addicting game, paid 100% worthily. playing on line is a lot of fun too, way harder than expert computer. only bummer are the HUGE patches that have to be downloaded in order to play on line.

I was looking for a good WW2 mod for Total Annihilation, when I stumbled over this instead. I guess I had seen some pictures of Company of Heroes, but since they were zoomed-in and panned-in ones, I hadn't realized the game was basically a new version of old Command & Conquer, with a camera/viewpoint you could manipulate any way you wanted. And that's pretty much what it is, without modification. But since it's so realistic looking (unlike, say, Dawn of War or any of the older games), the short weapon ranges and unrealistic accuracy and power of some weapons began to bother me. I tried a few mods, and only KMOD did everything I wanted and did it well. The game is now unique, never been done before, nothing to do with C&C, not much to do with even Dawn of War. The only thing about Company of Heroes + KMOD (1.5 Beta) that still sometimes bothers me is the movement of infantry units. The AI can't seem to handle packs of them in a realistic way, resulting in masses of soldiers that don't really look like they know what they're doing. But it's still by far the best so-called RTS I've played, very tactical and immersive, when you realize you can use the Pause/Break key to pause the game to catch your breath. Instructions: Update the game to 1.71, install KMOD 1.5 (beta), and the KMOD skin pack, which you can find at the same KMOD website, and you're done. The skin pack adds realistic uniforms for the Germans, and Swastikas for their flags and such. I recommend using it for realism, unless you live under Tyrants of Multiculturalism in Germany or some other country where people have been conditioned to get a heart attack when they see one. You can also get a unit cap from the same site. I use it for maps that are crowded with buildings.

First when I started up the game I thought with some disappointment that it was just DoW with Nazis. Though the gameplay does build on the DoW series, it also greatly improved and surpassed it. It become more realistic from the behavior of your units (down to the cursing) to the damage model of the vehicles. The basics are the same, though: capture strategic points, build bases, produce units. The need for aggressive gameplay remained, too. You can't spend time and resources protecting every single asset you have. You will lose strategic points to the enemy, and you will have to recapture them. They will get to your base. And you can't do a thing about it, because your resources are needed on the offensive. That part is actually quite frustrating, but the fact is that it's closer to the reality than you'd first think. I would have preferred a different game (again: I did not know what to expect), something along the line of the Blitzkrieg-series, or an enjoyable version of the Combat Mission series (too much realism is not good, either). I would prefer a "perfect" game with tactics in mind: moving armor, and infantry, placing the defenses, and trying to outsmart the enemy, but that's my personal preference. (I'd like to see a game where real-world Blitzkrieg tactics work.)
In this game you can beat the single player by throwing everything at the main objective after you built up your forces. Most of the strategy involves administering your limited resources to adapt to the situation at hand. The vehicles and weapons are not realistic of course (thank god for that, because the Sherman would not have a chance), and neither are the resources; somehow the Germans always seem to have more armor and manpower than you do. The game is fun, though; and the graphics is spectacular. I just wish they had a DoW mod for it :)
One real problem I encountered was the same as with the DoW game: the single player campaign is short. I started to get into it, and suddenly it ended, with not much of a catharsis. I hardly expected to finish the fight at Hitler's bunker, but I still think the makers of this game wrapped the thing up a bit too fast. The other problem I got is the fact that the skirmish mode is way too hard, even at the easiest setting. I'm not sure what I do wrong, but even though I had no difficulties beating the single player mode, in skirmish I get my butt handed to me most of the time. Since I have no time to polish my skills for multiplayer, that part of the game I cannot comment on.
I hope if there will be more installments, as the Eastern Front looks like a promising place along with the Pacific Theater and Africa. I really hope they will keep the storyline, and will not change to that stupid Risk-type gameplay they adopted with DoW.
Altogether I can only recommend this game.

Let me start off by saying that the WW2 gaming genre has been done to death in general. However, that is not so true in the Real-Time Strategy (RTS) genre which Company of Heroes is part of. Being a WW2 game is not even what makes Company of Heroes great. The brilliance of this game is the new gameplay mechanics introduced. No longer do you have dumb units to command around the map. Company of Heroes introduces a cover system, and when your units fall under attack, they automatically move to cover but not to the point of messing up your line of defense.

The different factions of the game have different strengths and weaknesses utilizing a different set of units and weapons. Overall the game is very balanced and has a tremendous potential for great strategy to be employed. If you are a fan of RTS games, then Company of Heroes is a must-play.

I've been playing this game for over a year now and it's pretty much the only one I play. I've been thinking about why exactly it's so good and different, and here's what I came up with:

(1) This is a game where there are NO hard and fast counter units. Unlike in C&C3, for example, where some vehicles are always better than some infantry and some units just demolish air units, Company of Heroes allows you to use tactics to overcome this limitation.

For example. Let's say you have a unit of riflemen and the enemy has a MG gun. The MG gun is designed to cover a decent sized area with fire and suppresses any infantry caught in its path. HOWEVER, this does not mean MG's counter rifleman. A savvy player can use 2 riflemen squads to flank the MG -- one can distract the MG's fire and the other can come from the rear and throw a grenade at it.

Even the Anti-tank gun..which you'd think is a direct counter..really isn't. A tank can avoid the AT gun's fire by shooting from behind a building or encircle the gun from behind (the AT rotates very slowly). Snipers similarly do not really 'auto-counter' anything..they are good at targeting other snipers and shooting at units in buildings, but are very vulnerable while doing so, especially to mortar teams.

In short, the main reason why this is such a great game in multiplayer is that the sides are mostly balanced and leave the game up to TACTICS and not 'who has the best counters.' A game of C&C can be won if you get infantry and your opponent spams APC units. In COH, if you spam infantry, your opponent can shred you with one or two MGs; similarly, you can defeat his MGs if you plan ahead and avoid those buildings or arrange a flanking maneuver.

(2)Atmosphere atmopshere atmosphere. Unit responses are awesome, and they'll even sound like they're on the radio if you're hearing them from across the map. Cool effect. The explosions and graphics are top notch -- and I've run this on everything from a 2 yr old laptop to a brand new desktop. Either way, this is one good looking game. It really feels like you're commanding Call of Duty from an overhead perspective. Or an episode of Band of Brothers. Just awesome.

(3) The only negative I can think of is that single player isn't so great, nor is the skirmish AI. However, this game is just incredible at multiplayer, and Relic online is a superb matchmaking service that issues tons of patches to improve the game play balance even years after release.

(4) Resource management is original. You don't have gatherers..you have strategic points that force you into the action. They come in three varieties -- munitions, fuel, and strategic points -- that you should prioritize based on your strategy. Munitions allows you to modify your units (e.g. add rockets to infantry units) whereas fuel allows you to build tanks and vehicles and some buildings. It's an innovative system and it works well.

Amazing, amazing game.