A sequel within a series. Is this like Final Fantasy X-2? Is there still grenade spamming? Will I always be without the rocket launcher when I actually need it? What’s all the fuss about this Russian level? These questions and more have been going through my mind lately awaiting the delivery of the latest Call of Duty game. Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 has large shoes to fill, seeing as Call of Duty 4 remains one of the most played games on Xbox Live. Does it have the legs to take over as the new game of choice for FPS junkies?
Right off the bat, I can appreciate how the game walks you through a few simple video setup steps to ensure you’ll be able to see what you’re doing. For now, I’m playing on my LCD TV since my old projector doesn’t do too well in dark scenes, but it looks like the game offers you a chance to boost your brightness levels before you even begin. It also gives you a Disturbing Content Notice, and the option to play through the game unwarned, or be prompted when a certain scene comes up. This title is rated M so buyers should know what they’re getting into, especially with the qualifiers of Blood, Drug Reference, Intense Violence, and Language, but I guess Infinity Ward wanted to cover all their bases knowing that their game would be receiving a fair amount of scrutiny and media coverage. I opt to be prompted, just to see what happens.
For my own sake, I decided to go through the campaign first, since jumping directly into multiplayer after being away from Call of Duty 4 for a while would be a mistake, says my ego and intuition. After hearing about how short the campaign is, I feel it’ll be a good reintroduction to the game and to its mechanics. The introductory cinematic feels more like a Metal Gear Solid game, but with a bit more realism like you would get from a Tom Clancy game. You get a recap of Call of Duty 4, and eventually dumped into your new avatar. Production values are obviously high and gives the creators some credit up front instead of at the tail end of the game. As we have seen in more games as of late, the first few minutes of the game are expository and double as a tutorial without breaking the fourth wall. You get on-screen commands reminding you the buttons you need, and get walked through the moves you’ll be using for the rest of the game, in addition to a quick check of how you like your controller aiming to work. Saves me the visit to the options menu and keeps the pace moving. Similar to show Call of Duty 4 tested you with a quick run through a maze, you get another chance to test your speed against a small cardboard cut-out army. Not only can you see how quickly you can get through the course, but you can also sample a few of the weapons in the game. Your success in the course gives you a recommendation on what level you should play at, but does not lock you into it. It does, however, keep you from starting the game until you can at least stumble through the course at an acceptable rate without killing all the civilians.
After the brief intro level, you are set off onto one of the many set pieces in Modern Warfare 2. While I managed to make my way through the single player campaign in a little over 6 hours, there is a wide variety of level design in play. This is not a game that takes place solely in a jungle or far away desert, but everywhere else in between. You will traverse the tundra, bake in the desert, and as the game brings things to the homefront, you will fight through America’s backyard. All of the different settings provided Infinity Ward with ample chance to show off their skills at creating new environments for each level. To keep the levels tied together, the plot weaves a confusing thread around the globe using several characters. Some are new faces, but you may be surprised by who else shows up.
By the time you get to the Disturbing Content Notice, you even have to confirm that you’re sure you want to play the level. You aren’t penalized for skipping, and it does its best to make you aware. In a world where anyone can sue for anything, this seems like a step back since at this point in the game, you’ve done your fair share of killing. Apparently this was enough of a hot topic that it earned special circumstances when dealing with how the player is presented the game. The level is no more violent than other levels in the game, but it is the context and emotion that are different. In Call of Duty 4, there is a moment where you as the protagonist is caught in the blast radius of a nuclear bomb. The game has you experience the last moments of this player in an almost agonizing way, different from the spawn-die-respawn cycle you normally experience during the game. Moments and experiences like this are brought back in Modern Warfare 2, whether to highlight the realities of war, or to bring back the emotion in the game instead of just being a run and gun shooter, they are a change of pace. Some may not care for these moments finding them distracting or unnecessary, but I feel that they should make us take pause. The grim realities of war are easy to forget from the comfort of home during a game. Let’s not forget those who are putting themselves in harm’s way every day in reality.
Political and ideological views aside, the single player missions play out similarly to how they have in Call of Duty games gone by. You may find yourself pinned down in an area with your CPU controlled allies, but until you move up to a certain point, the story cannot continue. Enemies still seem to have the ability to bounce grenades in on your position ad infinitum, so hunkering down in some locations to regain your energy is not always an option. Respawning in some tough areas can sometimes lead to a frustrating experience if you didn’t have much ammo or other resources initially, so be prepared to hear the same voiceover lines over and over if you get in a bind.
I played through on the Regular difficulty level and while I did have a few tough sections, the game was enjoyable. The Veteran difficulty is back again for those who are up for the challenge. Completionists again have the the enemy intelligence to track down, sprinkled as they are throughout the levels. I only found a few in my first playthrough, scoring 8 of the 45 in the game. Some are hidden out of the way, but you might stumble upon them whilst running for cover or checking an area out. Some levels are larger and more multi-branched than others, so I’m sure some areas become less likely to stumble upon.
After completing the single player mode, you’re beckoned to continue with the new Special Ops mode. These missions have a similar feel to the VR Missions from Metal Gear Solid fame. There are five levels, each containing five missions that test your skills. The introductory level returns, testing your accuracy and speed, granting you one to three stars for your abilities. Stars earned in these missions eventually unlock the higher Special Ops levels. Some missions require two players, either in a split screen or online mode. Levels are not all rehashes of levels in the single player mode, some containing completely new levels made just for Special Ops. One level, for example, has you trying to fight your way across a bridge bearing resemblance to the Golden Gate bridge, while being attacked by enemy troops and helicopters. Tougher difficulty levels earn more stars but mean deadlier, and more numerous amounts of resistance.
I’m sure there are many people who picked up Modern Warfare 2 and completely skipped the single player and Special Ops mode to jump right into multiplayer – and I can’t blame them. For some, anything but multiplayer is just a refresher or practice for the main event that is the multiplayer mode. Joining multiplayer matches a mere week after the game’s launch to see people already past level 40 shows the dedication being shown this game.
I find it odd to see the "Completion 0%" for the multiplayer portion of the game – is there a point where you get to 100% that it asks you to stop playing, or at least asks you to rethink the amount of time you’ve put into this? The multiplayer mode reprises the many environments from the single player campaign, with some fresh levels thrown in. The maps range from the large and sniper-happy, to the small and claustrophobic.
The feel of multiplayer hasn’t changed much from Call of Duty 4, providing you with some preset loadouts and eventually awarding you with custom classes. Finally – a way to rename your custom classes! It’s a small change, but a welcome one as I can remember tweaking my loadouts in Call of Duty 4 only to forget which one was for what; should help when needing a change in the middle of a match. Of course, whenever I change, it usually seems to mess me up since I then run into a situation where I could have used the previous weapons or skills.
The all too common martyrdom perk from Call of Duty 4, which had your player drop a grenade upon death in the hopes that it would take out nearby enemies, is now a Death Perk instead of one you can regularly equip and is always available. Death Perks come into play when you’re not on your A game, activating when you’ve died a few times in a row and valid until you take out another enemy. Other Death Perks include some extra health for a short amount of time, or let you take the loadout of the enemy that last killed you. These perks can help you out of a losing streak, possibly saving you from a rage quit. However, their nature means you only get it when you’re doing pretty bad, and they go away as soon as you take out one of the enemy team, so their existence does little more than annoyingly remind you of how bad you’re doing.
Regular perks are alive and well, with a few new ones thrown in. As you level up, you can unlock new perks, and you get to choose which ones you would like available. As you string together kills, you are awarded perks. You can only have 3 at once, although I am a fan of the Care Package perk where you get a box dropped from the sky that can be practically any of the other perks. It’s very nice to have a trip on an AC130 fall out of the sky for you. Conversely, it’s not so nice to get killed before you can get to your box and see it taken by the enemy, so best to have your wits about you when you decide to use it. Same goes with some of the other perks that leave you vulnerable while you pilot a Predator-fired missile, or gun from an overhead chopper. Popping open that remote control case in the middle of a field isn’t the best place to do this, I’ve heard, so it’s best to plan ahead if you do manage to get one of these. For those who can string together a large amount of kills, the game does have a Tactical Nuke perk. This perk, if achieved, gives the player a nuke with which they can end the game and win for their team instantly. The only way the opposing team can counter this is by firing another perk, the EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse), before the nuke hits. The perk system provides a little more variety in the game, mixing things up from time to time by making teams rethink strategies when they get flushed out of a previously fortified area.
The game seems to be a bit more arcadey in the multiplayer mode, with more bells and whistles flying about and popping up onto the screen as you complete objectives and challenges. This is very apparent in your first few hours online, since every action seems to have an event attached to it. "You fell off a high ledge and lived! Challenge accomplished!", says my Xbox. Lots of reasons to keep coming back to the multiplayer mode lie within these challenges, and this is where the long legs of this game go to work. As you become proficient with a weapon, you can unlock alternate attachments for it such as a scope or a holographic sight, or an alternate paint scheme or more powerful ammunition. These challenges can take more time, but for the weapons you like using, they can be worth their while. Completionists may be driven mad with the amount of time that needs to be put in to do this for every weapon, however. Finding the weapons and creating the configurations you enjoy using takes time, especially once you start unlocking more items to try out. Why are there still only 5 custom classes? Moving up the rank ladder is alive and well, as additional items are unlocked as you progress online. You can unlock titles and badges, pictures that other players see when you are playing online, although these serve more as another way of dressing up your name like the clan title which is also available.
War is Hell, and complaining about being able to hear what is going on in Hell sounds somewhat ironic. However, there were some points in the game where I could not decipher what I was supposed to do amidst the cacophony of weapons fire and explosions around me. The game does immerse you in sound, and would be benefited with a proper surround sound system. Perhaps dialog would come through more clearly in that case, since with my dinky stereo setup on the living room TV, you end up with every sound coming out the same speakers. In multiplayer mode, the online nature of the game and its content will regularly lead to some colorful exchanges of hate speech, but the game does offer an ability to mute players at will. Playing the game with a good group of friends can really change the experience here, since if you manage to fill the whole team with your well-communicating buddies, the tide can be greatly swung in your favor if you’re up against a group of strangers.
Is it an improvement over Call of Duty 4? With the changes to the online mode, it seems to have some improved gameplay elements and squashes the overuse of the martyrdom perk. An enjoyable, albeit short, single player campaign is bolstered with the addition of the Special Ops mode, but the bulk of the replayability lies in the multiplayer. If you are one to rent games and are on the edge, the campaign offers a good weekend of fun and a good step back in to the world of Call of Duty. Players who enjoy online shooters will likely be moving to this title but only time will tell how it is received on other platforms.
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