Call of Duty 2

"A most own game for first person shooter fans and history buffs!"

Call Of Duty 2 is a masterpiece, and I personally think it is the best WWII game in existence. This is a game that any first person shooter fan or history buff should own. Read on to find out why I think so highly of this game.

Story: The story is, of course, based on WWII. You start the game as a Russian soldier in training who soon finds himself in the middle of a battle to defend his ground against invading Nazis. Eventually you will fight as a British soldier, and then American. During the entire game you will switch between these three soldiers. Between each mission there are short clips about WWII from the History Channel, watching these will teach you more about the battles.

Gameplay: The gameplay of this game is fantastic. You have a wide array of weapons at your disposal, such as the Thompson, MP44, and MP40 to name a few, and they are very fun to use. Sometimes when you shoot a Nazi, he won't die right away but will draw a Luger (pistol) while on the ground and make a last attempt to kill you and your fellow soldiers. It's things like that that really add to the intensity of a battle. The only melee attack in this game is bashing your gun into someone, not particularly entertaining, but effective nonetheless.One other thing you can do later is fight in a tank as the British. Tank battles are intense and very fun, and filled with many explosions.

My favorite level in this game is D-Day. That is on of the most intense battles in the entire game. While on the shores on the D-Day level, you can shoot up a cliff at Nazis, and often they will fall down off the cliff to a quick death.

While this game may be very entertaining, you have to keep in mind the fact that many soldiers really went through these gut-wrenching battles, and with far more horror than can ever be portrayed in a game. In playing this game, try to honor the memory of those soldiers and what they did. Try taking this game as a sort of history lesson.

Graphics/Character Animations: This game has amazing graphics for the time it was made (2005). The faces of the models look very detailed, and their animations are smooth. The gun animations are very smooth and detailed as well. The scenery in this game is good, but some of it could have looked a little bit better.

Sound: Phenomenal sound effects. Great sounds from the guns and the explosions. But the main highlight of the sound is this game is the superb voice acting. During battle soldiers will talk back and forth very often, and with about 20,000 speaking lines, dialogue is rarely repeated.Controls: The keyboard controls are some of the best I have seen in PC first person shooter games. I have absolutely no problem with the controls.

Stability: This game has never crashed on me, but I have encountered a few glitches in all of the time I have played. Nothing really worth mentioning though.

Multi-player: The multi-player is pretty basic, but it is a load of fun. There are different online modes such as TDM, DM, and CTF (team death match, death match, and capture the flag). The most common of these is TDM. There is an option for server to enable voice chatting, but on the servers that have it enabled, no one uses it.One really cool thing in the multi-player that some servers have, is called "Killcam". The Killcam shows you how your enemy killed you from their perspective after you die.

Appropriateness: If appropriateness is an issue with you, or if you have a child and are trying to decide whether or not to let them play this game, take the following into consideration:

There is blood, though, it's only a light mist and it quickly disappears. There is a lot of swearing, though nothing beyond what you would hear on television (the worst word is the "B" word). And there is a lot of painful screaming from soldiers being killed on the battlefield.

There are no swear blockers in the on-line mode, and because of this I have encountered nearly every swear word imaginable.

Also, some servers are modded and automatically install a mod to your game when you join. Some of these mods will either increase the blood of the game drastically, or add a ton of gore and decapitations to the game. But these modded servers can be filtered out when searching for servers.

Replay Value: Once you beat the game, there is nothing to unlock and no extras. But it is so fun that you won't care about that. There are 4 difficulty modes: Easy, Regular, Hardened, and Veteran. I have beaten the game on every difficulty level and it is still extremely fun to play.

Conclusion: This game does well to portray some of the horrors of war that the soldiers faced fighting against the Nazis in World War Two. This game is too good for first person shooter fans and history buffs to pass up. I have enjoyed it very much and will continue to do so. I consider this game to be a masterpiece.

My score: 9.5.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 03/21/08

Game Release: Call of Duty 2 (US, 10/25/05)