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Commandos 2: Men of Courage
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Graphics & Sound:
This is my first experience in playing the Commandos series, but I could tell right away that Commandos 2: Men of Courage wasn't as good on the Xbox as it would be on the PC. The graphics are ok, mainly because everything is seen from afar. You play the game from a bird's eye view throughout its entirety, which is fine. However, I ran into problems many times because I couldn't tell what I was looking at. Everything is so small, that it's difficult to determine who you're looking at, or what you're looking at. This even includes the symbols for actions and weapons. At times, I didn't know what I was selecting. There is a button to zoom in on the screen, but it's not even worth it since everything becomes pixilated. Since the entire game is miniature, I'm left to say the graphics are sub-par. The animations are well done and the scenery is detailed well, but because everything is so small, there isn't as much detail on the character models as I would expect. I wasn't too overly impressed with the audio of Commandos 2 either. There were a couple glitches during a few conversations, where all of a sudden the voice track would glitch out. Another thing I found was during the narration of an introduction to a new level, the music was so loud that I couldn't even hear the voice track. That sucked because I then had to read a full screen of text, just to figure out what my mission was. Besides those details, annoying and repetitive phrases are the only things you'll hear out of the Commandos. I did like the music very much, along with the sound effects for the weaponry. |
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Gameplay:
The storyline for Commandos 2: Men of Courage is you must take a small group of elite soldiers through World War II, trying to change the course of the war in favor of the Allied Soldiers. You'll take your men, woman and dog through 12 different missions on 11 different environments, such as the Third Reich, a Northern European submarine installation camp, and the headquarters of the Japanese army. Each mission is long and difficult, and each requires a thought-out plan of attack. You'll need to learn how to use your group of specialists, a Green Beret, sniper, demolitions expert, and thief, to complete the missions. I was kind of expecting Commandos 2 to be something like the Command and Conquer or Warcraft series, and in a way, it was. Commandos 2 requires you to strategize each and every move before taking action. For those of you who have an itchy trigger finger like myself, you'll get your chances to take out the enemy from time to time. But the entire game is not an offensive juggernaut. It's more of a chess match, in which you must position your soldiers over a drawn out process, in order for a victorious outcome. The good news is that you can always check your status of where you're at in the mission by checking the list of things you must complete for a successful operation. |
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Difficulty:
If you're the type of person who likes playing a game, but only if the manual is nearby, then Commandos 2: Men of Courage is the game for you. This is no joke, you will need the manual by your side for the first few hours at least, if not longer, just to learn how to play the game. There are helpful tutorials you can take, explaining how the game works, how to use weapons, other actions, etc. However, the tutorials tend to be a little too long, and even after taking them, you won't remember how to do everything. There are three different levels of difficulty to play with: Normal, Hard and Very Hard. The higher the level of difficulty, the smarter the enemy gets. Believe me, starting out at Normal is no easy task.
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Game Mechanics:
Part of the problem, when trying to learn Commandos 2, is that every button on the Xbox controller has a function. This has its good and bad points. The good is that the same buttons don't have multiple functions, meaning you don't have to press a button several times to get the action you desire. The bad is that you must learn what every button does, otherwise you'll find your face buried in the manual constantly. Besides that small problem, the rest of the game is solid. The loading time isn't too bad, and with the beauty of the Xbox, memory space is barely used. I liked playing Commandos 2: Men of Courage, but I think there are things that need to be addressed if the series continues on the Xbox. Graphically, things need to get bigger. The look itself is decent, but because everything is so small, it's a little frustrating. I like the long, difficult missions. Unfortunately, I don't think there is an easier way to improve the controller configuration too much. Eidos will just have to hope gamers catch on to the series, and try to simplify the controls just a little bit. |
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-Red Dawg, GameVortex Communications AKA Alex Redmann |
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