Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway

Raw, frenzied action and deep thoughts about the nature of leadership don’t seem like natural bedfellows, but in Brothers in Arms: Hell’s Highway, they join forces to deliver both gripping drama and riveting gameplay. Like the heroes it portrays, the game itself is an imperfect experience, but its better qualities are so compelling that surrender won’t be an option.

Brilliantly, the game opens with a “Previously…in Brothers in Arms” sequence that we welcomed as a much-needed refresher on the events of Gearbox’s first two Brothers games, which both came out on original Xbox in 2005. Idiotically, the artsy cinematic that followed did little to reintroduce us to the characters and left us still trying to sort out which white dude in an American uniform was which. But stick with it. Once you’ve played the game for a couple of hours and can tell Paddock from Corrion again, return to the main menu and re-watch the cinematics. There’s a subtle, rich story being told here that mixes a moving drama with a twisty mystery, and it’s well worth the effort. Besides, it’s hardly punishment to take a second look at the game’s fantastic cinematics, which expertly blend creative, arresting camerawork with clever dialogue and some very human moments.

But if you’re not here for the deep-thoughts portion of the festivities, Brothers in Arms’ intense, brutal combat is just as engrossing. As with the first two games, expect just a smattering of one-man-army heroics and a heavy focus on find-fix-flank-finish squad tactics. In the worst missions, you’re sent on solo assaults — like a trek through a derelict hospital in search of an AWOL comrade — that’d count as pretty good stuff in your average Medal of Honor game. But Brothers’ genius hits its full wattage when it crafts a convincing illusion of a wide-open battlefield and turns you loose as the commander of two to three squads. Of course, you can’t go anywhere you see, but the game does a great job of making it look like you can — artillery rounds detonate terrifyingly close in nearby pastures, friendly tanks roll past on parallel tracks, and so on. The aura of authenticity is as superb as always with this series, and you’ll be utterly convinced that you’re just one small unit in the huge Operation Market Garden invasion.

We couldn’t get enough of those wide-open missions, particularly the game’s final level. You’ll approach, for example, a farm, and as you sprint to take cover, German units will pop up in a dizzying array around you. Get cocky about standing around in the open, and you’ll get your brain matter all over the guy next to you. But if you dig in, study the much-improved tactical map, and get your guys laying down suppressing fire on the MG nest and the assault team, it’s nail-biting fun to loop around on a flanking run and take out the Nazis yourself…or panic them into fleeing so your boys can finish them.

New squad types — bazooka and MG teams — both ratchet up the carnage and make things feel more realistic. After all, this war was not won with the M1 Garand alone, especially when the Allies had tanks and bunkers to eliminate. The new destructible-cover system also makes these battles more authentic, as you can mow down Nazis behind wooden cover…or get dropped yourself if you tuck into the wrong spot.

The A.I. enemies seem more evolved, too, repositioning in response to your actions and generally not sitting around like target-practice dummies — most of the time. Sadly, we did drop some motionless Germans who might as well have been holding up a “Shoot Here” sign. But even worse were the times our bazooka squad fired anywhere but where we told them. Once, we’d successfully snuck up on an 88 emplacement. Giddy with anticipation, we ordered the bazooka team to fire the first shot at the 88…and they unloaded on a brick wall two feet in front of them. Sob. A reload and a repositioning of that squad resolved it, but we didn’t expect to see these kinds of mishaps in a game that’d been in development for three years.

The same could be said for the infuriating lack of save-anywhere (checkpoints are so not okay, especially when their spacing is this erratic), the too-sticky Dig In button that refuses to let you out of cover at very inconvenient times, and the total absence of co-op. The new multiplayer fares better, offering 10-on-10 all-human deathmatches in well-designed maps. In this Call of Duty 4 day and age, though, it does little to stand out from the herd, but it’s there and it’s reasonably fun if you want it.

So sure, given our love for this series, we’d definitely hoped to be able to give Hell’s Highway a higher score. But the successes massively outweigh the mistakes here — which, strangely enough, is exactly how we’d describe Matt Baker, the games’ troubled hero. Props to Brothers in Arms for showing us how war can be hell…and fun, too.