okay, let me make it clear first that I wanted to review Modern Warfare 2 only, right until I noticed that I had 24+ game time on it.
"holy balls", I said with Monster Energy running through an IV, now why would this matter? every game I write a review for, and the 2% I actually put out for scrutiny, I try to keep the game fresh in mind, that being said, play through it like I have no idea about the game and let the waters of failure carry my words.
this was until I started playing multiplayer.
I hapened to remember having Hero's Over Europe rented [who's review will never see the light of day thank god], and decided to check out the game store to see if anything new was in.
and there it was, Way of the Samurai 3......... the first two games ate up precious weeks of time during my high school years, and here it was for the 360, I started reaching for it when something caught my eye.....
Left 4 Dead 2......
Im not sure if you can picture a 6'4" man squealing like an otaku....or furry...... at a convention, but I plead to the fifth of any said squealing inside a public place.
I sat down with it last night and early this morning, had it finished, well except for one level but I nearly beat it damn it!
so I decided to pin the Modern Warfare review along with this one, but I warn you it could be seen as being biased.
Left 4 Dead 2
I liked Left 4 Dead, and when a sequel was announced I had no idea how exactly they could improve on it, then the information came out. 'new zombies? okay I guess' 'ooohhhh is that a grenade launcher? I could see how that will be useful' 'holy crap! A CHAINSAW?' 'a frying pan.......really?' you get the idea...... and of course the controversy, people wanted a boycott because of the lack of content on the first one, to which I constantly said:
Kalezian:
If you dont like the game, dont buy it? its not like they are forcing you to play it, let the people who actually want to play it do so.
of course after Gabe flew out two of the top boycotter's some woes were put to rest, others wanted to boycott simply because they were not chosen to go out there, but in the end it frevor died down, so how does the game stand up? fairly well, and you can barely see any duc-tape!
The number one thing I have to praise is that there is now an actual implied storyline, unlike L4D, where you had four stories seprately, each of the five campaigns in L4D2 have dialog reminiscing about the previous level, from Nick shooting the helicopter pilot from the second level, to having to find more diesel for your rescue boat on the fourth level that takes you to the fifth one.
not having an actual story is what kinda pushed me away from the first game, so you can see how this is a big thing for me, but now lets go over characters.
in the human side we have Coach, due to a knee injury in college he was unable to play football and never was picked for the pro leagues, but has since changed his life goal to coaching a pro team rather than playing, Nick, a back alley gambler who has learned a thing or to about survival from run-ins with sore losers, Ellis, a mechanic and 'that guy', you know the one who will never shut up about 'that time with his friend.......', you know, Family Guy! Ellis is practically the bitch of the group, in the opening cutscene you can tell he gets the short end of the stick. and Rochell, workign a low level job with a news station, she was going to use the outbreak and related sickness of the news anchors to forward her career, the zombies on the otherhand had another idea........... no STOP THAT! I know what your thinking and no, I have yet to find any rule 34 over it!.........erm.............
and in the zombie corner, weighing in at a meager 100 lbs., the little bitch from the shallow ditch, the Jockey. let me talk about this guy first before the others, he will fuck your shit up, I am not joking, awww, your ontop of a building? NOT ANYMORE BIYAAA! he will jump on you and steer you into bad things, like other zombies, cliffs, fire, car alarms, ect. hard to hit when your surounded by the horde also.
The spitter, oh god Valve, why, why did you feel the need to have this creature running around? She will spray her liquid pain and block off exits and paths for a good while, even when you kill her some spitter goo, yes thats what its called, will drop where her body is. really annoying, like the boomer but with an added 'fuck YOU!'.
Ze Boomer, yep, fatty mc dingdongs makes a return, but he brought a woman with him now! thats right he's the same but now he comes in whale flavor, but it doesnt really matter though, they look the exact same.
The Hunter makes an appearance yet again, same as the boomer, nothing new.
Smoker, same.
Tank, same.
Charger, HOLY CRAP, ITS A- is all your going to get out before he smashes you in the face with his fist..... this is the only infected that has killed me, why? because he will charge your ass, and when he's done will pick you up and continue to smash you until you die. Contrary to belief, not as healthy as the tank, but in my opinion, more deadly.
Witch, yea, remember Ms. emo zombie? she's back but now has a few tricks up her sleeve, erm.......bra? I guess?......she will stand up and lean against walls, and even walk around, yes WALK AROUND, dont think this is bullshit? one level has you going through an area with, and I counted, 8 witches that are walking around, for a second I thought the Director was fucking with me but no, no matter what they will be there just in different areas walking around. same as before, call her an emo and she will flip out and kill you, then go cry on myspace/facebook/live[dead] journal/vampire freaks/deviantART.
Mudmen, they will swim after you, thank god they are only in one level.
CEDA Zombies, aka the zombies in hazmat suits, I have no idea what they do exactly, but they drop boomer bile, which means for good times.
SWAT Zombies, who the fuck put bullet proof armor on the zombies while we were sleeping? FRANCIS! yet again, only appear in one level.
Clown Zombies, god damn you valve, I hate clowns, but now clown zombies? they will run after you and because of their shoes will bring more zombies with them, the squeak when you melee their faces with your pistol.
now the weapons and oh my god do I love them, for one, the usual uzi, shotgun, auto-shotgun, assault rifle, hunting rifle return, but now we have more weapons to go around.
Silenced Uzi, wont draw much attention when used, but still inaccurate.
Chrome shotgun, more accurate than the regular pump shotgun?
combat shotgun, pop pop pop, 10 rounds as fast as you can pull the trigger.
AK-47, its an assault rifle with slightly better penetration, what more do you want?
SCAR, or as the game calls it, another assault rifle, three round bursts can help you out when ammo gets low.
Thumper, known also as the blooper or the m79, this grenade launcher does massive damage.
Frying pan, makes the best prong sound when used correctly.
Baseball bat, your not Babe Ruth, but then again you wont need to shoot up steroids to use it correctly like most of the MLB people do.
Cricket Bat, same as baseball bat, just flatter.
crowbar, you are NOT a doctor, dont even pretend that you are.
because this list is going on longer than I intended, Fire Axe, Guitar, Katana, Chainsaw........ save for the chainsaw, they all do about the same damage, the chainsaw however runs on gas, so use sparingly.
I wont go into much detail of the levels, only that there are some really lop-sided ones in favor of either the survivors or the zombies, but I will go into how a few are set during daytime.
Im not sure about anyone else, but during day time levels I tended to turn off my flashlight which put me at a disadvantage when I walked into a dark building, though its nice from midnight black, concrete gray, and random bright color, to brown, lighter brown, darker brown, and random bright color.
re-playability? it suffers the condition that L4D1 had, once you play through it a few times you get the hang of the levels, thankfully realism mode is there to kick our asses back into reality of how we would die horribly should the zombie apocalypse ever come upon us.
my opinion? rent it, if you like it or have friends that already have it you will be able to see what you do and dont like about it, some levels are confusing and your plainly out of luck should you play single player, though the AI is a little better than the first one.
also, you dont need to pay for survival mode, and get more levels to boot also!
Modern Warfare 2
why is MW2 longer than L4D2? because I had more time to look through it and actually see a lot of the mechanics in action, that and L4D2 is a really short game, complaining at MW2 having 6-12 hours of gameplay? L4D2 had roughly 5........... and thats if you dont die.
For a few weeks now Modern Warfare 2 has caused quite a stir in both terms of gameplay mechanics as well as developer decisions. However, does Modern Warfare 2 live up to the hype that people made it out to be, either good or bad? to me, a little of yes and no.
First off, let me say that this game was the first one ever to actually make me stop for a few seconds and question what I was about to do, and look in a perspective of what the characters were going through. I am of course talking about the infamous Airport level, though not all is what it seems, I cant reveal further without spoiling it for those who haven't got a chance to play through it, just remember, No Russian.......
Gameplay Mechanics
Nothing is really added nor taken away in Modern Warfare 2, what I did find was more sneaky missions, I use the term sneaky rather than stealth simply because raising an alarm just means more enemies you need to fight. While I enjoyed the sniper mission in Modern Warfare, it seems that someone in over at Infinity Ward liked it more than me, which is scary. From Afghanistan to America, to even Russia, the game takes different tones to match the events, for example the American portions have increased ammo caches you can use to refill, well, your ammo, while the TF-141 missions are more of a "use what you can" feeling, more often than naught you end up having to switch between several different guns in the same mission, while this does ensure you mess around with the fair share of weapons, it also means at parts you will end up with a bad combination, for example, having a shotgun while running in open areas. The new attachments are a great addition, though their uses seemed forced at times. I am of course talking about giving me a thermal scoped rifle just seconds before a group of enemies drop smoke grenades, being subtle this game is not.
I have to of course give praise for whoever thought up that by the time Modern Warfare 2 takes place we will have automated turrets, all Humvee's will have a m134 on top of them, and that we have EMP missiles on standby.
Now for the issues. Seems the AI took a back seat during development, at times making me almost cry at how lousy at actually doing anything they are. Add in enemy AI that at times just seems cruel and you have a bad combination. Infinity Ward also believed that having red-shirt AI partners was a good Idea, granted it made me feel a little bit of sympathy when one of the important characters yelled out that they had died in combat. Im not saying that they are horrible, but at times I would go into a room where they were running in only to have an enemy combatant attack me while they kept running, nice teamwork guys.....really..........
Add in a few action scenes reminiscent of '80's and '90's action films and you pretty much make out gameplay mechanics, I will get to why I have these here rather in the story portion next.
One thing I have to say is how the AI will kick your ass without a moments notice, I mean they will prone, hit last stand, and generally mess up your Sunday with grenades, and yet I loved every minute of it, aside from the parts that I have to yell at how stupid parts were, as an example, I ran into Burger Town, a part of a level later on in the game only to get killed by an AI with the semi-auto shotgun, so I load the checkpoint, carefully I walk through and kill him only for a grenade to hit me in the forehead a second afterwords, or another time when I was using the Predator missile strike computer to do an objective only for what I believed to be an un-destroyable car blew up while I was in the control screen.
needless to say, I died, a lot........and I enjoyed it. finally a game where I have to use online tactics on the offline single player.
and I was only playing on regular, mock me as you want, but I said I was going to go through it form start to finish without going back, that included re-doing the training level, I know though I could of hit veteran had I actually tried, sadly it was easier than the ship run through form the first one.
A gripe I have is some missions you are put by yourself should your AI red-shirts die. These missions were tough by themselves on regular, so I fear for trying them on veteran.
Story
When I first started the game I made a commitment, no matter what, keep going forward until I beat the game. So I took a swig from my Route 44 from Sonic [America's #1 Drive In] and hit play, immediately I got a message saying that there would be scenes I might find offensive in the game, and it gave me an option to skip them, however already knowing full well what the scene was I hit 'dont ask me again'. Starting off it gives you a nice, if somewhat broken and overly complicated, 'what you missed from last time' intro, granted if you just got done playing the first Modern Warfare you will understand a majority of it, but it feels like it could of been made a little better.
before you read any further, I am about to spoil the game for you majorly, so if you dont want it to be spoiled, I loved the game, but I consider it a rent just like MW1, dont read any further if you dont want to be spoiled.........
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Did Mike leave? good, I hate that guy........
You play the game through a multitude of perspectives, from Privates in the United States Army, to members of a Task Force grouped numbered 141, while its not like the first one had the same set-up, there is just too many characters in this one. the worst part?
SERIOUSLY, major spoilers people...........
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its almost needed because almost everyone you play as, dies. Thats right, and it sucks. after the third person died I just felt like it was dragging it on, even the final fight scene made me feel like it was just trying to drag things along hoping to squeeze more minutes of gameplay out, it is well done though Ill admit.
The first moment I stopped and thought was the infamous Airport level that people have, or haven't, been talking about, when the scene starts you see a crowd of people in front of you unknowing that there are four armed men behind them, as multiple people turn and see your group, as do they all, and for a moment I really didn't want to do it. Call me weak, but for the first time in a video game I really didn't want to pull the trigger. I saw the crowd, full of men and women who were just waiting in line to possibly go on holiday somewhere, with of course the security guards manning the metal detectors, then what I dreaded the most, we open fired on them, unarmed civilians.
now I play violent video games, hell, in GTA III I was running over everyone I saw with a tank with no regard for life at all, if you were in my way, you died, but here...... I cant really explain it, I just didnt want to kill these people, I even felt sad for the few security officers that were gunned down while trying to protect the civilians, partly because I am too a Security Officer, and if put in the same situation I would do the same as they were. The most nauseating part was re-walking over the carnage and gore from the few minutes past, only to take on more heavily armed opponents, but that scene will stick with me for a while longer than anything else in this game.
I wont spoil too much for those of you who haven't played through the story yet, but that mission is what sets the rest of the game into motion.
overall the story was really well told, though some parts could of used some work, but only in the lack of information it gave you.
Armory
The weapons available in Single Player are numerous, ranging from a Model 1887 shotgun, to some really obscure ones such as the Vector SMG, which I felt was a little overwhelming.
hear me out on this, its great you have a lot of weapons for us to choose from, but some just feel out of place, for example MP5k, basically a MP5 without a stock, just feels......wrong, compared to the other weapons in its class. I applaud Infinity Ward for trying to expand the selection, but really it feels like you already know which guns are the best.
Also, who's bright idea was it to give the Light Fifty immediately? compared to the other rifles in its grouping its more than powerful with a generous degree of accuracy and penetration, so why is the m21 EBR unlocked at a higher rank?
supplementing your cache of weapons of minimum destruction are equally varied sectional weapons, such as stinger missiles, Javelin rocket systems, automated turrets, just about everything for the future army to waste millions on. while having these part in a game where you need to use weapon A to destroy X amount of enemies B can sometimes ruin it, its almost the opposite in this, I actually wanted to use another Jav. Rocket on regular people, but in all there's about two to three sections dedicated to this.
I have yet to try out the Special-Ops mode, so I wont review it, I might add it in later as an edit.
in all, single player for me would earn a 8/10 should I ever decide to go stupid and use a numeral rating system. The story actually made me feel emotions other than rage which is a first in a while, so instant good points, however with as many plot twists that it springs on you, you would be inclined to think Infinity Ward hired M. Night Shamalayn as it story director suddenly takes some of those points away.
though I did like the part in space where he astronaut dies, that was a first............
Multiplayer
ahh yes, the part you probably skipped straight to. Wanting to see if I stand by my previous assumptions that the multiplayer isnt ruined? no
simply no, its not ruined, in fact Im starting to think I enjoy it more than the first modern Warfare, heres why.
the multiplayer is almost identical to the first Modern Warfare, just add a few more items and play methods, I had to perk an eyebrow when I saw the Callsign and Icon menu, yes when you level up and preform special actions in the game you can unlock more icons and call signs, for example, using the Copy Cat death streak perk, which allows you to take your killers load out, and kill your killer while you have his load out, you earn the Indentity Thief callsign along with the death streak icon. which considering how there is at least 70 levels, you can expect atleast something for every level up.
one thing I have to complain about is that you cannot get any challenges done until you're over level 5, for a while I was wondering if I was indeed getting any kills with my rifles to unlock its additions. but I guess its one way to make sure people play a few matches before finding easy ways to boost up to the highest level.
for the levels themselves, I have yet to play them all, but with the games being 9v9, you feel claustrophobic in some, often spawning in front of waiting enemies. This was one of my main complaints about the first Modern Warfare game, and it seems to continue in fashion.
as for death streaks, some said it would ruin the game, but in fact it kinda adds to it along with some of the other xp gaining techniques that are at your disposal, for instance lets say you just keep getting the short straw when it comes to spawn locations, it isnt fun waiting out 30-40 seconds so that you can finally get a spawn that doesn't have anyone near it, but with the pain killer death streak you get an extra boost of health, much like a weaker version of spawn shield, when you come back.
before you complain also about martyrdom, it too is a death streak now, which is a high level unlock.
as for XP generation it is fairly simple with a few interesting additions, for example killing someone who only needs one kill for a kill streak item [modern warfare's helicopter anyone?] will grant you an extra 200 or so xp, getting vengence for you or a team mate will give you anywhere between 50-150 extra xp. Are you a sniper? get kills for long distances, one shot kills and headshots and you get boosts to your xp.
now for what caused all the controversy for Modern Warfare 2, the lack of dedicated servers and lag, playing on a console I can tell you I had neither. the only noticeable lag I got out of over a days worth of game time, and numerous matches, was in four games, and these were types I didnt really play that often, like third person team deathmatch, which is interesting by the way, really awkward too. AS for the host migration, it happened so rarely when I was playing that at first I doubted it even happened at all, but it does and it is frustrating about to pull off a kick ass sniper kill only for the host to leave with a game experience breaking delay.
One thing I can agree on though is some of the kill streak items, most notably the Predator AGM, controlled by the player this little missile can ruin your teams score in an instant, and its a major rub in the face when you're the only one killed from it, dont believe the user, you do have to aim it.
another gripe is some of the weapon unlockables, example is the FMJ addition for guns, essentially, deep impact. but one I love most of all is the tactical knife for the pistols, already having your knife in stabbing position makes for some awesome kills
one last gripe about multiplayer is the cage fights, in the words of the great thunder dome, two men enter, one man leaves, or that would be the case would it be not perfect to boost your levels up much like the first Modern Warfare, yet again.
Overall, the Multiplayer has one or two bugs that are noticeable, but tries to help out lower level players possibly to the much hatred of the higher ups, and though you probably know what weapons you will want to use, the shear number of attachments and perks can make each class different in many ways.
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oh, and the shotguns can have silencers, dear game developers, unless its shooting a slug IT WONT WORK RIGHT, PLEASE STOP GIVING YOUNG KIDS FALSE HOPES.
Extra Punctuation
MovieBob: Intermission
Experienced Points
First Person
Miracle of Sound: Encore
Exploding Barrels
Loading Time
No Right Explanation
Backchat
Drinking Games
Escape to the Movies
Escapecraft
Escapist Podcast
Feed Dump
GinxTV
Jimquisition
LoadingReadyRun
Mahalo
Meatbag and Co
Media Sandwich
Miracle of Sound
No Right Answer
Pro-Gamer Gauntlet
Reviews
Space Janitors
Tales from the Table
The Big Picture
The Escapist Presents
The Retro Show
Trailers
Unskippable
Zero Punctuation
Max Payne 3 Review
Company of Heroes 2
XCOM Enemy Unknown
Black Ops 2
Diablo 3 Review
TERA Review
Firefall Beta Preview
Starhawk Review
Critical Miss
Name Game
okay, let me make it clear first that I wanted to review Modern Warfare 2 only, right until I noticed that I had 24+ game time on it.
"holy balls", I said with Monster Energy running through an IV, now why would this matter? every game I write a review for, and the 2% I actually put out for scrutiny, I try to keep the game fresh in mind, that being said, play through it like I have no idea about the game and let the waters of failure carry my words.
this was until I started playing multiplayer.
I hapened to remember having Hero's Over Europe rented [who's review will never see the light of day thank god], and decided to check out the game store to see if anything new was in.
and there it was, Way of the Samurai 3......... the first two games ate up precious weeks of time during my high school years, and here it was for the 360, I started reaching for it when something caught my eye.....
Left 4 Dead 2......
Im not sure if you can picture a 6'4" man squealing like an otaku....or furry...... at a convention, but I plead to the fifth of any said squealing inside a public place.
I sat down with it last night and early this morning, had it finished, well except for one level but I nearly beat it damn it!
so I decided to pin the Modern Warfare review along with this one, but I warn you it could be seen as being biased.
Left 4 Dead 2
I liked Left 4 Dead, and when a sequel was announced I had no idea how exactly they could improve on it, then the information came out. 'new zombies? okay I guess' 'ooohhhh is that a grenade launcher? I could see how that will be useful' 'holy crap! A CHAINSAW?' 'a frying pan.......really?' you get the idea...... and of course the controversy, people wanted a boycott because of the lack of content on the first one, to which I constantly said:
of course after Gabe flew out two of the top boycotter's some woes were put to rest, others wanted to boycott simply because they were not chosen to go out there, but in the end it frevor died down, so how does the game stand up? fairly well, and you can barely see any duc-tape!
The number one thing I have to praise is that there is now an actual implied storyline, unlike L4D, where you had four stories seprately, each of the five campaigns in L4D2 have dialog reminiscing about the previous level, from Nick shooting the helicopter pilot from the second level, to having to find more diesel for your rescue boat on the fourth level that takes you to the fifth one.
not having an actual story is what kinda pushed me away from the first game, so you can see how this is a big thing for me, but now lets go over characters.
in the human side we have Coach, due to a knee injury in college he was unable to play football and never was picked for the pro leagues, but has since changed his life goal to coaching a pro team rather than playing, Nick, a back alley gambler who has learned a thing or to about survival from run-ins with sore losers, Ellis, a mechanic and 'that guy', you know the one who will never shut up about 'that time with his friend.......', you know, Family Guy! Ellis is practically the bitch of the group, in the opening cutscene you can tell he gets the short end of the stick. and Rochell, workign a low level job with a news station, she was going to use the outbreak and related sickness of the news anchors to forward her career, the zombies on the otherhand had another idea........... no STOP THAT! I know what your thinking and no, I have yet to find any rule 34 over it!.........erm.............
and in the zombie corner, weighing in at a meager 100 lbs., the little bitch from the shallow ditch, the Jockey. let me talk about this guy first before the others, he will fuck your shit up, I am not joking, awww, your ontop of a building? NOT ANYMORE BIYAAA! he will jump on you and steer you into bad things, like other zombies, cliffs, fire, car alarms, ect. hard to hit when your surounded by the horde also.
The spitter, oh god Valve, why, why did you feel the need to have this creature running around? She will spray her liquid pain and block off exits and paths for a good while, even when you kill her some spitter goo, yes thats what its called, will drop where her body is. really annoying, like the boomer but with an added 'fuck YOU!'.
Ze Boomer, yep, fatty mc dingdongs makes a return, but he brought a woman with him now! thats right he's the same but now he comes in whale flavor, but it doesnt really matter though, they look the exact same.
The Hunter makes an appearance yet again, same as the boomer, nothing new.
Smoker, same.
Tank, same.
Charger, HOLY CRAP, ITS A- is all your going to get out before he smashes you in the face with his fist..... this is the only infected that has killed me, why? because he will charge your ass, and when he's done will pick you up and continue to smash you until you die. Contrary to belief, not as healthy as the tank, but in my opinion, more deadly.
Witch, yea, remember Ms. emo zombie? she's back but now has a few tricks up her sleeve, erm.......bra? I guess?......she will stand up and lean against walls, and even walk around, yes WALK AROUND, dont think this is bullshit? one level has you going through an area with, and I counted, 8 witches that are walking around, for a second I thought the Director was fucking with me but no, no matter what they will be there just in different areas walking around. same as before, call her an emo and she will flip out and kill you, then go cry on myspace/facebook/live[dead] journal/vampire freaks/deviantART.
Mudmen, they will swim after you, thank god they are only in one level.
CEDA Zombies, aka the zombies in hazmat suits, I have no idea what they do exactly, but they drop boomer bile, which means for good times.
SWAT Zombies, who the fuck put bullet proof armor on the zombies while we were sleeping? FRANCIS! yet again, only appear in one level.
Clown Zombies, god damn you valve, I hate clowns, but now clown zombies? they will run after you and because of their shoes will bring more zombies with them, the squeak when you melee their faces with your pistol.
now the weapons and oh my god do I love them, for one, the usual uzi, shotgun, auto-shotgun, assault rifle, hunting rifle return, but now we have more weapons to go around.
Silenced Uzi, wont draw much attention when used, but still inaccurate.
Chrome shotgun, more accurate than the regular pump shotgun?
combat shotgun, pop pop pop, 10 rounds as fast as you can pull the trigger.
AK-47, its an assault rifle with slightly better penetration, what more do you want?
SCAR, or as the game calls it, another assault rifle, three round bursts can help you out when ammo gets low.
Thumper, known also as the blooper or the m79, this grenade launcher does massive damage.
Frying pan, makes the best prong sound when used correctly.
Baseball bat, your not Babe Ruth, but then again you wont need to shoot up steroids to use it correctly like most of the MLB people do.
Cricket Bat, same as baseball bat, just flatter.
crowbar, you are NOT a doctor, dont even pretend that you are.
because this list is going on longer than I intended, Fire Axe, Guitar, Katana, Chainsaw........ save for the chainsaw, they all do about the same damage, the chainsaw however runs on gas, so use sparingly.
I wont go into much detail of the levels, only that there are some really lop-sided ones in favor of either the survivors or the zombies, but I will go into how a few are set during daytime.
Im not sure about anyone else, but during day time levels I tended to turn off my flashlight which put me at a disadvantage when I walked into a dark building, though its nice from midnight black, concrete gray, and random bright color, to brown, lighter brown, darker brown, and random bright color.
re-playability? it suffers the condition that L4D1 had, once you play through it a few times you get the hang of the levels, thankfully realism mode is there to kick our asses back into reality of how we would die horribly should the zombie apocalypse ever come upon us.
my opinion? rent it, if you like it or have friends that already have it you will be able to see what you do and dont like about it, some levels are confusing and your plainly out of luck should you play single player, though the AI is a little better than the first one.
also, you dont need to pay for survival mode, and get more levels to boot also!
Modern Warfare 2
why is MW2 longer than L4D2? because I had more time to look through it and actually see a lot of the mechanics in action, that and L4D2 is a really short game, complaining at MW2 having 6-12 hours of gameplay? L4D2 had roughly 5........... and thats if you dont die.
For a few weeks now Modern Warfare 2 has caused quite a stir in both terms of gameplay mechanics as well as developer decisions. However, does Modern Warfare 2 live up to the hype that people made it out to be, either good or bad? to me, a little of yes and no.
First off, let me say that this game was the first one ever to actually make me stop for a few seconds and question what I was about to do, and look in a perspective of what the characters were going through. I am of course talking about the infamous Airport level, though not all is what it seems, I cant reveal further without spoiling it for those who haven't got a chance to play through it, just remember, No Russian.......
Gameplay Mechanics
Nothing is really added nor taken away in Modern Warfare 2, what I did find was more sneaky missions, I use the term sneaky rather than stealth simply because raising an alarm just means more enemies you need to fight. While I enjoyed the sniper mission in Modern Warfare, it seems that someone in over at Infinity Ward liked it more than me, which is scary. From Afghanistan to America, to even Russia, the game takes different tones to match the events, for example the American portions have increased ammo caches you can use to refill, well, your ammo, while the TF-141 missions are more of a "use what you can" feeling, more often than naught you end up having to switch between several different guns in the same mission, while this does ensure you mess around with the fair share of weapons, it also means at parts you will end up with a bad combination, for example, having a shotgun while running in open areas. The new attachments are a great addition, though their uses seemed forced at times. I am of course talking about giving me a thermal scoped rifle just seconds before a group of enemies drop smoke grenades, being subtle this game is not.
I have to of course give praise for whoever thought up that by the time Modern Warfare 2 takes place we will have automated turrets, all Humvee's will have a m134 on top of them, and that we have EMP missiles on standby.
Now for the issues. Seems the AI took a back seat during development, at times making me almost cry at how lousy at actually doing anything they are. Add in enemy AI that at times just seems cruel and you have a bad combination. Infinity Ward also believed that having red-shirt AI partners was a good Idea, granted it made me feel a little bit of sympathy when one of the important characters yelled out that they had died in combat. Im not saying that they are horrible, but at times I would go into a room where they were running in only to have an enemy combatant attack me while they kept running, nice teamwork guys.....really..........
Add in a few action scenes reminiscent of '80's and '90's action films and you pretty much make out gameplay mechanics, I will get to why I have these here rather in the story portion next.
One thing I have to say is how the AI will kick your ass without a moments notice, I mean they will prone, hit last stand, and generally mess up your Sunday with grenades, and yet I loved every minute of it, aside from the parts that I have to yell at how stupid parts were, as an example, I ran into Burger Town, a part of a level later on in the game only to get killed by an AI with the semi-auto shotgun, so I load the checkpoint, carefully I walk through and kill him only for a grenade to hit me in the forehead a second afterwords, or another time when I was using the Predator missile strike computer to do an objective only for what I believed to be an un-destroyable car blew up while I was in the control screen.
needless to say, I died, a lot........and I enjoyed it. finally a game where I have to use online tactics on the offline single player.
and I was only playing on regular, mock me as you want, but I said I was going to go through it form start to finish without going back, that included re-doing the training level, I know though I could of hit veteran had I actually tried, sadly it was easier than the ship run through form the first one.
A gripe I have is some missions you are put by yourself should your AI red-shirts die. These missions were tough by themselves on regular, so I fear for trying them on veteran.
Story
When I first started the game I made a commitment, no matter what, keep going forward until I beat the game. So I took a swig from my Route 44 from Sonic [America's #1 Drive In] and hit play, immediately I got a message saying that there would be scenes I might find offensive in the game, and it gave me an option to skip them, however already knowing full well what the scene was I hit 'dont ask me again'. Starting off it gives you a nice, if somewhat broken and overly complicated, 'what you missed from last time' intro, granted if you just got done playing the first Modern Warfare you will understand a majority of it, but it feels like it could of been made a little better.
before you read any further, I am about to spoil the game for you majorly, so if you dont want it to be spoiled, I loved the game, but I consider it a rent just like MW1, dont read any further if you dont want to be spoiled.........
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Did Mike leave? good, I hate that guy........
You play the game through a multitude of perspectives, from Privates in the United States Army, to members of a Task Force grouped numbered 141, while its not like the first one had the same set-up, there is just too many characters in this one. the worst part?
SERIOUSLY, major spoilers people...........
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its almost needed because almost everyone you play as, dies. Thats right, and it sucks. after the third person died I just felt like it was dragging it on, even the final fight scene made me feel like it was just trying to drag things along hoping to squeeze more minutes of gameplay out, it is well done though Ill admit.
The first moment I stopped and thought was the infamous Airport level that people have, or haven't, been talking about, when the scene starts you see a crowd of people in front of you unknowing that there are four armed men behind them, as multiple people turn and see your group, as do they all, and for a moment I really didn't want to do it. Call me weak, but for the first time in a video game I really didn't want to pull the trigger. I saw the crowd, full of men and women who were just waiting in line to possibly go on holiday somewhere, with of course the security guards manning the metal detectors, then what I dreaded the most, we open fired on them, unarmed civilians.
now I play violent video games, hell, in GTA III I was running over everyone I saw with a tank with no regard for life at all, if you were in my way, you died, but here...... I cant really explain it, I just didnt want to kill these people, I even felt sad for the few security officers that were gunned down while trying to protect the civilians, partly because I am too a Security Officer, and if put in the same situation I would do the same as they were. The most nauseating part was re-walking over the carnage and gore from the few minutes past, only to take on more heavily armed opponents, but that scene will stick with me for a while longer than anything else in this game.
I wont spoil too much for those of you who haven't played through the story yet, but that mission is what sets the rest of the game into motion.
overall the story was really well told, though some parts could of used some work, but only in the lack of information it gave you.
Armory
The weapons available in Single Player are numerous, ranging from a Model 1887 shotgun, to some really obscure ones such as the Vector SMG, which I felt was a little overwhelming.
hear me out on this, its great you have a lot of weapons for us to choose from, but some just feel out of place, for example MP5k, basically a MP5 without a stock, just feels......wrong, compared to the other weapons in its class. I applaud Infinity Ward for trying to expand the selection, but really it feels like you already know which guns are the best.
Also, who's bright idea was it to give the Light Fifty immediately? compared to the other rifles in its grouping its more than powerful with a generous degree of accuracy and penetration, so why is the m21 EBR unlocked at a higher rank?
supplementing your cache of weapons of minimum destruction are equally varied sectional weapons, such as stinger missiles, Javelin rocket systems, automated turrets, just about everything for the future army to waste millions on. while having these part in a game where you need to use weapon A to destroy X amount of enemies B can sometimes ruin it, its almost the opposite in this, I actually wanted to use another Jav. Rocket on regular people, but in all there's about two to three sections dedicated to this.
I have yet to try out the Special-Ops mode, so I wont review it, I might add it in later as an edit.
in all, single player for me would earn a 8/10 should I ever decide to go stupid and use a numeral rating system. The story actually made me feel emotions other than rage which is a first in a while, so instant good points, however with as many plot twists that it springs on you, you would be inclined to think Infinity Ward hired M. Night Shamalayn as it story director suddenly takes some of those points away.
though I did like the part in space where he astronaut dies, that was a first............
Multiplayer
ahh yes, the part you probably skipped straight to. Wanting to see if I stand by my previous assumptions that the multiplayer isnt ruined? no
simply no, its not ruined, in fact Im starting to think I enjoy it more than the first modern Warfare, heres why.
the multiplayer is almost identical to the first Modern Warfare, just add a few more items and play methods, I had to perk an eyebrow when I saw the Callsign and Icon menu, yes when you level up and preform special actions in the game you can unlock more icons and call signs, for example, using the Copy Cat death streak perk, which allows you to take your killers load out, and kill your killer while you have his load out, you earn the Indentity Thief callsign along with the death streak icon. which considering how there is at least 70 levels, you can expect atleast something for every level up.
one thing I have to complain about is that you cannot get any challenges done until you're over level 5, for a while I was wondering if I was indeed getting any kills with my rifles to unlock its additions. but I guess its one way to make sure people play a few matches before finding easy ways to boost up to the highest level.
for the levels themselves, I have yet to play them all, but with the games being 9v9, you feel claustrophobic in some, often spawning in front of waiting enemies. This was one of my main complaints about the first Modern Warfare game, and it seems to continue in fashion.
as for death streaks, some said it would ruin the game, but in fact it kinda adds to it along with some of the other xp gaining techniques that are at your disposal, for instance lets say you just keep getting the short straw when it comes to spawn locations, it isnt fun waiting out 30-40 seconds so that you can finally get a spawn that doesn't have anyone near it, but with the pain killer death streak you get an extra boost of health, much like a weaker version of spawn shield, when you come back.
before you complain also about martyrdom, it too is a death streak now, which is a high level unlock.
as for XP generation it is fairly simple with a few interesting additions, for example killing someone who only needs one kill for a kill streak item [modern warfare's helicopter anyone?] will grant you an extra 200 or so xp, getting vengence for you or a team mate will give you anywhere between 50-150 extra xp. Are you a sniper? get kills for long distances, one shot kills and headshots and you get boosts to your xp.
now for what caused all the controversy for Modern Warfare 2, the lack of dedicated servers and lag, playing on a console I can tell you I had neither. the only noticeable lag I got out of over a days worth of game time, and numerous matches, was in four games, and these were types I didnt really play that often, like third person team deathmatch, which is interesting by the way, really awkward too. AS for the host migration, it happened so rarely when I was playing that at first I doubted it even happened at all, but it does and it is frustrating about to pull off a kick ass sniper kill only for the host to leave with a game experience breaking delay.
One thing I can agree on though is some of the kill streak items, most notably the Predator AGM, controlled by the player this little missile can ruin your teams score in an instant, and its a major rub in the face when you're the only one killed from it, dont believe the user, you do have to aim it.
another gripe is some of the weapon unlockables, example is the FMJ addition for guns, essentially, deep impact. but one I love most of all is the tactical knife for the pistols, already having your knife in stabbing position makes for some awesome kills
one last gripe about multiplayer is the cage fights, in the words of the great thunder dome, two men enter, one man leaves, or that would be the case would it be not perfect to boost your levels up much like the first Modern Warfare, yet again.
Overall, the Multiplayer has one or two bugs that are noticeable, but tries to help out lower level players possibly to the much hatred of the higher ups, and though you probably know what weapons you will want to use, the shear number of attachments and perks can make each class different in many ways.
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oh, and the shotguns can have silencers, dear game developers, unless its shooting a slug IT WONT WORK RIGHT, PLEASE STOP GIVING YOUNG KIDS FALSE HOPES.