Medal of Honor (series): Difference between revisions

* In ''[[Call of Duty]]'', playership is usually divided between a number of nationals, and any number of compatriots fighting alongside you. Though just as pivotal in terms of gameplay, more focus is put on your comrades and where you fit into this particular unit. The series, especially the later games, tends to have a far more "arcadey" feel to it, especially apparent in its somewhat bizarre ''[[Nazi Zombies]]'' survival game mode.

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* [[Absurdly Spacious Sewer]]: The first game. [[Justified Trope|Mind you, Germany and France did have such sewers.]]

* [[Air Vent Passageway]]: ''Allied Assault's'' second mission had you crawling through the vents, subverted by the fact that when you get out, you're still inside the base you're escaping from. Rather notably, the Germans find out you're in there and actually try to follow you in.

** The hydroplant level in the first game had a part where an air vent was the only way to get into a room you had to get into, and if the Germans saw or heard you, they'd start pitching grenades in after you.

** In the first game, [[Grenade Hot Potato|they would sometimes kick it back at you. In the second, they could actually catch the things in midair and throw it back at you.]]

** You can have SO much fun with that too...

* [[Authority Equals Asskicking]]: Sturmgeist in ''Frontline'' and the Nemesis Officers and Von Schrader in ''European Assault'' can all take significantly more damage that the basic [[Mooks]] under their command.

** The player characters themselves are usually officers in the Allied army and more often or not end up taking on the entire Axis by themselves.

* [[Badass]]: Dusty, from ''Medal of Honor'' (2010). Yes, he's based on Dusty Hammer. Yes, he's on the cover art. Yes, he's a Tier 1 operator. But look at his baseball cap in-game. It reads, "FDNY". Was he a firefighter in New York on 9/11 who got pissed off and decided to kick some ass? God, I hope so.

** Ahem. Jimmy Patterson. So badass that Nazi [[Mooks]] would address him by name.

*** Hell, the German Army declared war on him! Just look at those wanted posters of him all over the place in ''Frontline''.

* [[Badass Army]]: ''Medal of Honor'' (2010): The Army Rangers manage to be this while also being shades of [[Redshirt Army]], presumably to let you actually ''have'' friendly casualties during the game without having to kill off any members of your various squads. That said, the fact that three Rangers and an Air Force [[Death From Above|Enlisted Terminal Attack Controller]] managed to go up against an [[Zerg Rush|entire Taliban village]] and come out victorious ''is'' [[Lampshaded]].

** The Tier 1 operators know that they would have serious difficulty in doing the same thing {{spoiler|and in fact, AFO Nepture does}}. Their focus is much narrower, based on speed, stealth and tactical exfil at the end of the day. Tier 2 Rangers are more focused on conventional warfare, and they're better at it.

* [[Bad Boss]]: [[General Failure|General Flagg]], from ''Medal of Honor'' (2010). Not only does he seem dead set on not letting the commander on the ground run the operation, he's giving orders by ''[[Voice with an Internet Connection|teleconference]]'' from an office somewhere, in a ''[[Mildly Military|business suit]]''. What makes it worse is that he's just not any good at it.

* [[Benevolent Boss]]: [[Colonel Badass|Colonel Drucker]], who does his best to shield his troops from the General's micromanaging.

* [[Big Damn Gunship]]: ''Medal Of Honor'' (2010): The AH-64 Apache attack helicopters going by the callsign ''Gunfighter'' figure in two of the missions.

* [[Code Name]]: In ''Medal of Honor'' (2010), we have the two [[Badass|Tier 1]] squads, AFO ''Wolfpack'' and AFO ''Neptune'', Sgt Patterson's Ranger squad is ''Bravo One'', and the [[Big Damn Gunship|Apache]] crews go by ''Gunfighter'' Six and Eleven.

* [[Collapsing Lair]]: In ''Allied Assault'', the player must escape from Fort Schmerzen as the whole fortress is rocked by explosions.

* [[Continuity Nod]]: The 'Leave a Message' trailer for the reboot mentions Jim Patterson and his family. Jimmy Patterson as many know was the protagonist of the first game, ''Frontline'', and others.

** The fact that he is Jimmy Patterson's grandson has been confirmed. The blog post confirming this also confirms that he is as [[Badass]] as his [[Badass Grandpa]].

** During ''Vanguard'''s first mission, one may recognize parts of the background music from the Manor House level in ''Frontline''.

** ''Allied Assault'' has the same decorations, but you get them for things that aren't part of the actual mission but help anyway, such as saving an American POW, grabbing a manifest and destroying two King Tigers with explosives you have to find first. Like the first ''Medal of Honor'', they did nothing but give you a sense of accomplishment.

* [[Custom Uniform]]: Depending on the mission, the AFO teams may wear anything from full uniform and body armor to traditional Afghan garb or [[Nice Hat|an FDNY baseball cap]]. TSgt Ybarra seems to have a custom uniform of his own, being the only guy in the Ranger missions to wear the DCUs, even though he was technically the only one wearing the ''correct'' uniform for the time period.

* [[Dramatic Irony]]: From the intro of the 2010 game, you can overhear a radio broadcaster saying "It's another quiet Tuesday morning in the Big Apple..." The next thing you hear is another news broadcast talking about [[The War on Terror|a plane crash in Lower Manhattan]], and how this must be a terrible accident...

* [[Dressing as the Enemy]]: Most of the games have a level where you have to dress as an enemy officer.

* [[Driven to Suicide]]: On Nijmegen Bridge, if you shoot all but one of the snipers off the top of the bridge, the lone sniper will take his chances and jump off the bridge.

* [[During the War]] ([[World War II]])

** In the 2010 game, we have DEVGRU SEALs and their Army counterparts, Delta Force, as well as Army Rangers, an Air Force TACP/Combat Controller, and possibly two 'copter pilots from the 160th SOAR (Special Ops Aviation Regiment). In the [[Novelization]], there's a SAS operator.

** ''Warfighter'' contains a whole party of elites from all over the world. To whit:

*** ROKN UDT (South Korea)

*** KSK (Germany)

** Specifically, the developers worked with ultra top secret Tier 1 operatives who were so closely guarded they had to wear hoods and be given assumed names for speaking with the press, and so dangerous that when EA was going to have a scene in the game where one of them dies without a hint of threat or menace these real life Rambos said, "That's our story and ours alone to tell": the scene was immediately removed.

* [[Elite Mooks]]: The Waffen-SS in the first game.

* [[Enemy Civil War]]: ''Underground's'' "Civil War Mode".

* [[Fake Static]]: Late in the game, General Flagg is about to order Colonel Drucker to {{spoiler|leave AFO Neptune to die rather than sending in a rescue team.}} The technician, Jimmy, hits a button and disconnects the General.

* [[Gameplay Ally Immortality]]: Usually played straight with important NPCs, but averted in ''Allied Assault'' and ''Frontline'', where they can be killed and cause mission failure.

* [[Genre Savvy]]: In ''Medal of Honor'' (2010), a Ranger is sitting right next to the ramp in the Chinook as they're about run out into combat.

* [[Hyperspace Arsenal]]

** Averted in ''Medal of Honor'' (2010) - You get 2 high-power weapons (assault rifles, sniper rifles, etc) and one pistol, as well as some grenades.

* [[Iconic Item]]: In the latest game, [[Player Character|Rabbit's]] Lucky Rabbit's Foot, which we get to see him pull out just before making any [[Leap of Faith]] {{spoiler|and when Preacher is mourning his death.}}

* [[It's Raining Men]]: The whole point of ''Airborne'', and the player can control their descent to land almost anywhere on the map. The Allied players in multi-player could do it too.

** If I remember correctly, the raptor could kill you by jumping on you.

* [[Med Kit]]: Three types - bandages, "battle rattle", and a canteen in the first game.

* [[Minecart Madness]]: The level "Enemy Mine" (no relation to the [[Enemy Mine]] trope) in ''Frontline''.

** Which was a [[Shout-Out]] to the mine cart sequence from ''[[Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom|Temple of Doom]]''.

* [[Multi Platform]]

* [[Nazis With Gnarly Weapons]]

* [[No Escape but Down]]

** The end of Operation Repunzel, where you must push Geritt off a balcony, then jump off yourself into a hay wagon. Oddly, he can survive without landing in the wagon, while you die if you don't.

* [[Nom De Guerre]]: The Tier 1 operators all go by callsigns, even when introducing themselves to other American soldiers.

* [[No Sidepaths, No Exploration, No Freedom]]: Played straight in most of the games, averted in Rising Sun and Airborne to some degree.

** Vanguard as well. Some areas you can only get into if you land in them.

* [[Not Quite Saved Enough]]: {{spoiler|Rabbit; who dies just before the CASEVAC chopper lands.}}

* [[One Bullet Clips]]

* [[Parachute in a Tree|Parachute on a Windmill]]: In the Rough Landing level of ''Frontline'', a paratrooper who jumps with you is caught on a windmill, and is razed by machine gun fire while trying to free himself.

* [[Real Is Brown]]: Many of the games.

* [[Reality Is Unrealistic]]: Ben Crowshaw's rather well-known reaction to the [[wikipedia:Flak tower|G-Tower]] in ''Airborne''.

* [[Regenerating Health]]: In the 2010 reboot.

* [[Shout-Out]]: Tier 1 remarks that seizing Bagram Air Base was [[Generation Kill|pretty fucking ninja.]]

** The manor house level in ''Frontline'' has an [[Evil Chef]] who appears to do a [[The Muppet Show|Swedish Chef]] impression.

* [[Silliness Switch]]: ''Panzerknacker Unleashed!'' for ''Underground'' featured dogs dancing, driving jeeps, and wielding guns, German knights, zombies, and evil terminator nutcrackers. Did I mention the dancing dogs?

** The knights were in another mission, so seeing them wasn't very unusual.

*** There was also "Civil War" mode which caused enemies to fight one another.

* [[Sniping Mission]]: ''Rising Sun'' - On an elephant. With a turret.

* [[Sociopathic Hero]]: Voodoo in the 2010 game, a very self-restrained [[Sociopathic Soldier]]. Mother and Preacher seem to [[Vitriolic Best Buds|take some joy]] in teasing him about this.

'''Voodoo:''' Well, he was about a pound of trigger pressure from losing his.<ref> After Voodoo lost his temper and started shouting at a goat herder who was [[What Do You Mean It's Not Heinous?|taking too long to cross the road.]]</ref> }}

* [[Sorting Algorithm of Weapon Effectiveness]]: Averted.

* [[Southern-Fried Private|Southern Fried Marine]]: Willy Gaines in Pacific Assault.

* [[Stock Subtitle]]: ''Heroes''.

* [[Storming the Castle]]: ''Underground'' had Manon infiltrate an SS castle to retrieve evidence of the Holocaust, the only time in the franchise that the topic was touched on. Also, the bonus mission.

[[Category:Video Game]]

[[Category:Medal of Honor (series)]]