Medal of Honor ?

On October 12, 2010 EA will be releasing its new shooter Medal of Honor (MOH) to the mass market.   Honestly, if you asked me about this game 4 months ago ago, I would have said "Hell No."  At that point in time I was still nestled chin deep in Battlefield Bad Company 2 (BC2) and was in a pure love, and yes complete hate relationship w/ the game.

My love for the game should be obvious (if you've ever played it), it is amazing for a realistic shooter encompassing numerous fun and fascinating aspects..  My hate though...that was more directed towards EA itself.   For one, EA hosts all their online games on their own servers.  In this respect, BC2 had many online issues including massive lag problems and sometimes even ridiculous hit detection problems.  From that experience I had vowed not pay anymore money to EA to support their games since they can hardly keep the ones they have out there running.  Another example of an excellent game gone to S&*^ is Battlefield 1943.  I probably have as many hours logged in that game online as I do BC2.   Sadly when I go back to that game now and then for nostalgia or just want to do some dog fighting or tank busting, the game is still plagued w/ lag or has an extremely low population count active at the time.

Lag does deter players from playing, and people give up quite fast on games that do not perform to expectations.  I wish EA would realize this.  I think they've lost a significant # of gamers due to this who have MANY other options to play in the FPS or general shooter/war/action genres.   I wouldn't be surprised if EA decided the population of players and cost to support BF1943 is too high, so they shut it down.  They've done it quite swiftly in the past.

But, I digress.  This topic is about MOH.  So, when this game was announced, I was like "meh."  A sour meh, like I don't care for this game the series died and good riddance it was getting lame anyway.  However...once I started to check out the trailers tossed out in their marketing campaign, mainly through the Xbox Live dashboard channels, I was more like "Wow."  One key marketing piece they put together is linked to a recent music track release from Linkin Park "Catalyst."  This trailer is awesome and EVERY time I watch it I'm impressed w/ the game design and what looks to be an incredible campaign.

(edit: I'm terrible at attempting to embed the video, so here is a link to EA's site where you can look it up. www.medalofhonor.com/community)

I liked Call of Duty and its modern warfare stomping.  However, MW2 was a real departure for a realistic gripping story.  Once I completed that game I tried it online and was actually overwhelmed at the mass chaos that seemed to ensue.  It may just be my playstyle and patience, but there is too much going on all the time everywhere in the multiplayer there.   I expect the same for COD Black Ops and even for MOH too.

For me, I definitely want to hit up the MOH campaign.  The real question is, should I get this game new on or before release date, or should I sit and wait for it to come out and see if there are sales on it a few weeks down the road?  I can almost imagine that if the game does not sell enough in the first month release, it will be on sale at a nice discount not too long after in order to make up #'s and compete directly w/ Black Ops for their release. 

Anyway...hurry up and release Battlefield 3 already DICE and EA.  I want some real firepower landing on troops as I rush in for my MCOM station!