When video games first set foot on the blood soaked beaches of World War Two, Electronic Arts were leading the charge with Medal of Honour. Time has not been kind to the venerable series however; it has gotten progressively worse, hitting rock bottom with last year's Medal of Honour: Rising Sun.

For this reason, you can understand my scepticism when booting up Medal of Honour: European Assault'but in all honesty, I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised. European Assault puts you in the boots of US Army Lieutenant William Holt, apparently one of the first field agents of the Office of Strategic Services or OSS. As LT Holt, you'll be thrown into various conflicts throughout Europe and in true Medal of Honour style, ultimately play a pivotal role in defeating the Nazis.

European Assault is not an ultra-realistic recreation of Infantry combat in war-torn Europe and it never claims to be. It is pure, unadulterated arcade action within a historical setting and unlike its most recent predecessor is actually fun to play. Yet some might find this an apologetic excuse for a lacklustre experience, so what does the latest Medal of Honour campaign bring to the war-table?

A few things actually'specifically, European Assault brings some new and important additions to the series, and for the most part these additions are the bright light the dying series was searching for in order to survive. First up the level design has been completely revamped and now consists of surprisingly open battlefields with plenty of room for manoeuvre and exploration. In fact, exploration is encouraged as the more you explore, the more ancillary mission objectives you unlock.

Not only that, but once unlocked, you can jump back into any previous mission and attempt it again, perhaps to unlock an incomplete objective or to just replay a particularly cool moment. This new feature adds significant replay value to the game and is a big step away from the painfully linear levels of past games in the series.

Another major new addition to the series is the inclusion of an Adrenalin metre. Adrenalin is earned by performing especially heroic or skilful tasks such as making a head shot. When the metre is full, Adrenalin can be activated which baths the screen in a red hue and gives the player 'Bullet-Time' style reflexes, one-shot kills and invulnerability for a short period of time. The usefulness of this feature is somewhat questionable as it only lasts a moment, but it is a cool effect nevertheless and serves to reinforce the game's arcade style.

Yet another new addition is the inclusion of mini-boss battles. One of the objectives for each mission will involve neutralising a nasty Nazi nemesis (say that three times fast!). This 'Nemesis' as the game refers to them are usually important German officers who aren't particularly hard to kill but take a considerable amount of punishment compared to their nameless subordinates. It's a nice touch and who doesn't like a boss battle, even if they are a little too easy?

The final new addition to the Medal of Honour formula is the ability to control (and I use that term loosely) a squad of four soldiers. Essentially, if European Assault were to become a film, these troops would be the extras that managed to squeeze into every scene. Sure you can order them to move to a location and they do kill the occasional enemy, but their real purpose is to increase the on-screen character count and to act as bullet magnets in particularly hairy situations.

No matter the overall quality of the final product, Medal of Honour games have always had first class presentation and sound design. European Assault is no exception to this rule and immediately grips the player with slick menus, effective story telling and a thunderous sound scape.

The sound design is truly breathtaking and is easily one of the best examples of sound effects in a game on any platform. European Assault spoils the player with THX Certified Dolby Digital surround sound that flawlessly creates the illusion of being in a chaotic wartime environment, without the pesky problems of grenade-induced deafness.

Bullets whiz by your ears, explosions thunder through your speakers, friends and enemies alike scream and shout and a cacophony of environmental and ambient sounds give the game audio that all important complexity and depth. The music is of equally high quality, however you have heard it all before as the 'Saving Private Ryan/ Band of Brothers' sound is immediately recognisable.

European Assault's control scheme is initially a scary departure from tried and true formats, the biggest difference being the 'Aim Mode'. This is activated by pulling and holding the Left Trigger, which changes your perspective to a zoomed-in 'iron sight' or 'scope' view. When in Aim Mode the Left Thumbstick (Which is usually used for movement) changes function so that it controls leaning to the left, right and ducking up and down from behind cover. The analogue Thumbstick allows for fine progressive player input adding a layer of precision not afforded by the D-Pad.

This unusual system works and its use is essential for surviving the tough later missions, but it can be a little awkward at first. The main issue is the way you suddenly drop out of Aim Mode when reloading your weapon. This can result in you popping up from behind cover in the middle of a magazine change, leaving yourself extremely vulnerable to enemy fire.

Predictable as this sentence will sound, the graphics in European Assault are very disappointing, and it's obvious from the visuals that it was designed for the PS2 and ported to the more powerful Xbox. Recent games have shown the true potential of the Xbox hardware despite it now being over three years old. However, European Assault wouldn't have even turned heads way back at launch, let alone now. Frame rate issues are non-existent as the Xbox isn't even forced to break a sweat to keep up with the sub-par visuals.

Artificial Intelligence is not quite as mediocre as the graphics, but appears worse for your allies than the enemy. I'll make an assumption that if this was done deliberately, it was done to force the player to do most of the work and not hide behind his comrades. Whatever the reason, it can be extremely frustrating at times especially when 'Storm Trooper syndrome' sets in and you are the only allied soldier with an accurate weapon.

That said, the AI is not the worse you will see in a game of this type and isn't broken to the point of frustration. In fact the enemy AI is likely to make you work for your medals, especially in the later levels when the intensity of the action really ramps up.

European Assault is also quite light on Multiplayer support, and once again Electronic Arts shun Xbox owners by failing to include any support for Xbox Live. There are 15 maps to choose from but that's no big deal when you can only play with up to four people and only using split-screen. Not including Live is truly unforgiveable for a shooter these days, and hopefully EA will realise this sooner rather than later.

Each player chooses from one of four character classes, Infantry, Sniper, Heavy Weapons and Rifleman. Each class has its own weapon set and hotspots located within the maps allow players to change character classes. While the different classes are welcome, this is a clumsy system and would have worked much better if there were specific rewards or challenges for each class. It would also have been nice if you could change classes at will but as the whole system feels kind of useless, perhaps they should have just been omitted all together. Without the ability to jump online and squad it up with your mates the class system is just seriously under done.

Game types on offer include Deathmatch, Axis vs Allies and Free for All. Deathmatch is self explanatory and the other two modes are essentially the same except one is team based and the other individual. The non-Deathmatch modes revolve around objective based game types such as Capture the Flag, King of the Hill and a few other unique game types such as Artillery flag and Blitzkrieg. European Assault is patheticaly weak in multiplayer options, but thankfully makes up for it with a strong single-player campaign. If you want a first-person shooter to play with friends, look elsewhere as there is nothing of merit to be found here.

One gameplay decision that may be a major issue for some players is the favour of 'revives' over game saves. You are unable to save your progress during levels and there are no automatic checkpoints. Instead, whenever you are mortally wounded you must use a limited supply of 'revives' that as the name suggests, revives your character with around 50% health.

This is a similar system as that used in Star Wars Republic Commando and works fine as a measure of difficulty, but offers the player no option if they need to leave their game part way through for some other more pressing real-life matter. A save system of any kind would have been a welcome addition to European Assault and as many other Xbox shooters allow you to save wherever you like, this is just another sign of the games lowly PS2 roots.