The story of Men of Valor follows Dean Shepard and his squad of Marines from the 3rd Battalion of the 3rd Marine Division in 1968, through sixteen missions during the Vietnam War including missions at the height of the Tet Offensive. In historically-based scenarios, the player assumes a variety of roles in which they man the door gun on a Huey helicopter, steer a riverboat along enemy-infested shores, battle their way through enemy tunnel complexes, and call down fire as a forward observer. Mission types include pilot rescues, recon patrols, POW rescue, and search-and-destroy ops, all typical objectives throughout the offensive. Between missions are film clips in both Black and White and Colour showcasing the real war, a similar approach to most WWII games at the time.
The game received "mixed or average reviews" on both platforms according to the review aggregation website Metacritic, with 73/100 for Xbox and 71/100 for Microsoft Windows. The game was praised for its story, character development, setting, gameplay, and atmosphere, but was also criticized for its voice acting, unreliable checkpoint system, and frequent difficulty spikes.[24][25]
Eurogamer gave the title 6/10, stating: "The net result for the makers of Medal Of Honor is a game that's a pleasantly unpleasant diversion from old WW2 glories, yet evidently not the triple A game Vivendi Universal would have been hoping for. Still, Men Of Valor is a solid, enjoyable and challenging Vietnam take on the sort of scripted cinematic shooters that the public evidently love to death."[8]
IGN gave the PC version 6.8/10 and the Xbox version 7.8/10.
^Wolpaw, Erik (October 22, 2004). "Men of Valor Review (Xbox)". GameSpot. CBS Interactive. Archived from the original on August 13, 2017. Retrieved August 12, 2017.
^Perry, Douglass C.; McNamara, Tom (October 26, 2004). "Men of Valor (PC)". IGN. Ziff Davis. Archived from the original on August 13, 2017. Retrieved August 13, 2017.
^Perry, Douglass C. (October 19, 2004). "Men of Valor (Xbox)". IGN. Ziff Davis. Archived from the original on August 13, 2017. Retrieved August 13, 2017.