Modern Warfare 2: The good, the bad and the lost – Multiplayer Review

Written by Scott Sunday, 15 November 2009 17:24

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Call of Duty 4 will go down in history as one of the all-time greatest multiplayer FPS games. And rightly so – it featured an accessible format to the less “hardcore” player yet and brilliantly balanced perk system that was hard to master. Could Infinity Ward improve on the format for the sequel? I for one had my doubts but seeing as you could rationalise what made COD4 great, and what makes other shooters infuriating, it should be possible – at least in theory.

I will begin with what is undoubtedly the largest part of any MP game – the maps themselves. With COD4, Infinity Ward did the seemingly impossible of taking geometry and sometimes full environments out of the single-player campaign and create not just fun maps, but very balanced ones too. Take for example Crash, one of the most popular arenas. It was on the medium size scale of things and featured the quintessential focus point – the downed helicopter. Of course there were back-routes and different firing platforms but they didn’t flood the map – there were a very limited number of entries to any single point of the map which allows the player to slow down, feel a bit more comfortable and more-over: enjoy the game. This style was echoed throughout the rest of the maps, with the possible exception of Countdown, which appeared to have been chosen by a 5 year old who likes big holes.

This brings me to Modern Warfare 2’s selection. Off the bat you can see a fairly drastic increase in size, which is unlike any of the other Infinity-Ward games and feel like Treyarch’s Call of Duty 3, which was panned by many COD faithfuls. Size in itself needn’t be a problem of course, as many of the larger maps on Modern Warfare 2 brought with it some great matches; overgrown and pipeline spring to mind, but I’m afraid to say these just don’t work well. Afghan is the biggest culprit in my view, as it tries to introduce sniping positions yet gives the opposition many ways to get around the back and give them a shotgun in the back. Any position is virtually impossible to defend without a majority of your team. This is made even worse given that you only get one Claymore, when you actually unlock the Equipment. They aren’t the worst maps I’ve ever seen, by a long shot, but from an Infinity Ward I was expecting much more. The ones to look out for, in my opinion, are Derail, Quarry and Favela. They offer different challenges yet are all good fun. 

The weapons list is extensive and there is an obvious feeling that IW wants people to stick to the Assault Rifle, since there are more of them. This brings me on to balance, specifically of the ARs – the rifles appear to have been increased in potency with regards to bullet damage, accuracy and the lack of the gun when you are looking down the sights. This makes the guns dominate almost any map in the game. It is relatively easy, even on the largest maps, to go head-to-head with a sniper and beat him. Intra-class, the guns appear to be more balanced as the M16A4 and FAMAS 3-burst rifles only have an advantage at longer ranges whilst the M4A1 and SCAR-H are better suited to shorter ranges. This should be obvious since IW appear to have made a conscious effort to make the ARs all that anyone uses. The Sub Machine Guns have been trimmed right back – the MP5K, the slimmed down version of the MP5N in Call of Duty 4 is far less potent and the P90 doesn’t pack the punch it once did.

The Sniper Rifles have their uses, yet again, but with a much different feeling. You wont get many players running around with them since they’ll be easily mowed down by the typical SCAR user but if you can find yourself a useful position (which, it has to be said is not easy given the map design explained above) and if you have unlocked the Thermal Scope you will simply pick the opponents off. This scope is very useful on Wasteland and Underpass where the lower light and green backdrop makes it harder to pick out targets. I might go so far to say the Thermal Scope makes the Sniper too powerful, but I am enjoying them a lot so I won’t say too much.

The innovative perk system from COD4 has obviously been brought forward and has increased in depth by a large factor. Now you have regular Perks and “Pro” perks which are unlocked after completing certain aspects with the regulars. The ubiquitous Stopping Power and Steady Aim return along with some other more interesting ones, such as Commando which increases melee range. This is a favourite of mine, actually – especially on the city maps. So far I haven’t found any that stand out as unbalanced but I do feel that everyone will be using Bling (use multiple weapon attachments on a single gun) when they unlock it, despite Sleight of Hand being very useful.

I have left the worst to last, however. Killstreak awards were initially a neat way of rewarding the more careful (read: camping) players for their hard work. It was fairly well balanced in Modern Warfare, with only a couple of maps making the awards useless or downright silly (Air Strike on a ship?!).  Now however, they totally dominate the match, which doesn't make any sense. As you level up you can unlock more awards for pre-defined kill numbers. These range from the mundane UAV/Counter-UAV up to an AC130 attack plane or even a Tactical Nuke. Of course these extreme ones require a lot of kills (the latter two requiring 11 kills and 25 kills respectively) but if a camper gets into a good spot he will quite easily rack up the 7-11 kills necessary for the bigger rewards. And these will compound so the same person can have a Support Harrier aircraft and a Pave Low attack helicopter on the map at once, completely decimating the other team. I am not saying a good player shouldn't be rewarded, but this is taking the piss. I have a number of friends who I like to play Call of Duty with and many of them just quit games after someone got the bigger kill-streak awards because they knew that was basically game over, especially given the open nature of the maps. I can sympathise. I hope IW makes some changes to these in the future or a lot of players will be reverting back to COD4, not just infuriated PC gamers.

So Modern Warfare 2; with it, Infinity Ward has shown that they care more about the mainstream than the lover of FPS online gaming with their decisions. The above changes make it easier for the casual AR-fed grunt to run around and get big scores and K/D ratios whilst at the same time causing the people who like to play the games a bit differently a big headache. It is definitely a polished game, but the person getting the shiny reward isn’t the Call of Duty fan.