The two games I'm playing at the moment are STALKER: Clear Sky and Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway (theres always a subtitle isn't there!). Both on PC and you all know why. I was planning on getting the 360 version of BiA since my PC is getting on a bit now, but turns out the PC version actually runs quite smoothly and still looks very nice.
I can put all the details on high as long as I keep the resolution down at 1024x768 - which is ok for me since I use my PC/monitor like a TV these days and sit further away on a sofa, with my keyboard and mouse on the wooden coffee table in front. The low resolution isnt as noticable from afar, but the detail is still there. It really does live up to the screenshots and target trailers of olde.
Not only that, Gearbox have refined the gameplay that has been used in their previous games - ordering your mates to move, suppress and take out key points to help you progress seems easy. I found the first BiA frustrating in that much of the time you were taking cover - it felt like a chore to suppress an enemy and eventually overcome them, and then you had to do it all again with the next lot. This time the enemy are more readily supressed, and there are various ways to take them out more swiftly - with headshots, grenades, bazookas or the old flank. The maps are big and detailed enough to prevent you from feeling as though you're being funnelled towards a map exit, and the locations feel very authentic. I've never been to the Netherlands but the windmills are in there.
The controls are fluid and simple (they've even specifically built the use of the 360 pad in for those that want it) and getting from cover to cover, using grenades and various guns feels easy - which along with the brilliant camera makes you feel as though you're in a movie. The slow-mo headshots and grenade kills are particularly sweet, watching dismembered arms arcing through the air. The ragdoll sheep are also quite cool.
Ehem, aside from all that gory fantasy, the cinematics are also some of the best in any game, well directed with lots of character interaction and actually interesting to watch.
In short we've come a long way from Medal of Honour: Allied Assault, and although this is yet another WWII shooter, it actaully does it some justice.
Anyone else playing the game - we've been waiting a while and now its out, I haven't really heard much buzz around here, apart from Edwin's review with 'teabagging' in it. (I always thought that meant something else.)
I think I'm liking it more than Edwin though, not sure why, maybe I was expecting less?