New Orleans, Louisiana: National WWII Museum

Formerly the National D-Day Museum. From one day to nearly 2,000 days -- quite a mission expansion. It's in New Orleans because New Orleans was the manufacturing center for D-Day landing craft by shipbuilder Andrew Higgins.

Sidewalks outside the buildings are paved with bricks engraved with the names of WWII veterans. Found my grandfather's name when I was there.

"Road to Tokyo" is the latest in a continuing series of add-ons to the National WWII Museum. Ten different "immersion galleries" are light on the artifacts and heavy on the immersion, which is typical of the rest of the museum as well. There's video everywhere, with ample sound effects, moody lighting, and stirring/sad music to put you in the correct frame of mind. Stand on the bridge of the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise! Walk through the jungles of Guadalcanal! General MacArthur, Iwo Jima, kamikaze attacks -- all the Pacific War must-haves are here. The "Endgame Against Japan" display does showcase a couple of items recovered from the rubble of the Nagasaki A-bomb blast, but there's generally more virtual reality staging than actual museum objects.

The National World War II Museum just opened a whole additional building, the "Freedom Pavilion," displaying full-size airplanes and tanks. Its highlight, however, is the high-tech Final Mission: USS Tang Submarine Experience. It's essentially a dignified version of a 4-D ride. Thirty people at a time are sealed inside a recreated World War II submarine. As with the Titanic: World's Largest Museum Attraction, each visitor is given the name of a crewman, and at the end of the 15-minute ride they find out if they lived (Most don't; the Tang was a real World War II sub that sank in 1944).

Tourists sit at various battle stations within the dimly-lit sub, and are subjected to, among other things, the rumble of diesel engines and the smell of burning electrical wires.

The museum is pretty extensive and worth the $17 cover. It had artifact displays, audio, movies, and more. It was kind of dark. Nothing seemed too oddball.