Men of War™

Men of War is one of the very few games on the market with a real armor penetration model. That and the unique direct control option make it a strategy game unlike any other. The list of features would be immense and it has great replayability. If you buy this game be sure to check out http://www.moddb.com/mods/dynamic-campaign-generator-dcg

This game is a gem when it comes to the 3 singleplayer Campaigns, each one is well crafted with a lot of immersion & realism while being both fun & challenging. I never seen such fresh & unique level design in one RTS, you have missions that focus on stealth like "commandos", others in a 3rd Person Shoot them up, etc.. Unique features: - Realistic damage model when it comes to vehicles, you can set them on flame, detrack them, kill a crew member, hit the ammunition, crews also have morale & can flee. - Take direct control of one of your units, aim their guns & shoot them, this is a joy with the damage model. - Set your infantry behind hard cover, while allowing them to shoot from that cover or put them proned on bushes and grass to ambush the enemy. - Each unit has an inventory(infantry, vehicles and some objects) each unit can have uniforms, helmets, weapons, you can choose which ammo to take etc.. - Attention to detail like types of rounds & weapons, vehicles, historical settings, freedom of completing objectives to eye candy destructability, The worst aspect of the game is the micromanaging, the game is dumb I'm not talking about the AI(hit and miss), I'm saying that the game relies heavily on mouse clicks & baby sitting like: You are in a town that will be attacked and you want to pant some mines outside the town. 1- You have to look in many boxes scatter around the town for them, 2- After you find them you have to pick them up, you might have to drop some items to make space 3- After this you move your units and order them to deploy mines. Once you are finished move your units back to town and reequip them. Now this also happens if your unit runs out of ammo or you want to change weapon. You will have to find them, pick them up and take it back to the unit. A couple buttons like pick ammo on/of or better interface saying what equipment was inside a box would be so much better. The game is a must for WW2 lovers & RTS players just for the singleplayer.

The Men of War campaign offers a level of interactive depth that is rare to find, with each mission likely taking hours to complete if you count replays. I recommend turning the speed down for a more comfortable experience because being asked to not only set up positions but make sure each individual unit is well-equipped can quickly become overwhelming. The game is as much about logistics as it is about blowing stuff up, which means scavenging enemy equipment, organizing squads to stack ammunition into trucks, and running trucks between your lines to supply ammo-starved troops. If such detailed micromanaging sounds dull, it’s actually really intense, especially during defence missions. Heroism is born from desperation, and it doesn’t get any more desperate when a fresh wave of enemy tanks comes crashing against your isolated squad who are down to their pistols!

Despite the graphical & physics upgrade over Soldiers: Heroes of WWII - I found the campaign/missions in that game far more exciting, fun and with a much better flow - than the ones in this one; which alternate between frustrating difficulty to boring tedium; and are often disjointed from one another. They're also larger scale - however this larger scale is not too well suited to the engine and style of gameplay encouraged - in practice you'll end playing through most missions on the slowest speed setting, sometimes cursing the game for not being able to pause it outright to give orders and assign gear. Occassionally you get some very classy missions, your execution of which can evoke a cinematic quality; such as the break-out of the Red Army officer by partisans early in the Soviet campaign. However this is the exception more than the rule. It's a shame as all the rest of the ingredients were there to make this game an absolute classic in the genre. But the single-player experience lets it down.