Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360) Review
In case you were wondering, this review is completely spoiler free.
It has finally arrived ladies and gentlemen, Infinity Wards’ Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 has been released to the public. It’s safe to say that this is one of the most anticipated titles this year for nearly every platform – well, maybe not so much PC gamers as we know how they’ve been treated with the lack of dedicated servers and such. As with any true sequel to easily one of the best games this generation [Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare] there are some damn high hopes for it to succeed in every way possible – whether or not it actually does is a completely different matter though. You’ll have to read on to find out!
So where do we start? Ah yes, the single player – don’t worry, we’ll get to the multiplayer eventually as I know that is what you’re waiting to hear about. Once again, the story follows 3 different people; Sergeant Gary “Roach” Sanderson of the multinational commando unit Task Force 141, Private First Class Joseph Allen of the U.S. Army Rangers, Private James Ramirez of the 1st Battalion 75th Ranger Regiment & one final character that make surprise reappearance in the game. Throughout the game you jump between the 4 characters, following various different story lines and locations, which can be quite complicated to follow if you don’t pay attention.
The main story line for Modern Warfare 2 continues on from Call of Duty 4, still trying to bring down that bastard Zakhaev is any way possible. As well as his lieutenant Makarov, who is on a rampage of terrorist attacks across Europe, one of which you play and has been incredible controversial and has picked up a lot of press about how it “lets you play as a terrorist” – yeah, right. If you’re reading this and haven’t played the single player yet, I advise you to actually play the level as it isn’t as bad as people say it is, no-one is making you shoot the civilians, and it can help clear up parts of the story also. Plus, it is just a game for fuck sake.
One of the best parts about the single player is it is easily better than Call of Duty 4’s, the missions vary quite often from sniping/stealthy missions to full on hectic-warfare. When playing the game, it feels more like you’re in a 007 James Bond film because of the things which happen during the story line, plenty of plot twists and things which you wouldn’t expect to happen in a million years.
When screenshots, video’s and trailers were released for the game when it was nearing its release date, a small minority of people started to complain about the games graphics and how it apparently looks ‘outdated’, these people are morons. Modern Warfare 2 is a great looking game in its own rights, it’s very well polished and the games audio is brilliant – minus the sound of a few guns which can sound a bit like something being rattled around inside a tin can. If you do have a 5.1 setup, it’s a sin to not use it with this game, when in the heat of battle you’ll love hearing the bullets flying past your head in all its glory.
If you’re planning on buying this game for the single player alone, I heavily advise you to stay clear of this as if it were the black plague, although the black plague would last longer. When exploring the campaign menu you can access a ‘stats’ option, in it is tells you how long you’ve played the single player/multiplayer etc. And well, when I finished the single player on normal difficulty, it only took me 4 hours and 17 minutes – that is including watching every cut scene and taking my time finding intel (collectables) too. If you’re looking for a challenge too, this is hardly the game, the ‘Veteran’ difficulty which has been equivalent to climbing Mount Everest in previous titles, it is fairly easy now – even possible by the most common of gamers. They’ll just most likely end up seeing the damage indicator a fair bit though, on another note though: when you get shot, why the fuck does red water be thrown over your screen? It is just a nuisance, the screen fading to red in the past 5 titles was better by miles.
Unfortunately the game doesn’t support a co-op story like World at War did, instead it has its own separate new game mode called Spec-ops which is different specific scenarios which the mission you select puts you in ranging from eliminate a certain amount of enemies, retrieve and evac with some intel or reach a certain objective. Overall, spec-ops is one fantastic game with its 5 stages of difficulty (alpha-echo), if you’re a bit of a completionist/perfectionist, the game does have a star rating system for each mission (3 stars is the maximum) and some are damn hard to get.
I’ll let you in on a little secret of mine, I was an absolute fiend for Call of Duty 4’s multiplayer, having nearly 20 days worth of playtime online and finishing every challenge. So as you can imagine, I had incredibly high hopes for Modern Warfare 2’s multiplayer, thinking “they surely can mess it up that much, can they?” although it seems that they definitely had a shot at it. There are a lot of varying opinions on the multiplayer, some love it, and some hate it. You can tell from just playing the first match online that the game didn’t have any form of beta to balance out the maps/weapons.
It is incredibly to see the amount of customization that Infinity Ward have stuffed into the games multiplayer, it still has about the same amount of weapons as Call of Duty 4 but the amount of attachments that are available for each gun is astonishing. You’re able to use good ol’ fashioned Red dot and acog sights, as well as fancy new thermal scopes – if submachine guns are your thing, you can dual wield those bad boys. All of which are (fairly) easily unlocked through the in-game challenges, and there are insane amounts this time round, nearly 5-6 for each weapon as well as the basic training, humiliation, pretty much the same challenges from the previous 2 titles.
Final Thoughts
It seems that once again that a game hasn’t been able to live up to the hype that has surrounded it. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is a fantastic game, but it still isn’t as good as its previous title in the series Call of Duty 4 which [for multiplayer] is one of the best games this generation. The single player with its constant twists turns and epic situations it puts you in are incredibly well done – even though it does only last 4-5 hours, and the same goes for the new spec-ops game mode. It’s a massive shame that the multiplayer is such a letdown with how incredibly unbalanced and frustrating it is to compete in.
User Score:
1 vote
1 vote
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News
02 Mar 2010, 3:47 pm
[...] but until then be satisfied with the legions of sites heralding this a mediocre single player but Modern Warfare 2 beating multiplayer event! Check our review of the first game here and get ready for the [...]
30 Mar 2010, 3:59 pm
[...] seem to be dropping them regularly and the actually WORK unlike the £11 ones from Infinity Ward for Modern Warfare 2. The pack will be headed to Xbox 360 and PS3 real soon so get ready for yet more [...]