK OFF. FUCK OFF.

It sucks so hard, its so badly programmed. No, just because I stepped inside the machinegun nests geometric line of sight should not mean I INSTANTLY DIE AND LOST 20 MINS OF PROGRESS YOU PIECE OF SHIT.

This happened about 20-30 times in a row because I couldn't find where the fucker was. So of course you have to fumble with the god awful squad controls to try to get one squad to SUPPRESS while you fumble to get the tank to go around and blow it up, all the while not stepping into the invisible cone line of sight or you instadie.

Jesus fucking christ.......................................

Not to mention theres NO map variation. I mean NONE. You like french farmhouses? You like green fields? You got em. Not to mention the level design is nothing more than a corridor shooter with some bushes on each side and a skybox instead of a ceiling. Seriously. Invisible walls EVERYWHERE. It looks exactly like a hallway, just disguised as an outside area. With 1 or 2 branching obvious as fuck flanking areas on each and every battle.

Oh yeah, theres no health pickups either. You start the battle, and if you take shots ANYWHERE , its permanent. You could activate a checkpoint 20 mins into a level and be at 5% health and you're fucked......

Or you can just kill yourself 3 times in a row and the game is like "War isnt fair, but its a video game so do u want full health LOLZ XD?"

Seriously you just end up killing yourself for full health

Fuck this game.

There are slight times where it feels remotely enjoyable because you just run in and flank the fuckers yourself
but then you realize that basically any FPS ever is more fun than this
Bad gun mechanics, bad controls, bad squad mechanics, frustratingly bad programming, nonexistant AI, bad graphics.......

4.5/10

Weak game through and through. Its a FPS with a heavy focus on giving tactical commands to your squad, which is not a bad idea but the execution is really bad.

The game tries to force you to play with your squad by giving you terrible weapons, that cant hit anything after 10 meters. They always give you the M1 garand at the start, which does very little damage and has terrible accuracy. Thankfully the german weapons are much better, so i just grab one of theirs when i have the chance to. Another flaw is how broken the AI is. For a game thats based around giving orders you would think that they should have nailed that down, but no. They do some really idiotic things, ranging from making their way through crossfire to doing absolutly nothing when i tell them to supress the enemy.

Storywise its ok, it almost manages to develop a connection to the squad. but its hard to develop a connection with soldiers as moronic as these.

Visually its not impressive at all for a 2005 title. Its reallly blurry at long distances. Maybe this was an intentional way of showing that the protagonist is short sighted, thus explaining his inability to hit anything beyond a 10 meter range?

A mediocre game overal.

The Brothers in Arms series has always aimed to be Band of Brothers to Call of Duty's (or Medal of Honor's) Saving Private Ryan. The series offers a more fleshed-out, intelligent experience where most WWII shooters go for a more visceral, arcade-centered one.

Working on a less-robust engine with a smaller crew (Gearbox has always put out these games), Brothers in Arms was always destined to be overlooked among the more visually stunning games with familiar appeal. While Call of Duty overtook the Medal of Honor series in every respect, Brothers in Arms is a series that can live happily side-by-side the public's favorite shooter series. This is due to it offering an entirely different brand of gameplay and storytelling that makes these all too familiar war stories renewed.

Upon release in Spring 2005, Road to Hill 30 merely found a niche audience due to the over-saturation of WWII FPS games at that point. The game follows Cpl Matt Baker and his battalion of the 101st Airborne (based on factual events), during the initial week of America's invasion of Normandy. The game offers an excellent pace, giving you a little more freedom and firepower with every new level -- essentially, you go from a private with a pistol to a corporal with a tank.

Instead of running and gunning from A-to-B, Brothers in Arms relies on strategy. The ability to manage two squads (or, sometimes, three in Hell's Highway) that work under you and follow your orders offers more depth to the duck-and-cover firefights.

The game isn't a FPS/RTS hybrid but if there was ever a game to drive a fan of one genre into the other it's this one. How the system works is you have an assault squad and a flanking squad. You position your flanking squad to provide covering fire, while you take your assault squad in for the kill. It can often be difficult to set-up your troops, but like in real life you can't really tell your troops to go to places you can't see; the game does offer a "situational view" that gives a layout of the battlefield. However, you can't give orders from the view, so it's mainly there to plan ahead than to act within.

Road to Hill 30 has many great moments, but it's limited by the Unreal Engine from 1998. It looks alright but the maps aren't as detailed and intense as they could be. If you look at the details, it can completely take you out of the experience and make the game feel like a glorified Unreal Tournament mod. Despite its repetitive combat and lacking story, Road to Hill 30 was an excellent first entry and a overlooked shooter from 2005.

The Brothers in Arms series has always aimed to be Band of Brothers to Call of Duty's (or Medal of Honor's) Saving Private Ryan. The series offers a more fleshed-out, intelligent experience where most WWII shooters go for a more visceral, arcade-centered one.

Working on a less-robust engine with a smaller crew (Gearbox has always put out these games), Brothers in Arms was always destined to be overlooked among the more visually stunning games with familiar appeal. While Call of Duty overtook the Medal of Honor series in every respect, Brothers in Arms is a series that can live happily side-by-side the public's favorite shooter series. This is due to it offering an entirely different brand of gameplay and storytelling that makes these all too familiar war stories renewed.

Upon release in Spring 2005, Road to Hill 30 merely found a niche audience due to the over-saturation of WWII FPS games at that point. The game follows Cpl Matt Baker and his battalion of the 101st Airborne (based on factual events), during the initial week of America's invasion of Normandy. The game offers an excellent pace, giving you a little more freedom and firepower with every new level -- essentially, you go from a private with a pistol to a corporal with a tank.

Instead of running and gunning from A-to-B, Brothers in Arms relies on strategy. The ability to manage two squads (or, sometimes, three in Hell's Highway) that work under you and follow your orders offers more depth to the duck-and-cover firefights.

The game isn't a FPS/RTS hybrid but if there was ever a game to drive a fan of one genre into the other it's this one. How the system works is you have an assault squad and a flanking squad. You position your flanking squad to provide covering fire, while you take your assault squad in for the kill. It can often be difficult to set-up your troops, but like in real life you can't really tell your troops to go to places you can't see; the game does offer a "situational view" that gives a layout of the battlefield. However, you can't give orders from the view, so it's mainly there to plan ahead than to act within.

Road to Hill 30 has many great moments, but it's limited by the Unreal Engine from 1998. It looks alright but the maps aren't as detailed and intense as they could be. If you look at the details, it can completely take you out of the experience and make the game feel like a glorified Unreal Tournament mod. Despite its repetitive combat and lacking story, Road to Hill 30 was an excellent first entry and a overlooked shooter from 2005.