Medal of Honor Rising Sun

"The worse Medal of Honor yet"

I am a big fan of the Medal of Honor series. I still think the original is the best in the series as well, with Frontline right behind it. I was very excited to hear that there would be a new game taking place in the Japanese part of World War II and we would get to play through the Pearl Harbor attack. When I got my hands on the game, I was very disappointed. I will tell you why.

First off, lets check out the graphics. The game looks very nice. The player models are well done, the gun models look VERY good, and the environments are well done. I was also impressed with the draw distance in this game. The bad thing though is that the textures are very bland. Gun shots and explosions are well done too. I just wish they put a little more effort into the Xbox version and beefed up those textures.

The audio is good here too. The game sports a very dramatic, well done soundtrack that fits the game very well. The tune played during the Pearl Harbor level was amazing. The game's voice acting is decent and the dialog is well done too. The gunshots sound pretty realistic too, and the groans and grunts from enemies are cool. The enemies speaking in Japanese throughout the levels are a nice touch too, but we are used to this since the previous games had lots of German screams and commands being thrown around in gameplay.

Controls on the other hand could use some work. The analog sticks seem to not want to respond as well as games like Halo. I have trouble aiming properly in the game. The button configuration is well done though and everything there seems to be okay. I had some problems pulling off jumps though. Other then that, it controls pretty decently but could use work.

The gameplay is where the game starts to go down hill. The core mechanics are good and a blast to play, but there are many things that keep this from being fun. First off the game's levels are WAY too long. If we have to play through levels this long, then the game needs a save anywhere feature, which this game does not have. Also there are no checkpoints either. If you die in the game then you go all the way back to the beginning, which really ruins things.

Rising Sun's level design is very boring too. I often find myself walking around in circles too many times or not being clear on where to go. The game's level design just really lacks and bores me. Also the game can be pretty cheap by making you go through a massive level, then at the end throwing something really difficult at you. This results in getting killed easier, thus making you restart all over again. This completely ruins the single player experience. If the game featured a save anywhere feature within the levels, then the game would be saved. The game does sometimes give you save points within the levels, but they don't help too much due to how long these levels are because usually you only see one save point per level.

The most anticipated moment of Rising Sun was the Pearl Harbor level. I found it to be very disappointing as well. It doesn't feel as epic as the Normandy beach level found in Frontline and Allied Assault. I just didn't have a sense of struggle like I did in the Normandy beach level.

I found sometimes that scripted events also fail to happen sometimes. For instance I was in a level where a plane is suppose to fly by and blow a door open for me to walk in to and continue the level. This only happened on my third attempt at the level. When scripted events are suppose to occur, you make sure they happen or this makes the player unable to continue, remember this next time EA.

The multiplayer feature has bots, which is always a plus to me. Eight players can play and up to seven bots can be played against. There is a decent amount of maps and weapons too. Not too many multiplayer modes though. Also once again EA scrapped Xbox Live play, which really lowers the score. The game's multiplayer is quite slow and not very fun in my opinion though, so even if Xbox Live was included I doubt I would be using it.

In conclusion, Rising Sun features too many things that ruined a could be fun game. If you can stomach no checkpoints or save anywhere feature, and don't mind the boring levels, you may enjoy the game. People will similar tastes in games like mine will be completely turned off by Rising Sun's faults. Maybe next time.

5/10

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 04/01/04