Breakthrough's departure from core MOHAA design principles makes it the most difficult entry in the series.
Your character is Sgt John Baker, not that you are likely to remember this as play progresses. The missions are set in the Mediterranean theatre and primarily in the advance through Italy after the collapse of the Afrika Korps in Tunisia. There are no mission briefings, whether audio or text, as in the original MOHAA, to explain the missions or your role in them. Each major chapter uses wartime news reels to set the historic scene however how your character or the following missions fit in are never explained. Thus the level of immersion in Breakthrough is the lowest of the series. Here you simply go about completing the objectives that comprise each mission and trying to survive. As with the other MOHAA titles, while part of a bigger strategic picture, you will be very much on your own most of the time. Friendly troops appear from time to time and disappear just as quickly for you to soldier on and presumably save the day alone. Never do you feel part of a team, even if the other guys are AI, as you do in the COD WWII games.
On the surface there seems to be little new in the way of gameplay, enemy AI or even in mission types. What has changed, and dramatically so, is your character's survivability. By drastically limiting ammunition and health packs Breakthrough devolves into a series of step by step advances and repeated saves whereby the aim(s) of the mission are forgotten. I am by nature a cautious, non-Rambo, FPS player however despite using cover and only firing when well positioned I was constantly low on ammunition and/or health. While the aim may have been to better model the realities of limited ammunition supply and recovery of health than in the earlier games things got messed up. In the earlier MOHAA and most other FPS games there is an ability to pick up the weapons and/or ammunition from dead enemies. Not so, or very very, rarely so in Breakthrough. Many a mission I completed with less than 10% health and little or no ammunition. Does this make for "white knuckle tension"? In a way it does, but frustration was the main emotion this game elicited from me.
Breakthrough does have a good blend of missions, albeit you may feel like you have done it all before (and you have). The problem for me was that there was very little scene setting apart from the wartime news reels and no context for the missions was ever provided and in that sense the missions were rather generic. Breakthrough is not the only scripted FPS out there, in fact most are, but it seemed that one was merely undertaking a process of go there, retrieve that, then go there disable that, go there blow that up, defend bunker, defend next bunker, etc.
The chapters and missions that comprise Breakthrough, with a brief description, are as follows.
Part 1: Tunisia
o Kasserine Pass 1 - sandstorm, snipers, drive tank, clear bunkers, recover documents, and open indestructible gate.
o Kasserine Pass 2 - navigate minefield, provide sniper cover for convoy, blow up artillery, destroy enemy underground stores complex.
o Bizerte 1 - cross canal, rescue prisoners, clear buildings, meet and escort SOE agent across rooftops, escape.
o Bizerte 2 - night, infiltrate port in disguise, blow up ship, escape sinking ship, meet up with SOE agent, escape
Part 2: Sicily (Operation Husky)
o Glider Landing - night crash land, attacked immediately, destroy AA guns, eliminate sniper in tower, rescue other glider troops from enemy tank and infantry attack.
o Caltagirone Airfield - destroy radio tower, on the rails jeep ride, infiltrate airfield, clear a maze of buildings covered by sniper towers, sabotage planes, clear control tower, escape.
o Gela - repel enemy assault, advance through vineyard, clear village and warehouse, defeat advancing tanks with panzerschreck and mortars.
Part 3: Mainland Italy
o Monte Cassino 1 - ambushed in jeep, fend off enemy, regroup, another longer on the rails jeep ride, escort medic and rescue Brits pinned down by sniper crossfire, eliminate snipers, clear building, destroy tank.
o Monte Cassino 2 - continue with medic, find more trapped Brits, destroy tank, snipers, rescue prisoners, clear buildings, kill executioner, more snipers on way to plaza, find more prisoners, provide cover fire as POWs run to rescue truck while being attacked by multiple snipers,
o Anzio - ambush munitions convoy, clear enemy occupied building, advance to massive rail gun, attacked from all sides, advance to destroy rail gun, a literal on the rails rail mounted armored car ride, destroy blocks and enemy infantry and tank, speed up downhill, jump off and watch the fireworks.
o Monte Battaglia: defend bunkers A, B and C, sniper infested mountain pass, clear building, enter and fight through tunnels to castle, fight your way through the castles wine cellars, up to the tower, cover fire radio technician and snipe enemy sappers and send message on radio ... bombers arrive in one glorious cut scene. Game over (hallelujah).
As you can see, it is fair to say that Breakthrough has a reasonable allotment of notionally interesting missions. Unfortunately the lack of any real introduction to the missions makes you feel like going through the motions. These missions would be far more enjoyable and still challenging if the allotment of medikits and ammo in previous MOHAA titles was available. I will mainly remember this game, not for the otherwise good missions, but for the need to constantly save and replay segments as ammo and health was running low. That's not how I want to remember a gaming experience. I like games that are challenging but the change in ammunition and health replenishment mechanics makes parts of this game just plain frustrating.
The four most difficult and frustrating mission objectives all involved providing cover fire for friendly units who, if killed resulted in mission failure: namely, covering the SOE agent as he tries to unlock the door leading to escape; proving cover for glider troops being assaulted by enemy units; providing cover fro prisoners escaping to a truck in the middle or a plaza covered by numerous enemy snipers; and finally sniping enemy units trying to blow up a communications tower. While such missions objectives may be challenging in any event, the fact that by the time these objectives appeared one was usually low on both health and ammo did not help. Alas I do not look back fondly at these missions ... but I got through them with lots of quick saves that sadly destroyed the flow of the experience. There just seemed to be more luck than skill in completing such mission objectives.
On the plus side, Breakthrough maintains the high quality, for its day, graphics and sound quality of the MOHAA series. Due to the absence of pre-mission briefings there is minimal dialogue in the game so voice acting is difficult to comment on. While not a multiplayer fan I did wander around the multiplayer maps and these are well presented with lots of good firing positions with escape routes for those so inclined.
Breakthrough failed to truly engage me and indeed it was a case of completing the game in the hope that the next game I play will be a little more fresh and immersive. Alas the MOHAA series ended with a whimper; thankfully though the original game and the first add-on, Spearhead, lift the series and no doubt are fond memories to many long time WWII era FPS fans. Fortunately Call of Duty made its appearance shortly after the MOHAA series and the influence on the early COD titles is obvious. Later the MOH series returned with the excellent MOH Pacific Assault (with medics for health and some squad level tactical control) and MOH Airborne (with its almost open world gameplay).
OVERALL: MOHAAB is a reasonable FPS which failed to draw me in due to some of its frustrating mechanics. Only buy this as part of a compilation, such as MOHAA Warchest, and NOT separately.