Call to Arms - Gates of Hell: Ostfront

A bit of a learning curve but great to play out scenarios with classic WW2 equipment we've all heard of. If I were to start again I would go through the tutorial quickly, then jump right into single player conquest at lower difficulties

i have tried launching this game for up to what feels like over a year now and it refuses, no other game in my library does this, the game is awesome if you can play it.... my drivers are good, ive reinstalled, i even deleted all files on computer did a full wipe and still nothing, updated steam, verified game files, spent hours on youtube tutorials to get this game to launch and it wont. i was denied a refund for how many hours i have playing it (im pretty sure thats why i couldnt get my refund atleast). i just feel ripped off

Call to Arms - Gates of Hell: Ostfront

Good game, recommended for:
-Company of heroes fans who want to play a more realistic rts
-Tank fans who dont want to feed the snail

I'd like to give a thumbs up but man the modding stability is completely ass. I encounter problems every time I activate a mod, every time I coop with a friend, every time I deactivate a mod and hell, the game has a mind and preference of its own when you're not looking as it can automatically delete your mods next time you open it back up. Resource desync this, searching for session that, or just straight up crash even when internet conditions are perfect and mods accounted for and updated. By gahd fix yo insufferable game.

The learning curve is steep and the interface is a little clunky, but the gameplay is fantastic if you love WW2. There are a ton of vehicles and distinct units. Overall, a quite challenging but fun and cinematic game.

Really solid game, especially if you're into WW2 RTS games.

I've played Men of War before, but Call to Arms: Gates of Hell is just better in almost every way. The combat feels more intense, the AI is smarter, and the visuals are great. What really makes it stand out though is the ability to go into first and third person view—you can manually aim your shots, which is super satisfying, especially when controlling tanks or sniping infantry. It adds a whole new level of immersion that other RTS games don't offer.

I also bought some of the DLCs and for me, they were worth it. They add more missions, factions, and maps, and just give you more of the good stuff. Not everything is perfect—some small bugs here and there—but nothing game-breaking.

If you're into tactical gameplay with a bit of chaos and realism, definitely give this one a shot. Totally recommend it.

i have been liking the game but the units are too stupid, they will casually run over my artillery and shoot straight into my units

It is a really good game, though in current state it is totally unplayable - I play a coop with a friend, there is no game save system and the game crashes from time to time - which makes you play a really long mission from the very beginning.

The gameplay is fun. The UI is out of the 90s. It could use some tooltips in many places. The selling point of this game is being able to take control of a single unit and it does that well enough. Overall it's a fun game, but lacks a lot of the bells & whistles you'd expect.

game decided to randomly break. played well for 30 hours, then on both of my pc's this and mowas decided to develop a disease where as soon as I make any sort of input they freeze and lag to hell when each pc has a 4070 super and i7+. Their support team on discord offered no help. Don't buy this game if you want to play for a decent amount of time. 30 dollars wasted

Call to Arms – Gates of Hell: Ostfront (god, that's a mouthful for a game title) requires a lot of micromanagement, so the game is not beginner-friendly at all. It's extremely annoying if you take control of a big squad as they love to move out of cover and run into enemy fire when you try to move them to the nearest position, like a trench, for example.

Not only is unit control abysmal, but some objectives in the single-player campaign will also waste your precious time while you try to figure out how to get past them. These weren't explained during the tutorials and are purely based on your instincts and logical thinking. Even then, I feel like they could’ve given some hints on how to deal with the mission objectives.

Laughable AI aside, the game is more or less realistic. If you're looking for a war game, then this is not the right game, because it’s an RTS. It's not turn-based, but you do have a certain amount of time to prepare. Once the timer is up, you have to constantly pay attention to every sector and all the units under your command, as both the enemy and you are continuously sending reinforcements into the meat grinder. If you fail to keep your units in check e.g. well-supplied with ammunition, having a good strategic positions, and adapting to the situation of certain phase. You’ll quickly see how one exposed flank can lead to total defeat and the janky AI control makes the problem worse.

Nice rts elements with a perfect mix of direct control, historically accurate vehicles and infantry units, all round very nice

I need help I can’t play this game anymore my current Rex mode 3840x2160 it’s grayed out and will not let me change the mode it never did this before but just about 2 months ago this happned

I been a loyal fan of the franchise bought all expansion now I can’t play it everything so freaking small. Can some help me fix this please

An amazing RTS / RTT game with the unique ability to take control of individual soldiers and controld them in third person.

Very detailed, fun to play and lots of extra mods. Its also fun with friends, but its a bit glitchy playing co-op. I recommend getting a first-person mod, it will change the game for you and will give it a neat Call Of Duty 2 feel.

The best rts i've ever played , but i gave it up after finding out the AI cheats like a mf. The AI knows exactly where your units are at even if they are outside of the fight and hidden. I had an infantry squad hiding in the bushes way far out from where the fight was taking place and the AI spawns a tank and drives it out in the middle of nowhere (where my squad was located) and stopped an inch from their faces and blew them all to hell. Completely ruined the game for me.

The DLC is a whole story to activate and even though I own it all some of it isnt working. This is a payed product and I expect to receive my product without need to unpack and troubleshoot it myself.

The game is IMO one of the best RTS games out there for pure micro.

The Discord is also great since the GOH ticket support is good and quick

I gave it a go, and while I love the concept on paper - I found even the most basic elements of the RTS portion of the game extremely difficult to control. It also feels like there are basic features like control groups, hotkeys for most actions, or the ability to easily command more than one unit at a time are missing, which does not meet my expectations for an RTS post 1997.

I would love to see this game made more accessible by adopting more of the conventions of modern RTS at least when it comes to the basic control mechanics of the game. If they can fix that, then I think they will have a much better game.

This is just Men of War, but somehow even worse. Cover is complete bullshit, with a single centimeter of steel or an inch of mud protecting infantry from just about everything. Unit pathfinding is even worse, why does a tank have to worry about running a tree (Not even, it could just be a slight depression in the ground) over? The UI also overlaps with itself a good portion of the time, normally when you have like 8+ units causing their portraits to block out the minimap. Campaigns are fairly meh, with a lot of the missions being centered on stealth or defense, which you also have very few reinforcements if any at all.
Of course, there are a few good things compared to MoW, now you can actually refuel vehicles without having to go through 10 demonic rituals, and infantry can actually hit things now.

W wargame sale, I bought the game and some DLC for my comrade, and he bought one of the DLC too, can't wait to play it with him. Amazing game, expensive, but amazing

Good game overall. However, the last update unfortunately made the experience worse. German tanks have been nerfed, and the AI-controlled Soviet forces are now far more accurate and deadly even at long distances. I really miss the gameplay from the previous update .Love the addition of automated medics, which is a great feature. Honestly, I'm a bit disappointed. It feels similar to what happened with Company of Heroes: from the first to the third game, the experience kept declining. Right now, German units feel like they're firing water guns, while the Soviets seem to have nothing but snipers.
Could we please strive for more historical accuracy?
I still recommend the game, but I’m concerned that it might continue to get worse with future updates.

Gates of Hell" is a good game with impressive graphics, great gun sounds, and a well-designed environment. However, it has a major flaw: there are no servers. Considering the huge effort they put into developing such a detailed game, setting up a server should have been much easier for them. It's disappointing that such a crucial feature is missing."

One of the best WW2 RTS game of modern times, I absolutely recommend it!
Totally love this Direct Control function which game has because you can directly jump into action as soldier.

The lag is real in single player. When loading in the start there will be a lag window of about 3 minutes where the game is really laggy and mostly unplayable. And my pc is not even bad (the game is using around 45% GPU and 30% CPU). Maybe buy it when it's on sale but when it's not on sale I suggest you wait.

EDIT: And the path finding is out of this world, because my tank just drove into my truck and destroyed it and killed the crew operating it. Like WTF.

I think this is the most interesting RTS title currently available on Steam. It's probably also one of the jankiest.

The unit AI is awful and braindead, the pathfinding sucks, the squad controls are wonky, the camera is often wrong, the machinima / marionette cinematics in the latest Airborne DLC are terrible, the artillery balance is out of whack, the enforced stealth sections are hilariously bad, the conquest mode is a chaotic mess, the Steam page is a big pile of nonsense, and most of all the name is absolutely downright awful ...

... and yet it's a glorious game to play. It's the apex of the Men Of War / Outfront series, and is heaps better than the prequel (Call To Arms 1). It definitely holds the most potential of all the current in-development RTS games and I wish it to keep going and improve and maybe one day reach that potential. It has a huge amount of content (single, and multiplayer) and is so much more engaging to play than its most direct comparisons (e.g. Men Of War, COH) and indeed all other wee-men RTS games. The campaign missions are varied and fun. The procedurally generated Conquest mission is much improved from CTA1 and works well to feed hungry players with infinite content (discounting the hilarious movement AI often displayed by the enemy)

The base game is often on sale for a few quid and that's a massive bargain. Once it has its hooks in you'll be desperately buying full-price DLC before you know it as you're too eager to wait for a sale.

If you have even the minimal interest in WW2 or RTS games then it's a must buy. If you're a fan of the (once amazing) Company Of Heroes games, it's a must but. If you long for something to come close to the previous glory of Close Combat, then its a must buy. If you like challenging and engaging games, then it's a must buy

tons of fun! I love the complexity of it, with each unit having its own inventory and being able to pick up ammo and weapons from dead enemies. the tactics and everything are all wonderful. I only wish there were more single player campaigns. absolutely recommend. 9/10

As someone who’s a big fan of Men of War: Assault Squad 2, I can confidently say that Gates of Hell: Ostfront is a fantastic upgrade in nearly every way. Both games are phenomenal in their own right, so I don’t want it to seem like I’m downplaying MOWAS2, but this new installment brings a refreshing array of new features and improvements.

One of the standout elements of Gates of Hell is the variety of campaigns it offers. The single-player and co-op modes are both a blast, allowing for hours of strategic gameplay, whether you're tackling missions solo or teaming up with a few friends. The cooperative aspect in particular is where the game really shines—it's easy to get lost in the tactical depth and the team dynamics.

As for the multiplayer, I’ll admit I’m not much of a competitive player, so I can't speak much to the PvP side of things. I mostly enjoy jumping into private matches with friends and having fun without worrying too much about rankings. If you're into that casual, laid-back multiplayer experience, this game definitely delivers.

Overall, I picked up the entire game + DLC during a Spring Sale for just $30, and I can honestly say it’s been worth every penny. The gameplay is solid, the campaigns are engaging, and it’s an easy recommendation for fans of tactical strategy games.

used to be good. not really worth playing anymore. Conquest mode is always jacked so enemy gets late game arty/antitank while you struggle to even get 6 battles in.

the game doesnt seem to want to launch anymore. at first, it will just randomly crash and now i cant play it at all.

Best balance of fun/realism out of arguably any RTS out right now. Updates and mods will only make it better.

If your getting this game for multiplayer don't.

It requires that everyone in your friend group has a good connection AND a good computer with SSD.
So if anyone lacks either the game forces everyone to wait for the slowest person to catch up.

Additionally it lacks game modes for pvp and co-op is poorly optimised.

Only buy this game for singleplayer and when it goes on a deep discount

Good game, It scratches the MOW itch.

The audio and explosions are really good. I'm glad to see it is expanding beyond the east with the DLC. Love the details to each unit and how they sometimes change and have seasonal camo.

Critique about conquest:
No way to hide locked units, gotta scroll through all these units.
On defense maps if I manage to wipe the floor with the opposing force the game doesn't end until the timer runs out, not fun.

On the game: Cheaper DLC please, The pricing has gone up just in time to 'lower' it for a sale and it discourages purchase.

I love it when I micromanage so poorly I lose 90% of my troops, but clutch with just a flak cannon Blitz and a dream... Seriously though, this game is like alcohol for me, absolutely needed to enjoy the day. Only problem I've had is crashing when loading into a map (though it is probably a very easy fix, just haven't bothered lol).

This is the successor of Sudden Strike and Men of War Assault Squad 2! So realistic and amazing!

This game is absolutely awesome, especially if you can get it at an on sale price. Most realistic WW2 RTS games with the sort of depth seen in GoH are rather clunky and feel a tad lacking in production value. That's not the case here. The gameplay is solid and intuitive. The tutorials are excellent and they don't bombard you with information. After running through an hour or so of pretty slick and engaging tutorial content, you'll be commanding your forces without much trouble.

This isn't to say that the game isn't hard. Most of my time in the game so far has been spent trying to crack the first German mission where you need to break through Russian defenses. It took some trial and error, and some reloading of old saves, but it's a good way to get familiar with the game. Mission 2 scales things up in a big way, and I'm really impressed by the depth, spectacle, and smoothness of the game.

Yes, the AI can be a bit stupid, especially when you're in 3rd person control and the AI seems to just stand there with head poking up out of trench lines, but for the scope and scale of the game this can be forgiven. If you're into WW2 and RTS games, get this.

AVOID! This company went out of business and I was unable to complete the tutorial as the controls do not work.

WOW, Amazing game. Like Battlefield, but then you can RTS and then control any unit 3rd person!

its honestly just a worse men of war assault squad 2, the direct tank control doesn't feel polished and just makes tank game play worse. there are less unique units than MoW AS2 and the UI is more condesnt and less usable.

It has a few problems but all things considered, i love this game its very fun and can be quite challenging.

Deep, engaging RTS with good coop mechanics.

Potentially fun game ruined by braindead AI, GARBAGE pathing, and being an extremely bloated crash-prone pos. Get it on the biggest sale and it might be worth it. I might write a more in-depth review for this later but I just wanted to put the basics out there for now.

I really like the fact that you have so many actions you can take with an individual unit. but its simply too much to manage as one person.

Your units will not try to get under any cover if they are flanked, even if they are already in a trench but an enemy gets along the length of the trench they'll just sit and get gunned down...medics will not attempt to heal or revive fallen allies on their own, even in the same squad. you have to find the body and right click on it perfectly. Better yet, the medic will choose the most direct route, use no cover and probably also get gunned down.
When a unit runs out of ammo, its not always obvious, so an infantry with an anti-tank rifle runs out of ammo and just stops doing anything. I did notice the indicator on the MG infantry when he was out of ammo, but not others.

To top if off, despite getting most of my men gunned down, losing artillery and having a tank effectively disabled, the enemy AI wouldn't just move in to finish me off already... so i was left staring at live battlefield where my troops had no ammo or anti-tank capability, and the enemy tanks wouldn't move in and just kill them to end my misery.

I wanted to like it, but after restarting 4 times just to figure out how to get initial supplies, and then spending ~20 minutes setting up defenses that should have taken less than 5 minutes to do in similar games, I'm kind of turned off.

compared to men at wars 1, has more moderned look.
unfortunately severely lacks QoL updates with interfaces and mechanics feeling incomplete.
community mods seem outdated with game engine updates breaking them.
i know mods would be dependent on versions to an extent but how bad would a game have to have been for them to even cause crashes from updates that can be barely felt.
cant even find mods that fix management aspects like the menus and ingame GUI.

6.5/10.
atleast its playable to an extent

The Hell Let Loose of RTS games, the direct control seemed like a gimmick from videos but controlling units is fun and you'd almost think you were playing warthunder when in a tank.
Slept on this and men of war for years mostly because it seemed too niche to maintain a player base but this entry has more players than Company of heroes and other mil sim strategy games like warno now.
Add matchmaking instead of player lobbies cause finding friends to play this kind of shit is hard.

I'm still learning how to play the game right and I'm loving the depth, the learning curve is engaging. I love how realistic it is; playing this game is actually war simulation, stakes are high, and errors are punishing, yet success is rewarding. I like company of Heroes and World in Conflict, and this game got the best of two worlds with added realism and the option to micro and get tactical :)

Honestly fun for 2 hours. I suck at RTS games but love playing them for some reason. Most games like Halo Wars or Warzone 2100 are on my level (with my serious skill issues). This game is really complex and I love it, but I struggle to beat the Ai on easy mode. I turtle shell a lot in RTS and im a firm believer in playing games the way you want to play them. This game does not support the way I want to play it. I struggle to react to more than one conflict at a time and the easy Ai in dynamic campaign is still quite punishing halfway through run. Yes i suck at these games, and no i dont want to change how i play them. Despite my skill issue, there are still quite a few EXTREMELY aggravating bugs, like highlighting vehicles and infantry and moving them to one place almost always gets them run over and killed. wtf. Also units have no descriptions and some research tree options dont tell you what they do. Poor attention to detail so far in CTE. Also game takes FOREVER to load. I have a fairly new gaming pc (Ryzen 7800X3D + 16gb RAM + Nvidia 3080) and loading a level takes 2-5 min each time stopping at ~90% and doing cache stuff. Phenomenal gameplay and graphics. The sound FX are my favorite part of this game. Hopefully devs can fix the gaps thought (also carefull selecting units as telling them to move on the terrain is a different keybind than telling them to move on the minimap and panning around the minimap is the interact button for units. Not very thought out.)

i like it but theres hardly any content you have to pay more for the rest... ended up refunding ..

A realistic WW2 RTS that does not hold your hand. Currently going through the Airborne campaign and it feels as hopeless as it might have in those days. The icing on the cake is the ability to direct control individual units through either 3rd person or overview. Allows for tactical decisions that you would be limited by in other RTS games.

A love project for old men of war vets and new comers alike.