Medal of Honor - Rising Sun

The most memorable thing about this game is its opening level, which starts on the morning of December 7, 1941, aboard the USS California at Pearl Harbor. Series fans who had spent two games in Europe suddenly found themselves manning an anti-aircraft gun while torpedo bombers swept the harbor. It is a strong piece of scene-setting, and the rest of the campaign never quite matches it.

Electronic Arts built the game around Lieutenant Joseph Griffin, and it follows him through the early Pacific war, with missions in Singapore, Guadalcanal and other island and jungle settings. The Pacific changed the texture of the series. Instead of the rubble and hedgerows of Europe, you get dense foliage, narrow trails and enemies who can appear very close. The levels are still tightly scripted corridors, and squadmates and set pieces drive the pace more than your own choices do.

The weapon handling is where the game shows its age. Aiming on a controller was never this series' strength, and enemy soldiers can be both inaccurate and annoyingly tough to put down at range. Checkpoints can be unkind. The scripted drama is good, but the moment-to-moment shooting is merely serviceable, and that gap is what holds the game back.

At the time, the series carried real weight as a console shooter, and this entry arrived in the shadow of its predecessors and the rise of rivals that handled online and squad play more confidently. It was a competent follow-up rather than a leap forward. It also left out the kind of multiplayer depth that would later matter so much on consoles.

Played now, it works better as a historical snapshot than as a shooter to master. The Pearl Harbor opening still carries some force, and the Pacific setting remains less crowded than the European one. The rest is a reminder of how much of this era's blockbuster design was staged spectacle laid over fairly stiff mechanics.