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I first played through Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway on the Xbox 360 and felt shockingly indifferent towards the whole thing. I had been awaiting the arrival of the game since it was first announced, and that slow-build of anticipation coupled with Gearbox's habitual delays and empty promises left me feeling rather underwhelmed by the whole experience.

That's not to say Hell's Highway is a terrible game. On the contrary, it's a damn good WWII shooter that delivers just the right amount of story depth, interesting & relatable characters, tight, rewarding combat, and a fantastic strategic gloss that makes the game play both effective and entertaining.

I do believe, though, that the game's release date played a major part in my disappointment. BiA: Hell's Highway was dropped right at the start of 2008's holiday shopping season when so many great games were looking to release. Silent Hill: Homecoming was dated for the week following Hell's Highway, Far Cry 2 the following month, and soon after there were heavy-hitters like Gears of War 2, Fallout 3, and Call of Duty: World at War setting their sights for November.

As big a fan as I am of the Brothers in Arms franchise, Hell’s Highway quickly fell from the top of my "most anticipated" list to somewhere towards the bottom when I realized just how many high quality titles were being released within the following months, usurping Hell's Highway's late September release. Perhaps my excitement had been shuffled elsewhere, or maybe I just wasn't looking forward to it as much as I had been when first announced due to Gearbox’s numerous delays. Or, perhaps the development firm’s proverbial "hype machine" had propelled my expectations to heights so high that the finished product could never hope to reach them. Whatever the case, I quickly played through Hell's Highway, reviewed it, then forgot about it.

Some months later I find an alarmingly high number of copies sitting adjacent to Assassin's Creed and Army of Two in the unoccupied PS3 aisle at my local Best Buy. Since selling my 360 and all of my games, I had begun yearning for Hell’s Highway especially and decided to purchase a copy for my PS3 for the mere $20 I was going to be charged. On the way home, I remembered that some of the game's biggest flaws - those that were not directly related to Gearbox's innumerable delays and Executive Producer Randy Pitchford's gaudy hype statements - were actually its myriad annoying technical issues. These include, but are not limited to, a sometimes choppy framerate, clipping problems, muddy visuals, and what appeared to be a number of half-finished textures.

Those aforementioned glitches prevented Hell's Highway from achieving the kind of gaming nirvana I initially expected it to. Endearing game play aside, early videos and screenshots made Hell's Highway look like one beautiful game, and all the years Gearbox had spent working on it, I was shocked to find that not only were the visuals decidedly average, but spotting an assortment of vexing technical hang-ups was not uncommon.

Purchasing the game for an entirely different platform has brought forth two positives thus far. The first is noticeably smoother controls and responsiveness with the use of the PS3’s dual analog sticks and button layout. Not only do I find the PS3 controller to be much more comfortable in terms of maneuverability, but the aforementioned analog sticks result in more accurate, well-placed shots with less time spent trying to overcome jumpy crosshairs.

The second positive is greatly improved graphics over that of the 360 version. The PS3 iteration looks and plays more similarly to the visually superior PC port in comparison to the 360's jarringly console-centric sheen. Cinematics still suffer from abysmal framerates, unfortunately, but animations are breathtaking at times, as are the well-lit and finely detailed environments. Some character's facial renders have a tendency to look too “flat” or “angular,” but with the improvements that were made to better suit the PS3 hardware – which includes fix-ups of some unforgiveable technical issues (including reprehensible framerates during game play) and the addition of many minor graphical touch-ups (like high resolution textures and shadows, finished textures, and better special FX) - the PS3 version is, visually, leaps and bounds ahead of its next-gen counterpart.

In terms of presentation, Hell’s Highway has a very clunky feel to it; not quite as "slothy," but nears the same degree of pseudo-realism found in PS3-exclusive, Killzone 2. Walking feels slow and sluggish and even running (performed by holding down X while pushing forward with the left analog stick), though faster, is disorienting. Turning is near-impossible to do while running which manages to create quite a bit of tension during heavy firefights. That also brings up a major flaw inherent in the game. About 75% of cover can be utilized, and that’s including breakable cover (such as wooden carts, barrels, sand bags, etc…), but finding cover that can’t be dug into is both frustrating and problematic. Running full-on to a key position while one of your fire teams suppresses, only to find that Baker (the player character) won’t dig-in to an object or wall that looks entirely worthy of being used for cover, usually means that a checkpoint restart is on its way.

But these situations are few and far between, and most of the time finding cover for you and your fire teams isn’t an issue. Sometimes your teammates don’t always go where you want them to or can’t seem to fire on a group of enemies due to distance restraints, but a little maneuvering will get you through that with no trouble. Hell’s Highway, because it is story-driven and nearly all of your squadmates are essential to the story, will respawn at each respective checkpoint if any of them have been previously lost in battle. For as many times as the game allows you to send one of your squads to cover only to have them stand out in the open as they approach said cover and get gunned down one-by-one, there are those beautiful moments where a fire team will work their way to a well-covered position and take down every single enemy in their sights.

But there’s more to Hell’s Highway than simply controlling your various squads and surviving the game’s 10-12 hour campaign. If you’ve played the previous two BiA games, you will find more to enjoy than just the revamped combat system and much-needed ability to dig-in to cover. An extensive plot covers story details from both Road to Hill 30 and Earned in Blood (with one of the biggest surprises being more back story on Pvt. Leggett), as well as detailing an all-new set of events with one of the most harrowing endings in the genre’s history. Even if Hell’s Highway’s last mission – a brief segment in which you commandeer a British XXX Corps tank - is relatively underwhelming in comparison to the events preceding it, the end cinematic makes sure to pack the real wallop.

It’s amazing what playing on a different system can do for the enjoyment factor of a game. Because of improved graphics and a system controller that was seemingly made to play Hell’s Highway, I’m having much more fun the second time around than I did the first. There are still flaws present, such as unusually cumbersome movement and tank missions that do absolutely nothing for me. But with such a brilliant story backing it and the same entertaining game play we’ve come to know and love, Hell’s Highway may just be the best game in the series. Although non-fans will be lost plot-wise and probably won’t have the patience to endure 10 hours of strict strategic indulgence; a distinctive "brains over brawn" approach and mature, intelligent writing should appeal to fans of the series as well as those looking for a WWII shooter more grounded and realistic than your average Call of Duty sequel.

9/10