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Company of Heroes<\/strong> has been a household name in the strategy game genre for quite a long time. Relic Entertainment<\/strong> made a classic way back in 2006 and the sequel that was released in 2013 was well-received too.<\/p>\n

Now in 2023, we have Company of Heroes 3<\/strong> and it seeks to improve upon what its predecessors established. So ultimately does it live up to the hype? Let\u2019s dive right in shall we?<\/p>\n

Real-Time Strategy<\/h2>\n

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Company of Heroes 3<\/strong> kicks off with players taking on the role of a commander in one of two campaigns. The Italy campaign and the North Africa campaign. The Italy campaign follows your trek to take back Rome from the Germans while the North Africa campaign has you playing as the baddies, the Deutsches Afrikakorps as they fight their way across the harsh desert terrain.<\/p>\n

Each campaign in Company of Heroes 3<\/strong> makes extensive use of real-time strategy and tactics. Players will have to employ various different units to defeat the enemy forces and take back territories under their control. In the Italy campaign, players will fight battles across the Italian countryside and within various smaller towns and villages.<\/p>\n

There are plenty of buildings and infrastructure to navigate in the Italy campaign whereas, in the North Africa campaign, you\u2019re predominantly fighting battles across desert terrain. Each campaign, therefore, plays out extremely different from the other. Story content aside, the wide open expanses of the desert are perfect for armoured vehicle combat while the Italian villages are more suited to infantry battles.<\/p>\n

Commanding Officer<\/h2>\n

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As the commander, you\u2019ll have access to numerous abilities in battle. You\u2019ll be able to call in paratroopers or command your battleships in the Mediterranean Sea to bombard enemy encampments. Tactical gameplay involving extensive use of your commanding abilities combined with your unit\u2019s own capabilities is required for victory in Company of Heroes 3<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

With that said though, the A. I opponents in the game at the time of writing this review could use some serious work. They sit back and wait far too often and don\u2019t take the initiative to do anything to you. As such, they are a complete pushover and you\u2019ll easily breeze through the campaign because of this fact.<\/p>\n

The campaign involves the use of a strategic map view that involves players moving their units around on a large-scale map before diving into battles or auto-resolving them. Auto-resolving battles are not advisable though because you\u2019ll more often than not come out significantly disadvantaged afterwards. It\u2019s better to play through the entire battle yourself. It\u2019s way more fun that way too because you get to soak in the sights and the sounds of battle yourself.<\/p>\n

Dynamic Campaign<\/h2>\n

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Company of Heroes 3<\/strong> touts a \u201cDynamic Campaign Map\u201d and while it does sound exciting, in action it\u2019s a tad lacklustre. The Dynamic Campaign Map means that the enemy will move their forces around and attempt different things each time based on your campaign decisions to take strategic points. Yes, every single playthrough will be different based on what\u2019s going on but given the fact that currently, you can breeze through battles with minimal effort, the dynamic nature of the map interactions and battles seems watered down.<\/p>\n

Company of Heroes 3<\/strong>\u2019s campaigns both feel extremely fun to play through though despite the disappointingly easy beat to enemy A.I. Seeing artillery shells levelling buildings and cratering the ground is a visual feast for the eyes. Animations look great and so too do flashy visual effects such as fires burning and grenades exploding. Unfortunately, though there is a level of inconsistency in the game with some visuals looking extremely dated and rather bland.<\/p>\n

The Essence Engine could use some tweaking here and there to give the game a slightly more polished look. The game\u2019s user interface could do with some work too to make it a bit more user-friendly. It works but it looks rather dated in some areas to be quite honest. Though this might come down to personal preference and taste more than anything else.<\/p>\n

One major problem that I do have with the game\u2019s visuals though is the fact that you cannot zoom out enough. The entire camera view at the maximum zoomed-out level is still too close to the action. This makes giving commands to your units and quickly panning across the battlefields problematic when it should be enjoyable. There needs to be an option added to the game to allow you to zoom the camera view out a bit more because it\u2019s just not conducive to strategic gameplay at all right now if you can\u2019t see more of what\u2019s going on at any given point in a battle. More modernised real-time strategy games tend to have zoom levels that give you a lot more freedom than Company of Heroes 3<\/strong>\u2019s does.<\/p>\n

Skirmish and Multiplayer<\/h2>\n

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No Company of Heroes game would be complete with a Skirmish and Multiplayer mode. Players will have access to 4 different factions in these modes. These being the US Forces, the British Forces, the Wehrmacht and the Deutsches Afrikakorps. There are 14 playable maps and the game features mod support so the community will most likely continue to support this for a long time to come. Once you\u2019re done with the campaigns, the Multiplayer and Skirmish modes will add a lot of longevity to the game if you\u2019re into that sort of thing.
The downside to both these modes right now lies in the fact that certain units are quite unbalanced. With consistent patches and tweaks being made to the game though, this will be ironed out and things will normalise eventually. This does however mean that in its current form, Company of Heroes 3<\/strong> is not a finished package. If you\u2019re going to dive into this game for the multiplayer, be prepared to experience a lot of pain and suffering at the hands of more experienced players who know exactly what they are doing and how to crush you swiftly. This being compounded by the fact that certain factions are currently stronger than others. If you plan to just play against friends or a family member though, the 1 v 1 mode is still a lot of fun.<\/p>\n

Final Verdict<\/h2>\n

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As it stands right now, Company of Heroes 3<\/strong> is a flawed release. The Campaign A. I is lacklustre and disappointing while the Multiplayer and Skirmish modes are currently unbalanced. Unit pathing seems to be quite broken and vehicles seemingly cannot run over infantry at all which seems like a very strange decision. The game is still enjoyable in its current state but there\u2019s a lot more work to be done here. Pick it up if you must but if you\u2019re not in a rush to play this, give it a few more months before diving in. Hopefully, by then all the issues will have been addressed by Relic Entertainment or avid modders in the community.<\/p>\n