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The fortified positions of the real-time strategy genre have been overrun in the past few years by an invasion force of quickly produced and budget priced me-too titles that have clouded the field and made consumer reconnaissance nearly impossible. World War II is the latest theatre to see the most action, with new titles arriving to enter the fray on an almost monthly basis. D-Day from Monte Cristo is the latest green recruit to enter battle. With its limited training and inexperience, it is destined to become a quick casualty in this dirty war.
The game offers 12 missions split into three campaigns that are roughly equivalent to before, during and after the famed D-Day beach landings on the French seacoast. Within each campaign, the missions must be played in order. However, you can replay any mission you have completed at any time. After you choose a campaign, you choose a mission, a difficulty level, and the game begins.  Mildly entertaining historically based cut scenes set up each mission after which you are dropped into an overhead view of the battlefield with the units you will control. Several types of infantry units are at your disposal including scouts, machine gunners, bazooka men, flamethrowers, riflemen and tanks. Most of the real-time strategy standards are present. You can select multiple units, group units, issue commands, and watch your soldiers march off to die at your request. The 3D graphics allow you to zoom in or zoom out to many levels but you will find yourself zoomed out most of the time to make sure you can see as much of the field as possible. The missions themselves take place at a medium level of detail. You control soldiers at roughly the Company level (about 100 soldiers), however telling which is which is very difficult. Tiny icons are supposed to help you discern the unit types, but they are too small and distorted to help very much. Worse though, even when selected, units don't always perform the orders you have given them. Pathfinding is problematic and traffic jams are common. If you are determined to create an effective combined arms force to tackle a mission, you end up infuriated with a mass of troops directed toward the enemy positions simply because any more organization is not worth the effort. What seems like a deep an engrossing strategy game from the box and presentation turns into a WWII-themed puzzle game. It may seem like the field of battle is open to experimentation, but most missions are linear with little room to deviate from the path designers have set-out for you. Your units are almost completely helpless without your control, which turns the game into a micromanagement click fest. Almost all enemy elements on the field of battle come as a surprise, but it's you and only you who must react to them. If your soldiers discover a German machine gun nest, they will gleefully enter the kill zone one after another (uttering some of the worst dialogue you've ever heard in a WWII game as they fall) until you tell them to pull back. Units seem unable to do anything on their own save for returning fire, which in most cases is the wrong tactic for survival.  Not all is lost though. The graphics are nice. The 3D engine and interface are easy to use. There is no resource management, which in this kind of game is a big plus. It would be completely ludicrous to land on Omaha Beach only to collect gold, and build a tank factory to help liberate Europe. Your soldiers can operate vehicles, even ones captured from the enemy. The historical information included is helpful to understand the situations and get you in the mood for the game, even if it won't necessarily help with the missions. However there is just not enough to offset the fact that the game is frustrating and shallow. The developers of D-Day set their sights too low on a target as broad as the Normandy invasion. The game is far too restrictive in its scope, and does not use its subject matter to its best advantage. For example, one of the failures of D-Day was that cloudy skies prevented Air Corps from softening-up the German positions before the beach landings. It would have been nice to get the chance to hold-off the invasion for one day, and see what might have happened if air-power could have been used to full-effect. No such luck. D-Day is more a greatest hits album of playable vignettes of the struggle instead of the struggle itself. The real time strategy genre is capable of supporting a game that simulates the Normandy invasion, but sadly D-Day is not that game. 
The game is rated Teen but that is not the only reason kids should not play it. It will probably frustrate and bore them before the limited violence included does them any harm. It might be good for teens that enjoy puzzles and want a challenge, but don't get this because it might be educational. The historical information included is nice, but any documentary on the Discovery Channel will do the job many times better.
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