Some of the best in shooting, also the worst.
The call of Duty series and I have had ups and downs, it has certainly consumed most of my game time for a good while, but it also has provided me with the most cheated and despised moments in gaming. So I'm going to look back with the COD games I've played to explain just how do I feel abou the series.
Call of Duty: Finest Hour
This was th
e first Call of Duty game I played. From what I gather, it was the console version of COD on the PC, with new levels and stories. I bought this back on the Xbox, and at the time, I didn't have Live, so I'm only talking about the single player here. This was probably the best WW2 shooter I played up to that point, with the sound design being pretty damn good and the shoot-outs good as well. The missions that were the most fun to play for me were the British missions, along with the initial Russian missions, since they provided the most unique experiences at the time, such as using the turret on the truck or sniping off Germans while defending a fort. It wasn't the best game around, but was certainly worth the money.I didn't buy COD 2 or 3, so we will skip to the best in the series so far, COD4.
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
After playing Halo 3, my game of that particular year, I didn't think there was a real extreme contender for that title till I played this and BioShock. This game blew me away, with the intensity of the single player campaign and addicting multiplayer, this was truly a triple A title. This may not have beat Halo 3 for me, but it certainly came close. The single player was good due to the action sequences and the amount of momentum the first playtroug carries. The very beginning of the game was intense and fun, and never really lets up. Playing on veteran certainly was one of the hardest experiences I've ever had to pull through in a game, and I'm glad to have beat it on that difficulty.
The multiplayer was also very addicting, just the sheer amount of unlockables and the devious option of prestige made this all the more so. There were a good amount of weapons to select from and the maps were well-designed. It was also fun to glitch on old-school mode, finding so many secrets and ways to get out of the maps, long as it didn't actually count as cheating in a player match, it was good. I believe I played until my 6th prestige, which is around the time the game was starting to break up on me due to it forming circles on the disc. I was also getting frustrated with the cheap deaths in the game by grenade launchers, burst rifles, and the juggernaut effects. Even though I may use these at times, there was no denying these are unbalanced tactics. Still, I didn't stop playing the game in bad blood, it certainly was a fun time.
Call of Duty: World at War
I played the beta on the 360, but decided to pick this up for the PS3 anyway, not for any particular reason, just did at the time. This game may have not been better than MW, but it was certainly a good game, even improving in some areas.
The single player certainly had good intensity to it It was a lot bloodier and the Russian missions were certainly fun. Other than that, there isn't way too much I can say on it, it was a solid expereince.
The multiplayer improved on some areas, like making the grenade launcher the last attachment you unlock, so it wasn't available immediately. The dogs were certainly a effective replacement for the attack helicopter. I did also like how stopping power wasn't necessary to make effective kills, you could use a single shot rifle and it would still make kills. TreyArch's dedication to patching up bugs was also appreciated, so that people couldn't keep cheating constantly. Overall, World at War was a worthy game in the series.
Then MW2 came along... boy I couldn't name a game I tried to lie myself into liking. This game has forever tainted me, because it has to be one of the most over rated, broken, overplayed, over-talked about piece of shit I have ever played.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
Wow, you co
uldn't name a bigger cash-in if you tried for video games. Not only was this game rushed, but it wasn't even tested on a beta, big mistake. This game is declared the 3rd biggest selling game of all time, and was nominated, and even won game of year awards. Either critics these days are being payed out, or they are morons who don't know a good game when they see one, because this game chokes. I tried to fool myself into liking this, but this game has just cheated me out on so many occasions, that I can't take it anymore. Let's break down this game, shall we?The single player isn't bad, it's probably the most enjoyable part of the game. Soe of the levels are fun, and it dos seem to catch some of the intensity of the first MW near the end. That is, however, the problem, it just doesn't catch the intensity as well the first game did, and it just rehashes a bunch of tricks from the first game like 5 times, such as killing your character or others and repeat it throughout the campaign. There are also many plot holes in the game, specifically with what happens in the controversial airplane shooting sequence. Mostly the U.s would NOT let this happen to begin with, and also, the russians would not declare immediate war, even if under the rule of a new leader and be this blind about it. You can correct me on these plot points if you want, but I won't care, it is still BS, and doesn't setup very well for it's setting. The campaign is also ridiculously easy, I didn't play on veteran, but I did play it on hardened, and I blew through it in one two days, and on my second time, it only took me the rest of a day to beat, so it is also shorter. Overall, the campaign isn't special, but it's tolerable, which is enough for a single player campaign if the multi-player was worth a damn, right? Well, in this case, fuck no.
I've played the multiplayer for 4 prestiges, and the more I played it, the more I realized just how bad this game was, mostly since I look back on how many times I screamed BULLSHIT! at this one and realize ow this game has frustrated me more than any other game I played. Where to start? I guess I should start with the stupid option of keeping track of losses, and this is stupid for any game. Why keep track of losses if the game drops you into a game that you can't win? They even fucking drop you into a game that is over, and drops you into the losing side, just so you can get a free loss, so the win/loss ratio is totally irreverent. The network stability also pisses me the hell off, since the host migration system somehow is worst than simply stopping the game altogether. The game takes forever to decide who it wants to be the host, and even sometimes disconnecting the game for no reason altogether, basically wasting my time, and you can't leave during the migration either. It even will pick a new host and the game's connection will be even more unstable. Overall, the network stability was poorly built, and I can tell you, no other online game I've played has given me this much network problems.
The weapon balancing was out of check, there were way too many weapons that out-powered the other. Rather than balance grenade launchers, they just simply make a way to give you more of the freaking crap, basically you can have unlimited powerful grenades if you combine the right perks together. Stopping power was an absolute must on regular game modes, otherwise, the enemies won't die quick enough, especially when using a sniper rifle. They also severly messed up when using the commando perk, because you don't simply get better knifing distance, you get invincibility during the knife, since it basically works like a teleport, so bullets will just pass right through you. This encourages players to just run around the maps and melee everybody, you know, like REAL modern warfare. Don't you dare try to make the claim that this game is an arcade shooter, basically telling me that they weren't trying for realism, because that's a bullshit claim on every level, so don't try to get me started on how that claim is wrong.
Even though some of these mentioned glitches were patched, people still found ways to work around them to make them work again. IW eventually stopped patching them altogether, so fuck them. The javelin glitch I never really experienced, but do know what the effects were, which was major bullcrap. There was that ordeal about the ridiculous range of duel-wielding 1887s, but that was also not something I didn't really notice. Now what I did notice was the infinite care package glitch, which was stupidly cheap, and for those who use it to cheat to victory, be ashamed of yourselves. The leader boards were also meaningless since so many fucking kids thought that they are automatically pros for modifying their machines to allow themselves to be automatically 10th prestige with all titles and emblems earned, making them think that they are pros. No, your not, you cheated, and basically ruined the meaning of "achievement" there, with that title carrying no merit. You didn't get 1,000 head shots, you didn't kill someone with their own claymore by shooting through a wall, any achievement you claim to have with all titles and emblems unlocked, you didn't unlock, and you did nothing to unlock them, you are just the lowest form of scum for playing online, and you need to rethink what the hell you were thinking. I also hate those who infect the host system to make it so that you can become a host and make it so that guns have perfect accuracy, never run out of ammo, make all care packages drop AC-130s r chopper-gunners, and make a nuke that lasts 60 mins so that the match never ends, you can get as much exp as you want, and you will win no matter what, basically victimizing the other team. This is both sad for the hackers and the development team for this game, because this was just so poorly coded if this game allowed for this kind of shit to happen. I could rant on forever on just how bad this game is, but I think this will do for now.
Call of Duty Black Ops
Now so far, this game has learned from Mw2's mistakes, and I'm enjoying it so far, but I still need a bit more time with the multiplayer, so I'll write a seperate review for this game when I am done. Needless to say, it is better than MW2 by a long shot
So that's how I feel about the series, they have given me the best of gaming, and the worst of it as well. MW1 and WAW don't come on my personal 15 games list, but they are still really good games. Hopefully, BO will be able to stand with those two games, only time will tell if so.
