Battalion 1944 - First Look

It's hard not to think that Battalion 1944 is arriving a year too late to the party. Rewind 12 months or so and you've got Battlefield 1 doing the business for EA/DICE, with Activision and Sledgehammer quietly readying Call of Duty: WWII, a return to boots-on-the-ground action and the relegation of jetpacks and the rest of the sci-fi trimmings that continued to distance newer games in the series from the origins of the franchise. There's no Medal of Honor to speak of, and none of the other major studios are looking back to historical conflicts from a first-person perspective either, leaving the shooter space very much a No Man's Land.

Look back even further and the relative absence of WW2-themed shooters was being keenly felt by the wider community, and so in reaction to that in the last few months we've started to see the response, that being a number of smaller titles released that revisit various historical conflicts. A couple of them were really good, too. The best of the bunch were Rising Storm 2 (which is not only set in Vietnam but is built on the back of Red Orchestra 2, a PC classic), and Day of Infamy from New World Interactive. There were more besides those two examples, and they spanned different wars and different theatres, however, the fact remains that these games were all born of the same desire among shooter fans to return to the battlefields of yesteryear and move away from the sci-fi games that, for a time at least, seemed to be ten-a-penny.

Which brings us neatly to early 2018, a few months after the launch of Call of Duty: WWII, a return to form for the series that pleased fans to the point that, at the time of writing, it's still sitting pretty atop the UK retail charts. There's clearly an appetite for this return to historical combat, but with such fierce opposition now that the big hitters have returned to their origins, and with capable triple-I shooters nipping at their heels, does that leave Battalion 1944 in a precarious position before any real shots have been fired?

With that burning question in mind, we're not going to lie, our first impressions weren't good. At first we struggled to get a match, and the client itself crashed on more than one occasion during our attempts to get a game. Our initial retreat took place during the first hours of its recent beta, but eventually, after coming back later on, with alarm bells still ringing in our ears, we were at least able to sample a few matches and get a feel for what it has to offer. In a nutshell, that offering is snappy combat that takes place on tightly focused maps.

It's not a military sim like Arma 3, rather it's a fast-paced shooter with arcade-fuelled blood running through its veins. As was the case with the aforementioned Day of Infamy, you get the feeling that the devs at Bulkhead played a few rounds of Day of Defeat back in the day. It's got a similar brand of immediate, punchy action. Player movement is quick and the action is pacey. Perhaps the jump is a little overpowered, which isn't helped by the lack of the ability to mantle objects in the world, nor by the propensity of some players to hop around like heavily armed camo-wearing bunnies. Player-made distractions aside, perhaps the maps could feel more alive than they currently do. While the atmosphere felt a little static at times, overall the level design seemed solid. Whether you're running through the trenches or moving through wrecked and abandoned buildings, everything looked crisp and clear, if not a little familiar.

Importantly, hit detection seemed pretty accurate, and it felt like our bullets were landing where we were placing them (for better and for worse). There is a range of pre-made loadouts for players to choose from, and while we mixed things up a little, we mostly went with either a sub-machine gun or the standard rifle, the latter thanks to the power offered by each connecting bullet. The maps we tried didn't have too many long lines of sight, so it didn't make sense to us to play sniper, but we'll see what comes in the final game in that regard. Still, better players than us will no doubt enjoy that class, such is the brevity of life for each player; you don't go into battle with lots of health, and a steady aim coupled with a powerful rifle could prove devastating.

Given that we were playing a beta it was always likely that there was going to be some problems, but they extended beyond those mentioned before. For example, we noticed some big frame-rate drops while we were playing. Hopefully, these issues will need to be ironed out while the game is in early access. Otherwise we felt pretty positive about our time with Battalion 1944. The action was snappy and responsive, the maps look good (in fact, considering the size of the studio making the game, the whole thing looks impressive), and there are plenty of classes to choose from. While we sampled a handful of modes (variants of team deathmatch, capture-the-flag, domination, and bomb defusal), nothing really stuck out as being particularly original, so perhaps that's something the studio will look to address in the months ahead. They also have plans for the esports scene, but before those plans come to pass we think there's much work to be done.

If Bulkhead's shooter is going to mix it with the big boys, then the next few months are going to be key, and the feedback that they get from the upcoming early access period (which starts on February 1) is going to be crucial. If they can't convince enough players to get onboard then this fight is going to be over before it has even started, and that would be a shame as there's undoubted potential down in the trenches of this particular shooter. But still, the feeling persists that Battalion 1944 would have fared much better if it had landed 12-18 months ago, because now that Call of Duty is back in its old stomping ground, it's going to be a challenge for any game set in this era to get the traction it needs to survive and thrive.