A speedy but serious portable first-person shooter with an impressive enemy-per-square-inch ratio.
Released one year after the first Heroes, Heroes 2 takes up the context of the US American invasion in the Normandy --based on the so-called Battle of Cherbourg-- decisive for the Allied victory over the Nazi and Axis powers right after the successful landing on June 6th, 1944.
Less focused on the heroic personalities featured in previous titles, Heroes 2 lets the player act as Lt. John Berg, covert operative for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during the seven missions leading from The Beach and the deep-water Port land-inwards through Town and Sewers, Monastery, Village, to finally the V2 Base, in order to repel the German presence in Northern France and to sabotage their production of the new V2 rocket prototypes.
Whilst Heroes proved the PSP an appropriate platform for a decent first-person shooter, Heroes 2 appears more realistically a military shooter than the former, where the massive, aggressive enemy presence makes recurring to cover and crosshair a vital reflex beyond guerrilla-like running and gunning without even needing to aim: facing more than 100 enemy soldiers per mission, or at least five per square inch not signalled on the radar, alone or with two rather decorative squad members, it visibly is still the Nazi forces dominating the scene here.
And there are some other aspects in which Heroes 2 meets more the newer shooter standards than its portable predecessor: so the playable character automatically recovers his health the loss of which is indicated through the light to dark red-colored screen, while some (rare) checkpoints make it unnecessary to replay a mission in its entirety when failing at a point.
Correspondingly, health kits are not to be picked up nor are stocked in the inventory, while ammunition in addition to that of the killed enemies can be found at certain waypoints, along with sniper rifles, rocket launchers, turrets, mortars, and cannons, facilitating the destruction of specific German targets -–anti-air batteries, ammunition/V2 depots, convoys, support-- according to the more strictly scripted action.
Missions are less open-level here as they provide only one possible access route, but still there are the secondary objectives to be found --an incentive also for a second replay-- for not being indicated on the radar whilst necessary when striving for the Gold Medal, consisting in more voluntary actions --destroy additional targets, find documents-- than formerly the sole enemy Intel.
The design might be modernized as compared to the first Heroes, but still the game stays close to the historical conditions where only two non-upgradable, contemporaneous weapons are equipped --Colt .45, Thompson, MP40, Bar, StG44, M1 Garand, Springfield, Gewehr, Panzerschreck-- plus six grenades, with their authentic limitations regarding impact and ammunition (although the cartridges found always match the rifle currently used), and no superpowers providing temporal invisibility or invincibility are available to the common soldier.
Some of the historical weapons however are excellent still under today criteria, like the sniper rifles (Gewehr, Springfield) permitting an accurately zoomed, acute focus even for the PSP screen's reduced dimensions, while displaying their logical physical limits: so a cannon or mortar has to be manually adjusted and its trajectory calculated, ever so time-consuming with the furious enemy hordes on one's back...
A further original touch give also the well-pronounced German phrases uttered by the Nazi soldiers in the different situations --Der Feind ist da!, Gebt mir Feuerschutz!--, though their randomness can cause sometimes involuntarily comic effects, when an enemy announces he has to reload while about to being shot, or likewise the encouraging words of squad members in missions where completely on one's own.
Yet the sound design in general is excellent for the different environments and weapon types as well as their effects; so adjusting a rusty cannon or moving a heavy mortar produces the corresponding mechanic sound, as does weapon reloading or firing, and do enemy yells and explosions.
The visuals are comparable to the first Heroes and give some nice views on cloud-covered Atlantic skies, yet are less varied than in the former as are the missions as such, as more as taking place frequently in the interior or subterraneous, like the submarine port, the sewers, the monastery, the V2 base, in addition to numerous other gray buildings made of stone or concrete.
There are no bosses like in other Medal of Honor games, but additional challenge comes from the time countdowns set after planting explosives in order to avoid killing oneself, or in the final act when having to escape in five minutes from the V2 production base after its sabotage facing legions of upset Germans. Those tense moments require one to almost perfect the use of the gameplay controls which are essentially the same as in Heroes --except that Jump (Select) has been left out--, using the directional keys to interact, crouch, and change/recharge weapons, whereas the camera view is assigned to the function buttons in the corresponding north-south and east-west directions. The view too can be turned left or right more rapidly by double clicking the square or circle button, while short moments of sprint --until the thin energy bar is consumed-- can be realized by means of twice up-pressing the left analog stick; a pity that this energy cannot be used for triggering a short adrenaline-fuelled fury moment which some of the situations would make desirable, but no cheats seem allowed here.
What furthermore reveals impractical is the fact that although health recovers automatically, the exact percentage is difficult to be estimated from the red shading while reducing the sight above all in the shadowy environments, and in spite of the accompanying heartbeats hardly being heard due to the almost permanent shooting noise.
Moreover, while continuous clusters of all too trigger-happy enemies seem often to be popping out of nowhere, the possibilities for evasion are fairly reduced, even when using sprint or crouch and the more so when no objects offer true protection, though the cover system in general is as good as in the previous game permitting to lean over (left trigger) or turn sideward (right/left keys) while crouched behind a sufficiently low barrier.
One of the main attractions of the first Heroes, the Skirmish deathmatch against up to 16 CPU-controlled players, unfortunately is not provided in Heroes 2 anymore (nor are the fancy uniforms to be worn), which reduces the possibility to continue using the promising multiplayer features (Infrastructure) --Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag (Infiltration)-- after the EA server shutdown in August 2011 (and unless setting up one's own), besides the wireless Ad Hoc mode permitting to create a match for seven friends choosing either Ally or Axis gear on the six maps unlocked during the campaign (without The Beach).
--This is not a modern shooter in terms of story background and gameplay, but if one is looking for a fast-paced portable first-person shooter based on a historical military context, Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 is still a valuable choice worthy the other titles of the franchise.