Call of Duty: World at War

Posted 4 years ago By

Last year, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare was a hit with fans because of its present day contemporary setting. This year, Call of Duty returns to World War II setting but takes us to the pacific front. Fans couldn’t help but be skeptical admittedly, many first person shooters like this period in history, specifically every Call of Duty before Modern Warfare. Whether you’re a fan of the single-player campaign or the addictive multiplayer, you can’t deny that Activision has found a working formula with the CoD games. Here we take a look at the latest addition to the first person shooter, Call of Duty: World at War.


Gameplay

If you’ve played Call of Duty before, this game will be no different. The mechanics and addictive multiplayer system hasn’t changed since Modern Warfare. Call of Duty does a great job providing what fans want, fast-paced action and excitement that doesn’t deviate too far from past games. This isn’t a bad thing but it isn’t a great thing either.

Just like in Modern Warfare, the campaign in World at War splits it’s time between two soldiers in two separate theaters: the American struggle as they island hop around the Pacific against the Japanese and the Russian struggle to push the invading German army from their homeland and back into Berlin. The tone this time around deserves mentioning because it’s rare that a video game can illicit such raw emotion during a game. As you advance, the game eventually resonates to one of triumph, but it’s hard to forget those beginning moments. Throughout the game, use of actual World War II videos, photos and statistics presented as cut scenes between chapters further enforce the game’s overall spirited but grim feel.

Call of Duty doesn’t make any assumptions and careful scripts a tutorial to help those who are new to the franchise. At first, I thought die hard fans would quickly bore of the tutorial, but I quickly discovered that the tutorial also served the purpose of familiarizing us with our new adversary. Unlike in Modern Warfare, the first few levels you will be scraping for survival to try and gain a foothold over your enemy. There is no “training” to prepare you for war, especially on the Pacific and Eastern Front. You’ll be accompanied by a superior officer who helps drive the excitement and adrenaline to provide an exhilarating thrill ride.

Added to the campaign mode this time around is the multiplayer campaign. World at War offers players both two-player split-screen and four-player online cooperative campaign play but the co-op campaign is the same as the single-player experience. The only difference is that the number of enemies increases for each additional player that joins you online. The nice part about this is the competitive scoring, which can be turned on to see who can earn the most points by killing enemies. This also helps add some fun to the game’s campaign while lightening the gritty mood that the game invokes. There are also special death cards within each level and collecting these will let you mix things up a bit in cooperative play. I was really glad to see the developer’s add more than just the option for cooperative play, and it has helped give us a well rounded co-op campaign that made me wonder why I even bothered with the single-player mode.


World at War includes the same Multiplayer seen in Modern Warfare that let players rank up based on the experience points obtained during a match. As you rank up, you obtain access to newer weapons, accessories, challenges and perks. This gives players the ability to customize their online play to their own play-style. The only downside here is World at War offers ten slots for you to customize but only five are truly available unless you enjoy the Prestige process. This can be a little limiting for those who dislike that process, not everyone wants to restart over and over again just to gain those five save slots. I just don’t see much incentive towards it, either let me have all ten slots. It’s frustrating to sit there looking at them taunting me.

While the multiplayer experience hasn’t been updated a whole lot, I did like what the New Xbox Live Experience brought to the game. Players in the same party can hear each other, but not other players – even if they’re on the same team. So the days of derogatory remarks because I was a girl playing Call of Duty are gone! Hallelujah! While I reveled in the banter of the wittiest of players who would partake in this ritual, I am glad to see it come to an end. This is a welcome change for parent’s with small children in the background, or parents who let their younger children play (I do know an eight year old who can kick your butt on CoD). It doesn’t mean they aren’t sitting there taunting me, but I and other’s must choose to hear it by going into the chat channels and actively selecting the World at War Chat.

Almost all of the modes seen in Modern Warfare’s multiplayer remains the same. Of the new maps, I really liked the inclusion of tanks (on some maps). While they may seem over-powered – they are limited in speed and maneuverability. Anyone who can perform a headshot or toss a grenade can take one of these behemoths out – overall it’s just a nice way to mix things up without making things too overpowered. The newest mode is a cooperative game called Nazi Zombies and it becomes available after beating the campaign (or by joining someone who has). This may sound out of place in World at War, but so far it’s one of my favorites. Up to four players are dropped into a house that is barricaded. From there, zombies break away the barricades as they try to get at you and your party. Points are then awarded for kills made by your team, the highest points going to those killed once they’ve entered the house. Players can then repair the barricades and revive any fallen compatriots, as the next wave prepares for it’s assault on the house. Each wave brings faster, tougher zombies in greater numbers. The points awarded allow you to buy new guns (available along the walls) and unlock new areas of the house, but by opening more doors, you are also providing more entry-points for the zombies as well. Not being a fan of survival horror myself, I found the game intense and fun.

The main disappointment I had with the multiplayer is the lack of strict entry levels for those new to first person shooters. I recall a boot-camp area on Halo 3 and once players hit a specific level, they couldn’t participate anymore. They couldn’t team with friends who were higher up to ensure victory either. When I saw the Boot Camp game on Call of Duty, I was excited because it stated that the game would lock you out after level eight. This was great news to newbie’s, but that excitement quickly deflated when I entered the room as a level 2 to find myself up against a level 55 (who joined by piggy-backing off a lower level friend). Also, I get annoyed fast at people who cheat and there’s lots of exploits taking place that allow players to drop below maps and shoot you from below. When confronted (after reporting them) they tried to explain that it wasn’t a cheat if everyone knew about it, but this obviously wasn’t the case if they were the only ones exploiting the maps. Hopefully this will be fixed as soon as possible. There’s nothing more frustrating than seeing your “Kill cam” from below the map and knowing you cannot avenge yourself. Another unfortunate issue is that the lag seen in Modern Warfare has returned but as the weeks pass, this nuisance will sure go away, at  least we hope.

Graphics & Sound

The graphics haven’t changed from Modern Warfare to World at War. It’s not a bad thing but I was kind of expecting more than just a cut and paste. The biggest difference you’ll notice is in the maps provided, the shading makes it easy for people to hide in buildings but those with a good eye for detail will find themselves quickly excelling. The best new weapon available is the brilliantly designed and animated flamethrower. I’m not sure why we didn’t have this in Modern Warfare, the way the flames erupt from this weapon just makes the kill all that more satisfying (even if it does seem a little over-powered). The menu’s are clean and crisp, but there’s no real deviation from Modern Warfare here.


While the visuals don’t really stand out here, the voice acting and sound effects are amazing. Part of what helps set this game’s tone is the audio, the screams you hear when you kill someone, a tank rumbling within earshot, echoes of shots ringing out across the valley – all of these bring the horrors of war in perfect stereo. It’s the game’s truly awesome sound effects make each battle you enter feel real and truly engaging. The voice acting is phenomenal; you can’t miss Keifer Sutherland’s voice as he opens up the game’s story for the American side and Gary Oldman for the Russian. I almost didn’t recognize Oldman, his Russian accent is dead on but I had to look up to see why this voice seemed so familiar. Both give outstanding performances and I hope they do more voice work in games.

Value

If you enjoyed Modern Warfare, there isn’t much that you won’t like in World at War. Treyarch did a fantastic job of taking the franchise and making small improvements that was needed within the game. If nothing else, the Nazi Zombie mode is so much fun; you won’t find yourself boring of it very quickly.

Conclusion

I always felt that Modern Warfare isolate players with its lack of cooperative play and I am glad to see it get such great care here. If you were expecting a different game than what you are used to with the Call of Duty franchise, you might be disappointed with World at War, that being said, World at War does a fantastic job bringing us back to the World War II front into a period of history that get’s very little attention.

Verdict: This new addition to the Call of Duty franchise demands your attention; especially if you are a fan of the franchise. This is a definite buy for any first person shooter fan. The zombie mode alone is worth the price of admission.

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