Company of Heroes 3 Review

Company of Heroes is an undeniable tower of the strategy genre despite only having two mainline entries. The first, released seventeen years ago (I’m starting to feel old), revolutionised real-time strategy and captured elements of World War 2 in a way that very few games had ever managed. This includes titles that should be far more up-close and personal. Following the second release in 2013, we’ve had a reasonable delay which has seen Relic working on Dawn of War III and Age of Empires IV and focusing on where they could move the series next with Company of Heroes 3.

Having covered the western and eastern European fronts, Relic has now moved to the south, with a series of missions covering the actions of The Desert Fox, Erwin Rommel, as he led the Deutsches Afrikakorps. In addition, a brand new grand campaign covers the Allies’ push through Italy. In addition to moving south and seeing where they could use this terrain change, Italy has a new way to play Company of Heroes. I can’t help but think Relic have been looking at the homework of another SEGA-owned strategy developer, Creative Assembly.

If you don’t know by now, Company of Heroes is a real-time strategy game with base-building but on a more focused scale. The core RTS hasn’t changed in the past seventeen years, and you don’t fix what isn’t broken. You improve and expand. That’s precisely what Relic Entertainment has done with Company of Heroes 3. Every battle you do will follow the same squad-based real-time strategy action, with the usual mixture of missions where you have a base to those with a limited selection of units.

Let’s talk combat first. One of the things Company of Heroes first brought in was destruction, which is an area that Company of Heroes 3 expands. Rather than buildings (and the floor) having a few different states of collapse, every shell has a unique impact based on range and trajectory, even if it deflects. It also applies to everything in the battle. No shrub, horse cart, wall or building is safe from the destruction of war. Neither are your units if they’re next to a falling building – bricks hurt.

One may remember that an excellent tactic for units was to hide in a building; it helped limit how much they were damaged when it came to regular units, though a tank would make quick work of the surrounding masonry. Now you have the breach option for specific units, letting them lob a grenade in and take the building. It’s an excellent new feature representing how troops assaulted structures in the war during the brutal street-to-street fights. It also lets you use the same building after ejecting the enemy.

If there’s one aspect I appreciate being added to Company of Heroes 3, it’s something taken from a few real-time tactics titles: a tactical pause system. A quick press of the space bar pauses the game and lets you give commands to all of your units for them to enact when you unpause. The new system offers far more tactical opportunities in flanking and outmanoeuvring your opponent.

I mentioned that Relic Entertainment looks to have been looking at Creative Assembly’s work; this is in the Italian campaign. Here, we have a map of Italy with many towns, cities and airfields; the direction is moving your limited companies up Italy in whichever direction you want. In my campaign, I decided not to push right up the west coast for Rome, knowing how this turned out in history. As you move up the boot, you’ve got a variety of decisions to make, including the direction you want to progress and several side elements. I have to admit the side quests can be brilliantly organic and timed for when you hit specific markers, such as holding an athletics event in a newly captured city.

The problem is that the campaign is poorly optimised and has more than a few bugs (this is the shrapnel the title speaks of). More than that, it doesn’t have the challenge you would find from Creative Assembly, the game it’s been staring at through the crack in the changing room door. More than a few times, I would find myself with something in the campaign simply not working, with there being a bad start early on; every time I would capture the airport north of where you start, the game would crash. Throw in a few defective missions, companies that can spawn wrong or get caught on the terrain, ships that won’t attack the enemy, and more.

The Italian campaign, at least the Total War part, is a mess. From the bugs mentioned above to staggering performance dips, which make it unplayable, and require a restart, I wouldn’t forgive anybody for having some reservations. If it weren’t for the real-time strategy combat of this game and just how much Relic has put into how the story plays out on the grand scale, I would have them myself. It just so happens that the good, and by that, I mean amazing, outweighs any of the bad.

The AI is broken. That’s the one other issue with the grand campaign. From the misuse of their resources, such as planes and ships, to simply not attacking you or attempting to retake a town (unless scripted), you genuinely won’t have a second of challenge on your march up Italy. Were it not for the challenge found within the battles that you must have, and there are many created missions, it would have all fallen apart. As such, the grand strategy element feels more of a pause between rounds.

Before I move on, I do want to give some praise to this. It is an exciting addition to the series and, better optimised and designed – such as providing a few extra units and putting the axis on the attack – and you would get something special. The base is there, with a good variety of units, missions and even upgrade trees and unlockables for your companies; it’s hard not to like where Relic are going.

After mostly criticising what a decent chunk of Company of Heroes 3 is, you may imagine I’m somewhat down on the game. The honest-to-Lucifer truth is that I’m not, and it’s because the battles that campaign contains, and the battles found in the Africa campaign, are nigh-on unparalleled. The move to Italy and its winding paths, the beautiful soon-to-be-destroyed architecture to use as cover, and everything in between are exceptional.

On top of the extraordinary gameplay, you have a game that looks and sounds brilliant. The sounds of war permeate the battlefield. How the land changes throughout a battle are wonderous and terrifying to behold, with places being unidentifiable when you and the Germans are through with them. More than this, you can do it all over again in a robust skirmish mode, though I’d recommend increasing the difficulty. I’m suddenly exceptional, or the AI needs a higher threat level.

I can’t help but recommend Company of Heroes 3. Relic Entertainment has hit it out of the park, even considering the state of the grand campaign part. I don’t doubt for a second they will improve that through patches, and they aren’t going to get any points for it, but they don’t need the points. That’s before I even discuss multiplayer, which already has several maps, and you’ll never have a dull moment. You’ll be able to get hands-on yourself in just a few days.

PC version reviewed. Copy provided by the publisher.

Company of Heroes 3

Company of Heroes 3 is a triumphant return to the game that raised the bar for Real-Time Strategy. With unparalleled action on the battlefield, that alone makes it work your while. The new grand-strategy campaign is a welcome addition, though it has some flaws, ranging from performance issues and bugs to simply being too easy. Despite this, it’s impossible not to recommend Company of Heroes 3 for the excellent game that it is.