Some of the missions in this campaign are an absolute blast as well, with uniquely challenging objectives. The tight city streets make unit placement vitally important, especially when enemies are blockaded in buildings. This is where the switch to the Mediterranean Theatre of war starts to really work, as the Italian maps are packed with buildings, chokepoints, and flanking opportunities. The mission design of this campaign is where things really shine, with phenomenally designed objectives that really encourage methodical planning and strategy. In order to take over most settlements you’ll need to play through one of the real-time battles, which consist of some intentionally designed missions as well as standard skirmishes. There’s also an overarching upgrade system that ties into your advisor’s “approval,” You’ll need to piece together how the mode works and how, for example, building bunkers or cannons in the vicinity of a town will give you access to those perks within the real-time battles that take place. Again, however, the tutorials don’t effectively communicate how to build everything or what they’re used for. On the map you can build battleships, planes, and a host of other options that support your army, like anti-air guns and artillery. SegaĮssentially you need to command companies that have a move range each turn, moving them to different towns and settlements to take over, which provides you with more resources. The world map of the Italian campaign feels like an afterthought, simply there to link real-time battles together. Overall, however, this is a mode much more focused on mechanics than narrative, and it does a surprisingly terrible job of explaining how many of those mechanics work. The campaign plays out across a massive world map like in the Total War games, with three advisors largely giving you the “narrative” through dialogue. It’s clear that developer Relic wanted to display a thoughtfulness to how these events affected real people, but it just doesn’t land very well.īy comparison, the Italian campaign is a much more “grand strategy” affair that has you taking control of the Allied Forces, slowly making your way across Italy to take back Rome. This creates an odd tonal dissonance that tries to spotlight the horrors inflicted by the Nazis … even while you’re taking command of their forces. You play as the Nazi Afrikakorp led by Erwin Rommel, but between each mission, the narrative is shown from the perspective of the Jewish Berbers fighting in the resistance. What’s baffling about the campaign, however, is how its narrative plays out. For example, one mission has you making contact with recon vehicles and then protecting their retreat when the enemy’s main force arrives. By and large, these missions do a good job of each feeling different and challenging your strategy in some way. The African campaign is a much more straightforward affair, feeling like your standard RTS campaign that takes you through a series of guided missions. Sadly, each campaign winds up feeling drastically underbaked in some ways but surprisingly engaging in others. SegaĬompany of Heroes 3 has a staggering amount of content to offer, with a smattering of multiplayer maps and modes on top of a massive Italian campaign that takes a more grand strategy approach with a world map, and a North African campaign that’s your typical series of RTS missions. The lush landscapes of Italy make for a much different landscape from the usual hard grey battlefields found in World War II games. The change in setting to the Mediterranean Front (Italy and Africa) versus the usual European and Pacific fronts works absolute wonders, and while Company of Heroes 3 doesn’t have any truly revolutionary mechanical changes, this strategic gameplay is the most expansive and chaotic it's ever been, in a good way. 17 years later, there’s finally a sequel that lives up to the promise of the first game: Company of Heroes 3 is one of the most tactically satisfying RTS games of the last decade. While Company of Heroes 2 wasn’t bad, per se, it made some serious missteps in terms of gameplay design, map size, and overall tone. It completely redefined how cover systems and squad mechanics could work in the genre. The first Company of Heroes is one of the most important real-time strategy games of all time. The Italian countryside is a smattering of burned-out buildings and craters as I desperately command my troops to reinforce a break in my defenses, but it only takes moments before everything comes crashing down.
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