Men of Valor Preview

“We got back. We was all out of breath. The first thing they did was, they started laughing. I’m looking at these nuts and then I’m laughing with them. That’s when you find out that laughing at death is laughing that you made it alive.” – U.S. Soldier

The base is filled with jokes, some cussing and the sounds of men throwing around a football, enjoying quiet moments in the midst of chaos. Then hell visits. Shells rip apart the compound, and soldiers scurry for cover. The order comes to head into the jungle and find the North Vietnamese responsible for the sporadic attacks.

The convoy of troops carriers moves out. En route, a farmer and his oxen wander into the path and the trucks stop. Then the shooting begins. It’s an ambush. More orders are barked – advance to the tree line and take out the enemy.

Vivendi Universal and developer 2015 have put together a first-person shooter title called Men of Valor: Vietnam. The game combines a mission-based storyline, with intense action and single, multiplayer and cooperative gameplay.

The game is slated for release in late October, and while the code received for this preview was far from finished, it still provided a great sense of the game play and a look at the graphical elements as they stand.

In regards to the later, this is a game that actually has some elements that are contrary to the normal state of gaming. The cutscenes are decent, but not exceptional and the set-ups to the missions take a backseat to the actual gameplay, which is crisp and very well rendered. The animation is also very well done. Credit all of that to the Unreal engine used in this game. It creates a great feel and each mission has a solid look.

In the opening mission, you advance beyond the tree line to the top of a hill, where the rockets are actually coming from. Your mission is to slip in and mark the hilltop with smoke for air support to take out. That done, you are in a mop-up mode when another group of Vietcong attack from another tree line. Your squad scrambles for cover and a napalm strike is called in.

The smoke effects and the napalm are some of the better effects seen in the genre. The effects overall are extremely well done at this point in the game’s development.

While some FPS war titles will have you shoot an enemy, to watch them fall, then get up and finally stay down after you have put several more bullets into him, Men of Valor steps away from that. The game believes that if you hit the target in a vital area, one bullet is enough.

In the single-player game, you are part of a squad, but don’t expect a whole lot of help from them. The other members of the squad move independently, and shoot at will, but the more vital elements of the missions fall to you.

There’s a small village southwest of Da Nang. It seems to be the source of the guerilla activity. Your platoon is ordered to head there. During the trip, the APCs bog down and you are ordered out. The soldier in front of you suddenly drops to the ground, his head wrapped in a red mist. You have been expected and the firefight is on. From this point on, the intensity level of the game really picks up.

Men of Valor: Vietnam will receive an M rating for blood and gore, language and violence. This is a game that wants to bring home the horrors of war, but will challenge players to use skills other than pure reflex (which does play a big part) to excel. You cannot sit in one place, but need to move about. Grenades find those who are planting themselves behind or beside one obstacle. The enemy also moves, and the AI seems relatively good at times, and a little weak at others. You may find yourself flanked, and while you can crouch or go prone, doing so restricts movement. Sometimes the enemy just runs right at you, regardless of your team’s numbers.

The game also uses a small arcade-type system for battlefield pickups. You will take a lot of damage. You can stop the bleeding or you can use a med kit to heal wounds. You don’t carry those kits with you and will need to find it.

You can also pick up weapons on the battlefield.

The game itself has several difficulty settings, and players can tailor the game’s settings to their level of expertise. The controls are easy to use, and you have a free-roaming camera, which is controlled by the right thumbstick. The targeting skills are a little fine and the controls not quite as reactive to aiding targeting as they could be, but this is a preview build and that may be tightened up by the final code.

The game’s soundtrack is rather well done. You will hear the expletives one might expect in this situation, but there is also a terrific musical score that weaves into the start of each scene, and the orchestral undertones during the missions fuels the feel of the game.

Men of Valor: Vietnam is intense, and very well done. This game will keep you looking for cover, which isn’t easy to find in a rice paddy, and always looking around for the enemy you know is a heartbeat away.

If you are a fan of FPS titles, put this one on the list of must-have games.