As soon as I read the post title and was then greeted by wall of rant I decided to save some time and cut to the chase here.
Somebody doesn't know a true classic game when they see one.
For its time, the graphics are quite good where it uses the Quake III engine as did Return to Castle Wolfenstein also released around the same time. Anybody wanting the eye candy of something newer and somewhat similar to this might want to instead play Call of Duty: World at War. You'll be missing a real classic with a lot of fun gameplay though if you skip this just because of its age. It would be better to play them both in my opinion. Be warned though, the grenade spam early on in the CoD game can be highly annoying.
Comparing a classic game to a modern game is like comparing apples to oranges really. Yes, apples are shinier but oranges taste sweet too.
Oh, and you don't need to cheat in sniper town. You need to learn how to play and then you will do just fine in sniper town. I am no pro and I got through sniper town on normal without cheating. Yes, it was a challenge. I found it fun and rewarding to beat it and I am admittedly not the most patient guy in the world.
Your squad mates in this game are just window dressing mostly. Forget about them doing anything for you. You are on your own. The illusion of some company is nice though and they do kill some enemies so it's all good. If you need more help than they offer, you need to learn to play better. Practice makes perfect as they say. Few people are born with leet skillz so play it on easy if frustrated. There's no shame in that. It's supposed to be fun, not torment. Honestly, this game is not all that hard for the most part. I found it a lot of fun and again, I am no leet kid. I am just a lowly casual and I beat this so how hard can it be really?
The comments comparing this to Half-Life 1, Unreal, Quake II, etc. are ridiculous and wrong. As I said, it's a Quake III engine game and that was current tech in 2002 still. The OP makes reference to HL2 but that game did not ship for two more years and a lot of ground was broken in game graphics between 2002 and 2004 when HL2 launched. By 2005 we had DOOM III. It isn't fair or appropriate to compare any of this stuff to a Q3 engine game from 2002. It's silly. It doesn't apply. It is incorrect.
Comments about realism: this is a game, not a simulator. You might want to try ARMA 3 if you want simulation. This is pure arcade here, damn fun arcade too.
Yes, the game is linear. So what? It's not a crime. The scripted stuff was something praised about this game when it released. Some of the action sequences are pretty fun stuff. If you want open world, go play that game. This game is old and this accurate reporting I am giving here is not news at all. A little time looking into it before buying would reveal all for anybody that has missed it in the past.
The game is not very short. Now I am wondering if somebody stopped at Snipertown or what. There is a lot of levels to complete before you even get to the expansions one of which was criticized for being brief as I recall but the other one was not and certainly the game proper was not. I remember it taking me a fair amount of time to complete it which was fine. I enjoyed the entire ride on rails. Great stuff.
Hit detection is fine. Learn to shoot.
Destructible terrain and objects were not in yet in 2002 that I can recall. You might want to play Red Faction games to satisfy your need to shoot rocks and watch them explode. That was the huge deal with the first Red Faction - destructible environments! OMG! Actually, that was as a PS2 launch title in 2000 I think. So I guess somebody had done it before MoHAA but it certainly was not anything common yet so why would anyone expect it here?
I had little problem with movement in the entire game or getting stuck on anything. Somebody probably needs to drink less and stop walking into door frames and stuff is all I can imagine.
I love animals myself but killing German Shepherds that want to tear me apart and eat me in a computer game doesn't bother me even a little bit. This is a game remember? This is not real life. No German Shepherds were harmed in the making of nor playing of Medal of Honor. I promise!
I think the OP is simply someone who would be best off playing new shooter releases and skipping all classic shooters which despite their virtues cannot be appreciated by them. I wonder if they are not far younger than I and were not around before and during these game's heyday. Is there a nostalgia factor at work here? I am sure there is. I loved it when it was brand new. I loved the multiplayer and had hours upon hours of fun with it. Would I tend to be more forgiving of shortcomings versus a brand new shiny DX11 shooter that is well made? Well, yeah I know that I would. In the very same way I could thoroughly enjoy playing Ultima VII even though Pillars of Eternity is a very high quality modern game of similar kind.
I think it comes down to how much you appreciate various classics for their quality which is most fairly rated by considering when they were made in technical terms at least or how much you'd rather skip that in favor of the new and shiny. I am not saying that the latter choice is wrong. We are all different and entitled to our own preferences. That's fine. But to bash a classic shooter like this with such an out of touch, out of context and unfair yardstick isn't fine. The OP tells me one thing very clearly and that is that they don't get it. They don't get what playing this today is about. It's not for them. That has zero to do with whether or not it is an excellent classic game which it is.
I think many old timers or older timers will tend to agree with me here just generally speaking. These classic games are probably more often than not appreciated more by us than anyone else. It's kinda like oldies music. I wouldn't expect a kid today blasting rap with bass so loud it makes my chest hurt to appreciate Led Zepplin's 3rd album the way that I do. I even like stuff like Johnny Mathis because my mom spun his records a lot. I am not wrong to love that stuff. In fairness, kids today are not wrong to think its stupid. It's from another time. I don't get rap. They don't get classic rock. This stuff is nothing new under the sun but games have now been around for long enough that we see the cycle beginning to occur with these too.
EDIT: I failed to properly acknowledge that the things I just said regarding age are certainly not universal. I know there are plenty of younger people who can and do appreciate great classic games. In my comments I was thinking of the many who don't see any value in them when they make comparisons often based on differences related to newer vs older tech, etc. So please put away the pitchforks and torches. Those of you who get these games just as much as I do know who you are. I apologize for failing to recognize you before this edit.
Post edited April 23, 2015 by dirtyharry50