Squad 44 is a tactical First-Person Shooter co-developed by Offworld Industries, the developers and publishers of Squad, and Mercury Arts.
Set during World War II, specifically the War in Europe and Africa's Western Front, the game is divided into four main campaigns, each released per chapter. The first chapter, "The Bloody Seventh", focuses on Operation Market-Garden in the Netherlands, with British, American, and German forces introduced. The second chapter, "Plan Jaune", adds the French Army, with its maps set during the Battle and Fall of France to the Germans. The third, "Day of Days", adds the Battle of Normandy, introducing new American infantry uniforms. The fourth, and most recent, chapter, "Watch on the Rhine", was released on September 14th, 2022, adding a new winter map Foy, plus a number of new vehicles and uniforms for the American and German factions.
The game began as a mod for Squad by Periscope Games under the name Post Scriptum, which was made into a standalone title after being picked up and published by Offworld Industries. It was released on August 10, 2018 on Steam, on Microsoft Windows. Development on the game halted in December 2022 when Periscope Games suddenly fired its dev team without notifying even its publisher. Almost a year later, Offworld Industries announced that they had fully acquired the game and will continue to support and update it alongside Mercury Arts, a now-professional modding team who had been working on an expansion for Post Scriptum prior to its sudden abandonment. The game was rebranded by OWI to Squad 44, officially pitching it as a spin-off to Squad.
Squad 44 contains examples of:
- Anti-Vehicle: Several weapons issued to players are capable of destroying enemy light vehicles and armor, ranging from the rifle Grenade Launcher with AT rounds, to handheld rocket launchers like the Bazooka, Panzerfaust, and Panzerscheck. In some cases, these can even be anti-tank guns like the 5cm Pak 38 or even the 88mm Flak 36.
- Awesome Personnel Carrier: Several armored troop carriers like the German Sdkfz 251, M3 Half-Track, and Universal Carrier appear. Armed with machine guns and having sufficient armor to protect them from small arms fire, they're essential in both attack and defense, being able to go where "light" vehicles would be shredded to pieces and tanks wouldn't fit.
- Combat Medic: Medics in-game, in addition to their morphine syringes and field dressing kits, are also equipped with a standard-issue rifle and handgun, allowing them to participate in combat against enemies on the frontline.
- Crew of One: Averted. To properly man tanks, armored vehicles, and artillery guns, 2 or more people are necessary in order to fully utilize them.
- Defeat Equals Explosion: Hitting a vehicle enough times with an anti-tank weapon or explosive will eventually cause it blow up, causing anyone unlucky enough to be in or near the vehicle to get killed or wounded.
- Dolled-Up Installment: An odd example with the move from Post Scriptum to Squad 44, as the game had always been a mod for Squad, the new title simply making the connection more official.
- Elites Are More Glamorous: Several of the units featured in-game, such as the Waffen-SS Panzer Divisions and Airborne/Fallschirmjager units, are this, complete with unique uniforms and access to additional weapon loadouts.
- Game Mod: The game itself originally started out as one for Squad, before Offworld Industries took interest in the title and made the modders an official development team.
- Following release, in addition to having Steam Workshop support, the game also has several community-made chapters, with the most notable of these being Operation Mercury between the German Luftwaffe and ANZAC forces, and the North African Campaign between the German Afrika Korps and British 8th Army.
- Grenade Launcher: Certain soldiers are given access to rifle grenade launchers, which allow them to fire either frag or anti-tank grenades using their primary weapons.
- It's Raining Men: British, American, and German paratroopers are featured on several maps, with the first two in particular being the focus of the maps set during Operation Market-Garden. On some maps, the paratroopers even drop from transport aircraft, all the while being fired upon by waiting German forces on the ground.
- Only a Flesh Wound: Averted. Getting even slightly wounded by gunfire, shrapnel, or an explosion will eventually kill you via bleed out if you don't bandage yourself or receive treatment from a medic.
- Pinned Down: Near-misses from gunfire and nearby explosions will blur the player's vision, forcing them to Take Cover! in order to avoid getting picked off.
- Satchel Charge: Available for the Engineer classes are Satchel Charges, which can be used to clear enemy defenses and structures or take out enemy artillery guns and vehicles. To detonate them, they're on a wick-based timer, and must be planted and set up beforehand.
- Sniper Rifle: The sniper classes of each faction are issued a scoped version of their nation's respective service rifle.
- Storming the Beaches: The Utah Beach map involves the US 4th Infantry Division landing on the beach of the same name, while the Germans defend from various beach defenses, beach houses, and inland fortifications in an attempt to contain the American onslaught.
- Tank Goodness: Several American, British, French, and German tanks are available for use by their respective factions, and can prove devastating to both enemy infantry and tanks when crewed by skilled members.
- Urban Warfare: The vast majority of maps in-game have villages, towns, and cities in them, forcing players to traverse their way through to their objectives while avoiding enemy ambushes, mortars, and tanks in the process.
- Winter Warfare: Chapter 4: "Watch on the Rhine" adds two winter maps into the game, Foy and Hagenau, both of which are set in the winter of 1944-45, with the American 101st Airborne fighting elements of the German Wehrmacht in frozen Belgian and French countrysides.
- War Is Hell: Among other things depicted here, deaths are violent, instantaneous, and oftentimes unexpected, bullets and explosions will suppress you, and non-lethal damage will eventually kill you if you're not healed by a medic or bandage your injuries.
