The ever-growing trend of releasing a World War shooter ever continues. With so many good titles all fighting for the top place, Codemasters are trying a different approach, the alternative history, a kind of What If…. In the instance of Turning Point, the What if is that of the death of Winston Churchill before the WWII kicked off, but does this novel idea make for a good game?

In Turning Point the Nazi war machine has ploughed through Europe and Africa and now has its sights on America. It is 1953 and you play Dan Carson, a building suite worker, as you are on a skeleton a of skyscraper an strange hum comes from the distance, then hundreds of zeppelins and planes start to attack the coast line, taking out familiar landmarks. The action starts with you first trying to get away form the initial Nazi attack, and then joining the rebellion to take out the Nazi rule in areas like the White House and also London. 

During the game you are able to carry only two weapons at a time as well as a few grenades. The weapons range from sub machine guns, pistols, rifles and snipers rifles for more pinpoint shooting. You are able to bring up your sights with the Left Trigger to allow for a zoom option, depending on the weapon you also have an alternative use, like a flashlight or infrared scope.

As well as weapons you also have a melee attack, a small icon will appear when close enough to grapple an enemy, with this you are able to use them as a human shield for a while, kill them instantly or even use an environmental kill, like throwing them off a building or into a furnace. Whilst this is a nice touch, the execution of this move is really difficult, you have to press the B button when the grapple icon appears, which means taking your finger off the movement button, during this time the enemy can move, leaving you grappling air and most of the time, getting shot at, to be honest, unless you are playing for achievements, I would leave this move out.

I was surprised by the varying quality of the graphics in the game, some areas look really well designed, with a real noir feel to the buildings, but then you have areas where the textures look jagged and boring, they also load up whilst you are playing, for example, in the back of a truck on one level intro, the internal roof of the truck will change texture 3 times, and when it has finished, it still looks poor.

Another harsh part of the game is the checkpoints system, there is too much of a gap between each area save point, making you have to replay some hard areas over and over again. Leading from that is also the objectives, you will have one objective at a time, however there are times when it is not clear where you need to go. One point springs to mind, where you need to use a bus boy to gain access to a higher part of the Whitehouse, you know what you have to do, but there is no indication as to where it is, I was literally shimmying along walls for 10 mins trying to find it.  

As any FPS worth its salt will have an online function, Turning Point also has one, but it seems a bit bare. All you have is an up to 8-player deathmatch and team deathmatch mode across a few maps, meaning that unfortunately the Xbox Live mode really seems like an afterthought little work put into it.

Turning Point: Fall of Liberty seems a good idea for a story, but in reality this game just doesn’t match up to the wonderful Call of Duty 4, which it seems is the benchmark for any War game that is to be released these days.