12/05/05 >> Call of Duty 2 (Xbox 360)
Genre: First-person Shooter/WWII
If you ask a history buff, what is the most popular war? Nine times out of ten, that person will say, World War II. No other war in history has been as profitable as this war. From movies to games to HBO specials, and even to games, there is no doubt that this war has been very good for some people. Finally, this war gets good for home console gamers. Call of Duty 2, sequel to last years Call of Duty, is not only the best Xbox 360 launch game, but the best World War II FPS game that I have ever played, and I have played a lot.
The story of this game has you following multiple characters across multiple theaters of war. There really isn't much to elaborate on here. You are a certain character based on what mission you are on, and you do what you are told. You are in a certain war torn country, whether it be Russia, somewhere in Northern Africa or Europe, more specifically France. Unlike other games, Medal of Honor, the only story here is the Allied troops beating the Axis forces across the WWII time line.
This game’s graphics are gorgeous. When I say that, I mean that this is the best looking console game that I have ever seen, and it's easily the best looking Xbox 360 game out so far. The environments that you fight in are huge, and very well detailed, from bombed out cities to rural farmhouses, the war hits home everywhere. The character models are big and very well detailed. The first time that I loaded the game up and saw one of the characters, I was taken back by how huge they looked. After the initial surprise settled, I realized that they weren't huge, they were made up of a lot more polygons than ever seen before, and that is what made them seem big. This game even looked good on my 10 year old mono TV! So those worried about not getting the full effect of the graphics on old TV's need not worry. This game will look good anywhere. The smoke in this game, whether it be from a smoke grenade or the dust after a tank has blown an eight foot hole through a wall, is life like. Another aspect of this game that I liked are the Military Channel black and white footage that intros each new level. It gives an authentic feel to the game, and makes the missions that much more intense.
Game play has also been brought into the next generation, as there is a huge variety of it here. The game gives you control of different characters, about 4. The characters that you play as are determined by where you are. For instance you play as the Russian when you are trying to get the Germans out of Russia. There are also different locales that the player will visit, Russia, Northern Africa and, of course, Normandy, France. The missions in this game are as varied as the characters and the locales that you will visit. The missions range from freeing towns, and clearing out buildings that are beneficial to the Allied forces, holding strategic strong points that can be used as staging grounds for Allied advances further into Europe, demolishing buildings that are being used as Field HQ's for German troops, and even some missions where you drive vehicle's, including tanks! Of course, one of the main missions of the game doesn't happen until late in the game. I am talking about storming Normandy, France. Now, Infinity Ward could have done the same beach head landing that has been done time and time again, but they didn't. They took it another way. They followed a troop of Allied soldiers onto the beaches of Normandy, and had you climb a rope to the top of a hill and take out German nests along the way to clear the main beach head landing for all the other troops.
Another great thing that I liked about this game was the scripted areas. When leaving your boat to get onto the beach, you have a close call with heavy artillery, and you are lying on the ground facing the sky. You can't move, and a medic comes over to check you out. I thought that was great! Yet another scripted event was when you are actually climbing the rope to get to the top of the hill, you see other soldiers falling off, and one falling soldier hits another soldier climbing the rope. These are just little things to help the player get into the game, and actually realize that this isn't just a mission in a game, but something more. It goes a long way to draw the player into the game. This game never leaves a player alone, as you are storming a foreign land and shouldn't be left alone! There are always Allied troops backing you up. It is rare, when you look around and don't see one of your comrades.
I don't have a lot of negative things to say about this game, but there are a few things that I can elaborate on. First is the enemy AI. These people, while they will take cover; don't have a sense of self-preservation. They will jump out from cover, while bullets are flying, to shoot at you. Another point about the enemies that I didn't like was just how accurate they were. When they jump out from cover, they don't even need to aim their guns; they can just shoot from the hip. The Allied AI suffered too, as you don't really work together other than the scripted events. They get in your way too often, and most of the time they get in your way is when you are trying to run from a grenade that was just thrown. That got annoying.
These little problems don't inhibit the fun factor that this game brings to the Xbox 360 launch. This is the best looking, best playing 360 launch title. As I said, if you own an Xbox 360, you should own this game.
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Game Score: 9.0
Reviewed By: Staff
