Call of Duty 2

"Nothing like cruising over the hot sands of Africa in a brand new Crusader."

Fans of the historical first-person shooter genre will distinctly recall a certain title that was released after the Medal of Honor and Battlefield juggernauts swept across the war-torn fields of Europe 1939-1945. This title was Call of Duty, one of the best WWII games ever, and winner of practically every Game of the Year award possible. No other game could match up to its awesome soundtrack, cinematic gameplay experience and engaging multiplayer experience.

That was the challenge the developers, Infinity Ward, had to face. How does one create a sequel that is better than its predecessor? Infinity Ward had to pull some fancy tricks out, figure out holes in the original gameplay, then pack the improvements into a bigger and better game that would surpass the Call of Duty experience. The result was the long-awaited Call of Duty 2.

Call of Duty 2 follows the same template as the original game. Players are put in the shoes of Pvt. Vasili I. Koslov of the 13th Guards Rifle Division, Sgt. John Davis of the 7th Armoured, Tank Commander David Welsh of the 7th Armoured and Cpl. Bill Taylor of D Company, 2nd Rangers, shifting from one battlefield to the next as players fight the Nazi Germany war machine from the perspectives of the Russian, British and American forces.

Rather than recycle previously used missions and settings, Call of Duty 2 selects different locations of the war. The Russian campaign starts in Moscow 1941 and shifts to another aspect of Stalingrad, focusing on brutal house-to-house combat. The British campaign focuses on the North African efforts of the British against the forces of Rommel, including a mission which puts players in Crusader tank tearing across the desert to close in on German lines, and later features the British Normandy invasion effort concentrated around Caen in 1944. The American campaign also starts on D-Day 1944, but rather than a stroll on Omaha Beach, players now fight alongside the 2nd Rangers at Pointe Du Hoc, scaling the treacherous cliffs to sweep the German trenches and disable German artillery, with further missions in France and the crossing of the Rhine.

Gameplay-wise, Call of Duty 2 is essentially the same game as the original, so fans of Call of Duty will have little trouble adapting to it. In Single Player, players fight alongside numerous team mates who provide support your advance through the levels. Call of Duty 2, thanks to its new proprietary engine, features an in-depth “Battle Chatter” system. Thousands of commands and responses were recorded by the developers to provide some of the most sharp and accurate battlefield intel ever presented in a game. While not the first game to feature team mates shouting out enemy locations (Medal of Honor Pacific Assault also had this feature, albeit a poor one), Call of Duty 2's Battle Chatter is a major aid to players, as team mates are very specific and clear about enemy locations. While you are busy scanning for targets or engaging enemies, your squad members will yell things like “Machine gun, fourth floor of the red building!”, “Enemy on the first floor, left window!” and “Fascist, behind the low wall!”. The amount of chatter is not relentless enough to turn into noise, so players can keep tuned to the squad's chatter and easily locate enemies with their aid. This makes team mates more important, as they can see targets that the player can't, facilitating easier progress through the game and immersing players in a more intense combat environment, compared to the rather expendable allies in the original Call of Duty.

Gone too are solo missions. Call of Duty featured a certain mission that put the player with the task of blowing up a dam alone, reminiscent of the Medal of Honor games, which proved to be hugely unpopular. Instead, the developers have striven to include as many allies as possible during the large battlefield scenes, while thinning out the numbers in smaller areas to prevent congestion.

The shortcomings of the AI are noticeable, however. While team mates do a reasonable job of pouring out fire support, their accuracy leaves a lot to be desired and tends to leave the player doing all the killing, as usual. The AI triggers are also noticeable, as they will follow the player and advance only when the player moves past a certain point.

To facilitate a more accessible single player experience, Call of Duty 2 features a mission selection screen, which allows players to pick specific campaigns to play through under different difficulties, whereas Call of Duty levels could only be accessed through game saves. Likewise, the training mission in the game is very brief and puts players straight into the action against live enemies, doing away with the “walk around the obstacle course and shoot targets” mandatory training of Call of Duty.

The gameplay is very similar to the original game. Players use a variety of authentic WWII weapons to advance through each mission, carrying a maximum of two weapons at a time and able to swap with dropped weapons. Grenades are now thrown using a separate button, enabling players to quickly throw grenades without awkward weapon switching. Smoke grenades have been added to the game as a means of portable concealment, with some areas requiring smoke to advance past safely. The biggest change in gameplay is the revamped damage system. While similar in practice to the original game, weapons have been simplified and do similar damage and have similar handling properties, blurring the distinction between each weapon and emphasising player tactics more than skill with specific weapons. This is more evident in Multiplayer, where players can kill with a short burst with any weapon, compared to the arcade-style damage physics of Call of Duty.

Another change in the weapons is the revamped aiming system. While each gun retains its iron sights, the sights have been greatly enlarged in Call of Duty 2, making it far easier to rely on the iron sights than the original game. The Lee-Enfield rifle, for example, now has prominent aiming pins instead of the short stumps of the original game. Snipers are also able to hold their breath temporarily to achieve perfect aim while using scoped weapons. Several weapons have also been introduced into the game, including the Grease Gun and the PPS-42, alongside the more common WWII rifles, submachine guns and machine guns.

One of the more noticeable tweaks is the modified Health system. Unlike most other games, Call of Duty 2 drops the health bar system and instead adopts a regenerating health system, much like Halo's shields. In both Single and Multiplayer, players can shrug off light wounds, but when sustaining too much damage in a short period of time, the player goes “critical”, with an increase in heart beat, dulled senses and a red tinge around the screen. Sustaining further damage results in death, while taking cover and waiting until the pressure goes down allows the player to go out of critical mode and regenerate back to full health. While this change has been met with scepticism, the new health system removes the rather annoying gameplay element of hunting for health packs and instead forces players to rely on immediate survival tactics rather than absorbing bullets.

The visual aspect of the game has been revamped. The new graphics engine gives Call of Duty 2 some excellent weather and smoke effects, including thick fog and snow. Models are greatly improved in detail, and the game makes extensive use of volumetric lighting and bump mapping, with shadows and reflections relative to surfaces and even the folds of soldiers' uniforms, adding an incredibly dynamic environment. For gamers without the necessary specs for these high-end effects, Call of Duty 2 allows players to switch to DirectX 7 mode, which drops the DirectX 9 effects and takes on a static visual effect similar to Call of Duty's graphics, but greatly increases the frame rate, making Call of Duty 2 playable for both high-end and mid-range systems.

The weapon sounds have been changed in Call of Duty 2 to provide more accurate gunfire noises. Most of the sounds, however, have been recycled from the previous game, which is a fair decision as some of them were quite good. The background music is less noticeable, but is strongly influenced by soundtracks from popular movies such as Enemy at the Gates and Saving Private Ryan. To add to the lustre, some of the voice recordings were performed by actors from the popular WWII miniseries Band of Brothers.

The Multiplayer aspect, outstanding in Call of Duty and more so in its expansion, United Offensive, is a rather mixed bag. Call of Duty 2 removes vehicles, which is popular to many players due to the generally more immersive infantry combat similar to Call of Duty. Game modes include classic modes such as Headquarters and Search and Destroy, and retains the Capture the Flag mode from United Offensive. The maps are a huge improvement over the original game. Many of the maps are used from Single Player, but the environmental detail has been accurately rendered in the game from proper on-site research. Rather than putting down a street, dumping a few houses on it and calling it a village, Call of Duty 2 maps feature small towns compete with French-style street layouts and structures. Multiplayer also features some classic maps such as Brecourt, Carentan and Dawnville redesigned for Call of Duty 2.

Unfortunately, the Multiplayer side fails in some disappointing aspects. While the weapon balance is somewhat fair, the introduction of the incredibly powerful shotgun for free use from the weapon menu, combined with numerous close-quarters maps, has been met with unpopular criticism and deemed as a ‘noob cannon'. Even worse, the game lacks any form of anti-cheat system, and within days of release various cheats and hacks have been implemented for multiplayer, delivering a blow to what would have been an enjoyable multiplayer experience. Furthermore, the apparent disregard of United Offensive innovations, such as sprinting and grenade cooking, have left a rather sour taste in fans.

All things considered, however, Call of Duty 2 has maintained the incredibly high standard of the series, with an immersive and memorable single player experience that retains the cinematic gameplay of the original game, combined with a solid, fast-paced multiplayer aspect that can be improved over time when patches are rolled out.

Graphics: 9/10
Sound: 10/10
Gameplay: 7/10
Replay: 9/10
Overall: 8/10

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 11/14/05