Call of Duty: Black Ops - The Review

Due to unemployment (I now have a job) I had to put off playing the newest entry in the Call of Duty franchise. Thanks to a friend gifting me the game on Steam I was finally able to play Black Ops.

The middle of last year when Black Ops was announced I was really excited to play it. I came away from Modern Warfare 2 with a bad taste in the my mouth. I think Infinity Ward really dropped the ball on that one and I was hoping Treyarch could right the wrongs that were done in MW2.

I'm going to skip all the stuff every Call of Duty games has, if you're reading this then I'm going to assume you know the series and what it's all about but I will sum it up. You go to war, shoot dudes and then you save the day and that's about it.

Black Ops takes place in the 1960s a time frame not really explored by FPS games or really game in general. You play Alex Mason a super secret black op soldier who does all the dirty work the US government doesn't want people to know is going down. The game starts out during the Bay of Pigs invasion you and you're group are sent in to kill Castro, that goes sideways and then it's full throttle for the rest of the game.

Two things I think Black Ops gets right are the story and the overall action of the game.

The story is really well told and the time frame is actually fresh for a war FPS game as many people haven't messed with it in the past. You start out in an interrogation chair being tortured about Alex's past. Through that series of interrogations we learn all the stuff Alex has done over the years, I liked the way it was presented it felt fresh for the series.

After Modern Warfare 2 was basically a walk through the park Black Ops tries to bring the series back to the brutal difficulty it's known for and while it's a tough game it's not as brutal as COD2 or 4. As you go through the levels the fighting feels really nice, the enemies are well placed and the levels are all pretty cool. This game does suffer from Call of Duty's version of war where you poke your head out and the entire enemy army turns on you and begins to fire, it feels really unrealistic, all the COD games do it but I think it's garbage.

As we follow Alex's missions we go to very different locations and times. As I said above you start in Cuba and eventually make your way to Vietnam and onwards. When Black Ops was first announced it was rumored it was all going to take place in Vietnam. Vietnam hasn't had a really good showing in video games with only a handful of mediocre to downright crappy games and I thought this was going to be the one to be awesome. Now the Vietnam levels are the best levels in the game with some of the most brutal things like the sneak assassination of some Vietcong soldiers. It really should of been the full focus of the game. I know the Vietnam war is a soft spot for a lot of people but I think if done right it's time for a good full on Vietnam game.

The one thing I took away from Black Ops was one of the characters, Frank Woods. Frank Woods was an awesome character and one of the most believable the series or really any game has every seen. As I was playing I felt like this was a guy I could follow into hell and no matter what we'd both make it out. James C Burns did his voice and it was an outstanding performance. I'd have to put Woods easily in my top ten list of best video game characters, no question.

Finally the multiplayer. It's Call of Duty, it's an almost exact copy of Modern Warfare 2, it seems like they shoehorned guns that aren't from that era so they could include them in the multiplayer. One gun is the Steyr AUG, the game doesn't go any later than 1968, the AUG wasn't in service until 1979. It's a nitpick but they shouldn't of had it for continuity sake but I guess I'm expecting to much from a Call of Duty game. So really, if you like the MW2 multiplayer you'll like this, if you hated the MW you'll hate this too. And as far as Zombies go I didn't really spend a lot of time with it but I liked World at Wars better and of course you have Left 4 Dead which is way better, so go with those for Zombie killing fun.

I know a lot of people don't like COD after 4 but this one is actually an decent game. It does somethings the series hasn't done before but it does keep with it's traditions. So take that into account if you decide to pick this one up.

Call of Duty: Black Ops - 7 out of 10

The Battle of the Bloom - Crysis 2: Multiplayer Demo Impressions

I have to say I was a little bitter when the Crysis 2 multiplayer demo was only released on the 360. Seeing as Crysis was a PC game to shun the audience that put your game on the map seemed like a bad move to me. Then a few weeks later the word came down that Crytek was indeed releasing the demo on the PC. On March 1st I eagerly downloaded said demo because I was excited to see what Crytek had done with the sequel to one of my favorite games.

I'd seen some video of the demo in action so I knew all about the Call of Duty revamp the Crysis multiplayer had received. Gone are the big battlefields, only to be replaced with close quarters combat and the same perk based level up system most shooters these days have.

Getting into my first match I was greeted with the absolute worst thing in this demo, the Bloom. This game is really and I mean really bright. I usually play my games with the brightness a little higher than suggested and this time I had to turn the in game brightness down to zero and it was still to bright. I blame this on Crytek's over use of bloom. Everything is so shiny, it's blinding. I'm going to take a wild guess on this and assume Crytek is using so much bloom because it's covering up some weak textures. Seeing as they need to cram this game onto the 360 the overall graphics are going to suffer and we all know the secret to covering all that up is with bloom.

The controls are not up to par either. They just feel wrong like there's a slight delay or something. It's like they were going for that "weighted" feel like Killzone 2 but in this game it just doesn't work. When you have a fast paced shooter like a COD or a Halo then you put a weighted delay on the shooting it just feels off. I tried both the mouse and keyboard and my wired 360 controller and neither of them felt right. Also with using the mouse the sensitivity wouldn't stay were I put it often resetting to some random number while I was playing. When you're playing a game and all of a sudden the mouse goes all wonky due to the sensitivity deciding on it's own to change it doesn't inspire confidence.

Everything about this demo feels wrong. It's not fun to play and it's always feels like you're fighting with the game on top of the other players. The bloom is a major problem that needs to be toned down in the final game or preferably taken out all together. The controls are garbage and need major tweaking but I don't think either of these will happen. The first Crysis was a great game with amazing graphics (Part 1 looks better than part 2) and super tight controls. I don't see how Crytek could drop the ball this hard on the sequel but it's a real shame. I know it's only a demo but a demo is suppose to help sell the final product and all playing this demo has done for me is make me not want to play Crysis 2. It took a game I was super excited for and made me not even care. Crytek may address some of my issues in the final game but I'll never know as I will never play Crysis 2. Maybe the mod scene can get their hands on this and actually make the game playable, of that we can only hope.

Call of Duty: Black Ops Multiplayer Reveal and some thoughts on the COD series as a whole.

So today we were shown the first video of the new Call of Duty game, Black Ops. Treyarch the "other" company that make COD games is up to the plate this time and well what can I say? It looks just like Modern Warfare 2 with new guns. But I have some other thoughts on this game which I will put after the video.




At first glance you'd think exactly what I said it's the same as MW2 while that's going to be true in a way I don't think Treyarch will make the same mistake Infinity Ward made with MW2. A lot of people like to show hatred for Treyarch for the mere fact they're not Infinity Ward when it comes to COD games.

Yeah COD3 wasn't the most polished game but Treyarch made it in about 8 months time. For a game with such a short development cycle they did a hell of a job and I blame the hate to the they're not Infinity Ward hate.

After that one we saw COD4 and yeah it blew the gaming world away, me included. I hadn't been into online FPS for while because I'd kind of given it up when I stopped playing Counter Strike but COD4 was like this amazing experience. I along with many others was instantly hooked. We would go on to see every aspect of the multiplayer ripped off in other online shooters which is expected but it changed the face of online multiplayer.

Then along comes Call of Duty: World at War. Another WW2 shooter, the last WW2 shooter in the COD series and it's made by Treyarch. The Campaign fantastic one of the best if not the best WW2 shooter campaigns I've ever played. Treyarch managed to show the overall brutality of the second world war in a way I don't think other games have really captured. Well this game had multiplayer and it was almost identical to COD4 except for the setting and the weapons but guess what? It played well and was a hell of a lot of fun but people hated it just because it was a COD game not by Infinity Ward. WAW also had the amazing Nazi Zombie mode, I logged so many hours playing Nazi Zombies online and by myself because it was just so much fun.

Then the super hyped Modern Warfare 2 comes along, people are crapping themselves in anticipation, the excitement is building, everyone is sure it's going to be like the second coming. I was one of these people, I couldn't wait for it. Then I played it, and let me tell you the game was crap. The campaign in COD4 had that one "Oh shit!" moment which made the whole thing have a good impact on the player but MW2 tried to cram as many, "Oh shit!" moments into that game as they could and by the end I was rolling my eyes it was kind of sad. COD games on Veteran have always been a test in skill but also patience as some parts need to be played over and over again but not MW2, it was easy way to toned down. Then the multiplayer, in one word, crap. The guns are not balanced, the maps are not good, the game is glitchy as hell and it take IW to long to fix the glitches. Where COD4 was like a drug to me I played MW2 for about a weekend and I was done. With all the IW drama that went on after the release of MW2 I wonder if they released the game buggy and broken on purpose just to shove the screw you at Activision, but who knows?

Now we have Treyarch back for another COD game, Black Ops. While it's not the fabled Vietnam game we so desperately need, well I mean a good Vietnam game it looks interesting. After WAW I firmly believe Treyarch has surpassed Infinity Ward as the premiere COD developer and I have high hopes for Black Ops. If Treyarch just takes the look of MW2 and actually balances the game maybe with a beta we could have the definitive online shooter for the next couple years.