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Maybe World War II wasn't the best topic to choose... - Ult1mateSlayer - 05/01/2010 18:06:09 - edited by Ben Taylor
Genre: RTS - Publisher: Square Enix - Release Date: 22/09/2009

I expected something a lot better than what Order of War turned out to be, even though deep down I kept saying to myself,”Don't, DON'T expect it to be a masterpiece!” Well it's no masterpiece, it's not trying to reinvent World War II strategy gaming, it definitely doesn't bring anything special to the table and if it was trying to do either of those things, it failed.

It's visually pleasing if your camera is zoomed out as far as possible. Once zoomed in, the textures become blotchy and stretched on the ground and units. The cinematics could've used a lot more work, improved effects such as explosions and muzzle flashes and higher quality animations for troops and especially tanks. Having your camera zoomed out as far as possible has another advantage of allowing you to see a lot more of your units than it would zoomed in and being good soldiers they're not grouped together, standing around in a circle looking up to see if a mortar shell will hit them soon, they're in lines or other formations and rarely move from them.

The first time I loaded the game, I decided that I liked the soundtrack but after five minutes of listening to it I realised that it was the same track on repeat and it was driving me nuts. The units voices are repetitive too. The whole game is just one huge loop of sounds and the voice acting for troops and your superiors is terrible! I know it wasn't fantastic in previous World War II games but this is just a huge let down.

A firefight which should've taken 10 minutes for me took 47 minutes instead, I wasn't too pleased

Moving onto the gameplay, it's simple. VERY simple. With games like this I usually go through the tutorial just to make sure I pick everything up but with Order of War I just jumped straight in and there were no problems with getting to terms with the game. Although movement is sluggish and units don't always do what you tell them to, you're bound to get a decent firefight at the end of it and although it won't look fantastic it'll still meet some expectations watching it through the cinematic camera.

Personally, I feel that they've tried to head into the direction of a cinematic game more than a playable game. You don't particularly have to do anything to progress through the missions and everything takes a lot longer than it should do, enemy soldiers don't die after taking several rounds to the face, the armour on tanks are not accurate and a firefight which should've taken 10 minutes for me took 47 minutes instead, I wasn't too pleased. I went and played on the 360 for that time until it was over, checking on it now and then whenever I got reinforcements.

I honestly wouldn't recommend it to anyone unless they were really desperate to play something different and even then, it's not that different. If you want to play a World War II strategy game. play Company of Heroes. It's not the same as this but it's more fun and it's a lot more complex, if you want to play something just like this then play Sudden Strike, it's a classic.