I really would've liked some voice acting for the campaign characters, as it could've create some really funny delivery of some lines.Īs is the case with most strategy games, Heroes of Normandie relies on dice rolls to decide damage. The battle soundtrack is passable, with some good tracks, but far too few. The maps have a very surprising amount of variety to them, but can blend in together. Unfortunately, the board game pieces are very small, so I had to zoom in a few times in order see the stats for each unit. The art for the characters is particularly charming. The board game aesthetic of Heroes of Normandie is very unique and serves the game very well. Many of the jokes could be hit-or-miss, but I enjoyed the cheesiness of having a Clint Eastwood character make some tongue-in-cheek remarks. These humorous caricatures breathe some life into the game. As well as those two, there's a slew of references to tons of World War II movies, and many other famous characters and actors. It's fun, but the games will drag out for far too long.Īs you play through the campaign, the game will have some very funny banter between the field commander, who represents the player, and the General. To compensate for that, you can have multiple matches going on simultaneously though there weren't too many active players when I was looking for matches. It offers a good deal of strategy, but there's no timer for matches, meaning players can come and go as they please. Heroes of Normandie also has an online multiplayer mode, though it doesn't work as well as I'd hope. There's also skirmish mode, which is a free-play mode that allows the player to create their own scenarios. Outside of the main six campaigns, there are two other campaigns that take the difficulty level way up, making the game a bit more 'rogue-like'. Limited turns combined with multiple goals requires tactical thinking, giving Heroes of Normandie's gameplay a little more difficulty. This means that the player must make plans with the next three or so turns in mind. Each mission has a primary and secondary objective, but the player only has limited number of turns to achieve these. The campaign is very tactics-focused, with some puzzle elements. Despite these phases, the turns themselves move along very quickly. Lastly, the supply phase is where you can move all of the units that didn't attack. The explosions and gunshots during this phase are incredibly satisfying, especially when an opponent's tank has been destroying your units throughout the game. Units will make the actual attack in the activation phase. The order phase has you pick the units that will attack and prepare them to fire on enemy soldiers. The second campaign is far more challenging, stacking the odds against the player a bit more.Įach turn takes three different phases: an order phase, an activation phase and a supply phase. Germany's play style, for instance, is more aggressive than England's. The first campaign for each country takes you through the strategies and tactics that the country's army is best at.
In those campaigns, you can play two of each as England, the United States or Germany. Heroes of Normandie has a lot of content, with the main chunk of it being the six campaigns. In some other areas, they don’t work that well. Some of these board game ideas work really well. As it's based on a board game, it has certain gameplay and visual aesthetics that are translated to the world of video games. A tactical war game, Heroes of Normandie takes you through their own humorous interpretation of World War II.
Heroes of Normandie's title is the first in a series of clever puns that the game will throw at you.
Reviewed on PC From Board Game to Video Game