Despite its success in design tweaks and the Desert War levels’ narrative framework, the online modes and Italian campaign that constitute much of the game aren’t all that novel, even if they’re still an enjoyable return to the past. He mentions how “newer strategy games are remixing age-old mechanics with modern gaming influences,” and he explains that Relic's “job is to listen to our players to build the game they want and refine the experience with exciting new ideas until we get it right.”Ĭompany of Heroes 3 doesn’t make the case for a widespread resurgence of real-time strategy games, but it does serve as more than an exercise in nostalgia. Mele believes that real-time strategy games from well-known series will maintain their audiences, but he sees the need for innovation within the genre as well. A change in perspective makes the old feel new again. The tension of controlling armies fighting for dominion of a land whose citizens suffer terribly from the effects of the war lends higher stakes to familiar modes of play. Though players are tasked with controlling German forces under Erwin Rommel during combat, each battle is bookended by diary entries and cutscenes describing the horrors faced by Libyan Jews persecuted by their Axis occupiers in the Holocaust and treated with deadly indifference by the British forces that opposed them.īy shifting the perspective of a WWII strategy game to focus on those typically ignored by the genre, Company of Heroes 3 finds value in reworking what’s come before. The highlight in this sense is the North African levels’ narrative. Speaking of Relic’s choice of setting, Mele says the team “also wanted to tell powerful stories that show the devastating impact that the war had on the local populations of the region.” Mele noted that these locations also drew “armies from all over the world,” which allowed Relic to incorporate less frequently represented forces, like Indian artillery companies and Gurkha units, into the game. The deserts of Libya and Egypt and tank battles of the North African campaign provided one part of this, the rolling hills and infantry-led fighting of Italy another. Mele says Relic sought to provide players with “interesting new perspectives” on the Second World War, deciding to set the game within the Mediterranean theater to showcase other aspects of the conflict not depicted as often in games.

Companies of heroes movie