tldr: Better than HLL and far from dead.
In just my first 10+ hours of playtime I can easily say this game is much more historically authentic. The gunplay is funner and more chaotic. People use comms more. The Community is smaller but more dedicated, and actually alot more helpful to me so far than the people I got in my first 10 hours of HLL. I've heard it said this game is dead and it almost scared me off but so far no problem finding full servers even some with ques. The Devs of Squad picked the game up and it has fresh content planned. The game also has integrated workshop support, and all the large servers are going to start rotating Eastern Front maps on the 22nd when a workshop mod that is essentially an entire free DLC comes out (it's been actively playtested for balance as well). For anyone who played Red Orchestra, or is more into the Ostfront in general, this is great news.

(See here): https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3126699237

Meaning the game will also cover more theaters of the war than HLL, though it already has more variety in terms of playable forces in the game; French, Poles, a variety of different US and UK army groups, and different German army groups (including the electricians). This arguably means this game offers more content for less money (30$ vs 50$), and I do genuinely feel this game has both more and better polished content than it's competitor.

Expanding on the roles, I think they did a better job with them as well. There is more variety in a single squad in terms of roles. For example you don't need to make a special 2man recon squad to use the sharpshooter role, which means it's less often being locked and coveted. You don't need to 'grind' a certain role you don't enjoy to unlock a certain piece of kit, feel free to go Pioneer from day 1 and satchel some ♥♥♥♥. There are roles with grenade launchers and Anti Tank rifles which I haven't seen in HLL. The individual roles themselves have more utility as well. You like being a Medic but tired of HLL players calling Medics "useless" and not waiting for you when you're less than 25m away? In this game there are Tickets, and nobody is in a rush to respawn if they can help it. So your efforts as a medic will actually be appreciated and people will usually wait for your revive. Even rifleman get a 1 use revive for a battle buddy.
On the topic of locked squads, I don't see any people solo locking heavy tanks in this game either.... I so far have no issues finding squads within matches, and unlike HLL it does not seem like people go out of their way to avoid leadership roles, almost every squad leader I've gotten so far is great and happy to help. The game has dedicated logistics squads instead of just having one player flip between support and engineer roles like a trick pony, and there are no shortage of players who play in the logistics squads unlike HLL where nobody wants to go support or make nodes.

Graphics wise the game looks great, Explosion rendering and FX along with volumetric smoke in particular stuck out to me. Have you ever been close to a tank explosion or arty strike in HLL and noticed how poor the explosion animation looks? Almost like a 2D JPG. The explosions and artillery in this game so far have been much more fleshed out and nicer to look at. The uniforms also have a much nicer attention to detail, without having to pay money to use any camos, and there is no historical censorship of German units. Guns are very detailed. I usually don't spend too much time talking about graphics but I give it a section here because I notice alot of people say this game has poor graphics especially compared to it's competitor, and in my opinion this game actually looks better. But obviously everyone has different tastes, graphical settings, and monitors.

There is a larger variety of weapons, equipment, vehicles (more tanks), and weapon systems; Flak guns, stationary machine gun platfroms, mortars, AT guns etc, all with a closer attention to detail, realism, and historical accuracy.

Cons? Similar to most "sim" shooters. If people aren't working as a unit, or your team is generally getting steamrolled, you will spend alot of time walking and respawning. When you're new, and run around in the open too much you will struggle with not seeing who is shooting at you but this is not a problem with the game, more like a "skill issue". Lack of popular dedicated servers means if you get banned from the bigger servers like 1D or etc, you are somewhat unable to play the game. This is easily fixed by not being a nuisance and starting arguments/doing ban worthy stuff (should be obvious enough to not need explanation.)

To conclude my yapping, this is HLL's big brother on Pervitin, and in my opinion with the points shown above offers more content, at a lower price than HLL, without looking worse graphically. More subjectively I feel this game has a better community/playerbase, that is the people in it communicate better and try to play their roles instead of just ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ off and doing their own thing. The game is far from 'dead', it has active devs, updates in the works and full workshop support.

With just a little bit of fresh blood and coverage I think Squad 44 could have a surge in popularity. Get it, you won't regret it. Find a server to play consistently and communicate with the people there to learn the game, there's also alot of online resources for you to use. See you on the front!

After 787 hours I can say with absolute confidence that this is the definite WW2 game if you like strategy, tactics and visceral firefights.

If you can get passed the (partly) steep learning curve at the beginning, the game rewards you not with fancy experience points or unlocks but with a long-term sense of immersion that only few games in this genre are capable of providing you.

There's nothing more satisfying than successfully executing your (or your squad leaders) plan to take an enemy position. Flanking, tactical retreating and obscuring enemy vision actually have real depth in this game.

If you want the best experience then communication with squad mates and other squad leaders is absolutely vital. The game is designed to be a social experience where call-outs from team members of lower ranks are also crucial. Everyone can contribute to the success of the squad and ergo the team.

I strongly recommend Squad44.

i dont know when i played this but im fairly certain it was probably better than hell let loose.