Civil War reveiw

Games have not been kind to the History Channel. First comes the abomination that was Civil War ( that was a craptacular turn-based strategy game). Then comes this reincarnation of Civil War. I must say I was suprised.

It starts simply with your commanding officer telling you to hold the bridge. The sounds of battle are ringing in your ears, and sound is one thing Civil War: A Nation Divided does right. Muskets go off with a rather loud pop. There is an extremely satisfying thud as the butt of your rifle connects with your opponets head and you stab him with your bayonet.

Speaking of weapons, Civil War features tons of them, and each one is realistic. This includes the reloading times. While I was used to pop the clip out and stick in a new in about four seconds, I found myself waiting for 20 seconds while my character loaded in a fresh bullet and rammed some gunpowder down the barrel. Well, at least for the muskets. They are useful for the long range firefights, but I found myself using repeatinng rifles far more. The ability to fire off five ( unnacurate and short-ranged) shots compared to a single one hit kill shot really neutralized the need for a musket.

With all these features, you would think Civil War would really make an identity for itself. This is not the case. It feels WAY to much like Call of Duty to have one. I mean, the mission structure is the same ( hold the bridge, plant the explosives,yawn)
and enemys and allies msysticly poof in. The ai is good, but not perfect.
All these flaws place the game in the above average zone rahter then the great zone I would like it to be in.

A weird thing I noticed: you can get acheivements jsut for killing enemies. At first lance it seems like the developers were lazy in the acheivment area, the are cleverly implmeneted here and will keep this game in you disc tray for awhile.
Overall 7.5 out of 10.
While I may have given it a lower score then most of my games, the realistic weapons and battles make this a must have for anyone who likes the Civil War ( like me, I was in 2 reinactments).