Medal of Honor Heroes 2 is a 2007 first-person shooter video game for the Wii and the PlayStation Portable. It is the 12th installment in the long-running Medal of Honor series of World War II games, and a direct sequel to the PSP-exclusive Medal of Honor: Heroes, released a year prior. Each version was built from the ground up for its respective system. Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 is set in World War II, starting on the Normandy beaches trying to control German bunkers and then move on to secure a village in France.
Medal of Honor Heroes 2 | |
---|---|
Developer(s) | EA Los Angeles (PSP) EA Canada (Wii) |
Publisher(s) | Electronic Arts |
Series | Medal of Honor |
Engine | EAGL |
Platform(s) | PlayStation Portable Wii |
Release | |
Genre(s) | First-person shooter |
Mode(s) | Single-player, multiplayer[a] |
This is the second Medal of Honor game to be released for the Wii (the first being Medal of Honor: Vanguard), and the latest game in the series to be available on a Nintendo system.
Plot
editThe player takes the role of Office of Strategic Services operative Lieutenant John Berg. The game has eight missions (seven in the PSP version) and is set against the backdrop of the Battle of Cherbourg.
Lt. Berg is deployed to Northern France in the midst of the Normandy D-Day amphibious invasion to conduct investigations into the German special weapon programs situated in the area. There, he discovers a terrifying weapon that could potentially shift the war in Germany's favor, and endeavors to thwart Hitler's plans to produce that weapon.
Gameplay
editIn addition to featuring a single-player campaign mode and an arcade-style rail shooter mode, both versions of the game have extensive multiplayer modes. Both versions can support up to 32 players online on a single server, with six maps and six uniforms, three for Axis and three for Allies. The uniforms for the Allies are "Ranger's 2nd", "Ranger's 4th", and "Ranger's 5th", whereas the Axis uniforms are simply "Axis Rookie", "Axis Regular", and "Axis Elite". There are three different online multiplayer modes available:[1] free-for-all deathmatch, team deathmatch and Infiltration. While the Wii version's multiplayer is online-only, with no offline split-screen multiplayer modes, the PSP version supports local wireless multiplayer among up to 8 players.
In free-for-all deathmatch, players compete to kill as many other players as possible, earning one point for each opponent they kill and losing one point every time they are killed. Team deathmatch divides players into two larger teams, either the Axis or Allies, and players earn points for killing enemy players, while losing points for friendly fire kills or suicides. Infiltration is a capture the flag mode between these same two teams, which compete to hold majority control over a contested flag. An online leaderboard system was powered by EA Nation to recognize skilled players who have scored many kills while suffering fewer deaths.
There are over a dozen Allied and Axis weapons available to use throughout the game, although the multiplayer mode applies small, but significant changes to the behavior of certain weapons, such as nerfing the Stg 44's rate of fire and allowing players to fire bazookas in a non-stationary position.
Development
editMultiplayer support limitations
editOnline multiplayer is unavailable altogether for both the Australian and Japanese releases of both versions of this game. The Australian version's lack of online multiplayer was widely criticized.[2] EA Australia & EB Games Australia also removed all references to online multiplayer from their websites.
EA's official response to the lack of multiplayer for Australia was: "Medal of Honor Heroes 2 for Wii does not support online functionality in Australia. We made an error in the documentation and marketing materials. We are very sorry to have caused confusion for our customers. We will provide a refund to anyone in Australia who wishes to return the game to EA because of the lack of online functionality."[3] EA Australia has declined to comment on why the online element of the game was omitted from the game, which has led video game news websites to speculate that the company did not deem it profitable to host the local servers necessary for low-latency game play.
Online multiplayer service for the Heroes duology was terminated on August 11, 2011, a few years ahead of the shutdown of Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection for the Wii and DS.
Reception
editAggregator | Score | |
---|---|---|
PSP | Wii | |
Metacritic | 69/100[21] | 73/100[22] |
Publication | Score | |
---|---|---|
PSP | Wii | |
Eurogamer | N/A | 5/10[4] |
Game Informer | N/A | 6.75/10[5] |
GamePro | [6] | [7] |
GameRevolution | N/A | C[8] |
GameSpot | 7/10[9] | 8/10[10] |
GameSpy | [11] | [12] |
GameZone | 8/10[13] | 8.3/10[14] |
IGN | 8.4/10[15] | 8.4/10[16] |
Nintendo Power | N/A | 8/10[17] |
PlayStation Official Magazine – UK | 7/10[18][19] | N/A |
411Mania | N/A | 8.6/10[20] |
Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 received "average" reviews on both platforms according to video game review aggregator Metacritic.[21][22]
See also
edit- The Conduit, a similarly praised Wii first-person shooter with online-only multiplayer
Notes
edit- ^ Multiplayer is not available for the Australian and Japanese releases of the Wii version due to such version being online only and online multiplayer being unsupported for these countries; multiplayer disabled in all other releases of the Wii version on August 11, 2011 due to server shutdown.
References
edit- ^ Medal of Honor Heroes 2 Instruction Booklet
- ^ Van Leuveren, Luke (February 7, 2008). "Medal of Honor Heroes 2 Wi-Fi support removed from Australian version". PALGN. Archived from the original on February 9, 2008. Retrieved October 1, 2015.
- ^ Chiappini, Dan (February 10, 2008). "Multiplayer mix-up leads to EA refund offers for MOHH2 in Australia". GameSpot. Archived from the original on September 5, 2020. Retrieved October 1, 2015.
- ^ Reed, Kristan (February 6, 2008). "Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 (Wii)". Eurogamer. Archived from the original on September 5, 2020. Retrieved October 2, 2015.
- ^ Bertz, Matt (January 2008). "Medal of Honor Heroes 2 (Wii)". Game Informer. No. 177. Archived from the original on January 30, 2008. Retrieved October 1, 2015.
- ^ Hall, Spenser (December 4, 2007). "Review: Medal of Honor: Heroes (PSP)". GamePro. Archived from the original on February 4, 2008. Retrieved October 2, 2015.
- ^ Kim, Tae K. (December 4, 2007). "Review: Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 (Wii)". GamePro. Archived from the original on February 2, 2008. Retrieved October 2, 2015.
- ^ Costantino, Jesse (December 12, 2007). "Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 Review (Wii)". Game Revolution. Archived from the original on October 1, 2015. Retrieved October 2, 2015.
- ^ Thomas, Aaron (November 16, 2007). "Medal of Honor Heroes 2 Review (PSP)". GameSpot. Archived from the original on September 16, 2015. Retrieved October 1, 2015.
- ^ Thomas, Aaron (November 16, 2007). "Medal of Honor Heroes 2 Review (Wii)". GameSpot. Archived from the original on January 21, 2016. Retrieved October 1, 2015.
- ^ Lewis, Cameron (November 14, 2007). "GameSpy: Medal of Honor Heroes 2 (PSP)". GameSpy. Archived from the original on September 5, 2015. Retrieved October 2, 2015.
- ^ Lewis, Cameron (November 21, 2007). "GameSpy: Medal of Honor Heroes 2 (Wii)". GameSpy. Archived from the original on September 6, 2015. Retrieved October 2, 2015.
- ^ Sandoval, Angelina (November 26, 2007). "Medal of Honor Heroes 2 - PSP - Review". GameZone. Archived from the original on October 6, 2008. Retrieved October 2, 2015.
- ^ Knutson, Michael (November 29, 2007). "Medal of Honor Heroes 2 - WII - Review". GameZone. Archived from the original on October 5, 2008. Retrieved October 2, 2015.
- ^ Bozon, Mark (November 8, 2007). "Medal of Honor Heroes 2 Review (PSP)". IGN. Archived from the original on November 11, 2007. Retrieved October 1, 2015.
- ^ Bozon, Mark (November 8, 2007). "Medal of Honor Heroes 2 Review (Wii)". IGN. Archived from the original on November 9, 2007. Retrieved October 1, 2015.
- ^ "Medal of Honor Heroes 2". Nintendo Power. Vol. 223. December 25, 2007. p. 86.
- ^ "Medal of Honor Heroes 2". Official UK PlayStation 2 Magazine: 123. December 25, 2007.
- ^ "Medal of Honor Heroes 2". PlayStation Official Magazine: 113. January 2008.
- ^ Aranda, Ramon (December 12, 2007). "Medal of Honor 2 (Wii) Review". 411Mania. Archived from the original on January 21, 2016. Retrieved October 1, 2015.
- ^ a b "Medal of Honor Heroes 2 for PSP Reviews". Metacritic. Archived from the original on April 29, 2013. Retrieved November 2, 2012.
- ^ a b "Medal of Honor Heroes 2 for Wii Reviews". Metacritic. Archived from the original on August 27, 2012. Retrieved November 2, 2012.