Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway

Multiplayer

Now while the single player had a few faults, it’s still at its core a very entertaining experience and doesn’t show any signs of being an inferior console port. The multiplayer aspect however is the polar opposite, and is one of shoddiest examples seen in a while. The first annoyance is that the game uses the Gamspy ID system for logging into the server browser – an utterly unnecessary irritation that just gets in the way, but it sadly gets a whole lot worse.

Servers can only be hosted by users – there’s absolutely no dedicated server support at all, meaning finding a reliable server can be hard enough, and when you do, you’ll be unexpectedly disconnected when the host has to go do his homework. This is just unacceptable for a multiplayer component of a modern FPS, considering the excellent server support in similar multi-format releases like Call of Duty 4 or The Orange Box, and it’s utterly infuriating trying to find a reliable server with a ping that doesn’t cripple you.

The actual gameplay in multiplayer is very different to the single player component as well; with the squad based combat of the original Brothers in Arms multiplayer dumped for a more conventional attack/defence objective-based first person shooter. Squads remain only to decide which weapon set you have access too, with access to machine guns and bazookas rotated with the more conventional rifles – a frustrating trade-off considering that in most situations the conventional weapons are vastly superior.


There’s also a squad rotation slot to crew a tank (only if you’re on the attacking side) – a bizarre inclusion considering the poor quality of the vehicle sections of the single player, with combat quickly becoming focused on running away from/trying to blow up the tank before it annihilates your entire team.

The handful of maps are all fairly samey, with the defensive and offensive sides near identical bar the threat of the attacking team’s armoured support and there’s just one game type, so no option for free for all or team death match.


But the most annoying thing is the microphone support, which has clearly been shoddily ported to the PC and is a prime example of EPIC FAIL. There’s no push to talk option and the game transmits any noise your mic picks up to everyone on the server, a left over from the console versions where the push to talk button is included on the hardware. The audio pickup is ridiculously sensitive, and when you add some player’s speakers into the mix you’re soon experiencing server wide feedback.

This is just the icing on the totally sub-standard multiplayer experience, and it’s incredibly disappointing to see considering the, for the most part, excellent single player campaign.