GamerNode: Reviews - Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare

• Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare...
• PC
• Infinity Ward
• Activision
• November 05th, 2007

When a series constantly churns out yearly installments, I feel like wading through a movie bargain-bin at a store since all of these games tend to accumulate quickly. But for a series like Call of Duty, each passing year tends to add another award to the mantle. It's arguable that the series hit a minor bump with Call of Duty 3, but Infinity Ward certainly raised the bar again for FPS games with Call of Duty 4. Move over beach landings, a jump to modern warfare is what the Call of Duty series needed to get a boost.

The plot switches between two main characters; Sergeant Soap MacTavish, a member of the British 22 SAS Regiment and Sergeant Paul Jackson, a U.S. Marine. Moving away from the World War II theme, CoD 4 focuses on modern warfare. You'll immediately notice the move with the introduction of new modern weapons and technology. Such showcased weapons and attachments include grenade launchers, FGM-148 Javelin anti-tank cannons and night vision goggles.

In the first level aboard a cargo ship during a torrent rainstorm, one thing you'll quickly notice is the amount of hand signals, squad communication and cohesiveness used in Call of Duty 4. Since it's in the middle of the night, your squad utilizes stealth tactics to sneak through. But once you see your squad in action, you'll be totally sucked into the atmosphere. Your squad will constantly chirp with intel, 'check your left, check your right', 'check', 'Gaz, move to your right' and it's things like this that made the game very enjoyable.

With a spiffy propriety graphics engine, Call of Duty 4 looks mighty fine. Speaking about the first level again, while traversing the deck of the ship through the lightning storm, each lightning bolt illuminated the shadows of everything on deck in real-time. Since you're on a ship, you'll also constantly be rocking back and forth and the shadows will move with the ship in real-time. Visual flairs such as depth of field, bloom, glow effects, bullet penetration and awesome death animations are all included in the package.

Infinity Ward also finally added physics for in-game objects, in some form. While physics have been an FPS stable for years, the concept was something the CoD series seemed to lack for the most part. Even in CoD 4's case, it's still in a basic form. For example, grenades will fling boxes and corpses around but you can't move a box if you bump into it. People also tend to clip through random objects.

Multiplayer is (as you may know) a hoot as well. Thanks to the experience gaining system, you won't feel just like another soldier in the field. Instead, you have something to strive for: more weapons, more classes, ability to create your own classes, more perks, etc. It's also very approachable, meaning gaining the first few ranks are easier so newer players won't feel alienated from the veterans -- after just an hour and a half of playing, I reached rank 7. With over 10 game modes, loads of servers and thousands of players floating around, CoD 4's multiplayer will be here for a while.

That being said, there were some odd inconsistencies in the game. For example: floating corpses in mid-air, people clipping and running right through people, and AI bunching up at times. The gameplay can also get down-right difficult at times, thanks to checkpoint saves. Other than these minor problems though, the game is pretty spotless.

All in all, Call of Duty 4 has everything an FPS gamer will enjoy: awesome presentation, fast and furious action, and awesome visuals. Sure, the single-player campaign is short, but it's very, very sweet. Despite that, thanks to the multiplayer Call of Duty 4 has plenty of longevity in the FPS game world, and gamers will surely have something to talk about for quite a while.

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