Company of Heroes

2006

real time strategy (rts)
strategy
action
historical
warfare
single player
multiplayer

The story

Command the company that changed the face of history! Battle your way across Europe as your troops make intuitive use of the terrain and buildings for cover and mount attacks on an equally intelligent enemy. Your Mission. Your Men. Your Decisions.

What it’s like

Grimy, desaturated WWII dioramas rendered in a painterly-realistic style: muddy fields under overcast grey skies, smoke and dust hanging in the air, hedgerows, shell-cratered villages and snow-dusted forests that look worn rather than heroic. The camera floats at a high, zoomable angle over the battlefield, so the map reads like a living tabletop model, with tracers stitching across open ground and the crack of rifles, the grind of Shermans and the hiss of steam from buildings filling the speakers. The score is restrained, mostly ambient drones and martial snare under the chatter of radio orders. Its vibe is tense, methodical calm punctured by sudden chaos, the feeling of a long grey afternoon spent planning a flank. Pacing is deliberate: long stretches of positioning, scouting and resource management broken by violent firefights, with soldiers who grow more personal as they survive. Violence is frequent and bloody, with blood spatter, explosions and human casualties shown in realistic, unglamorous detail, though not gratuitous gore. It suits a rainy weekend session or a focused evening, for players who enjoy tactical real-time strategy, historical military settings and the satisfaction of outthinking a clever opponent.

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