Call of Duty 3

"This was the first seventh generation game that I played"

A lot of people are going to look at the tagline, look at the score I gave the game, and just dismiss the high score as a result of Call of Duty 3 being the first seventh generation video game I had the pleasure of playing. However, maybe I can ward off some skepticism with a little story. You see, I got to play Call of Duty 3 for three days. The day I got my 360, the second day I had my 360, and the third day I owned my 360, which was also the day that my Xbox literally demolished my Call of Duty 3 disc. Nearly two years later, I have finally managed to get my hands on a disc repairer and have fixed the disc. I hope that will reassure you that this review isn't biased or influenced by all the hype behind the seventh generation consoles back when they were first released.

That being said, Call of Duty 3 is a great game and one of the best shooters on the 360. While it is worse than Call of Duty 2 in some places, it manages to exceed it in other areas, providing an experience that is on par with its very popular younger, and older, brothers.

Right off the bat, you'll notice that the gameplay in Call of Duty 3 is very similar to Call of Duty 2. From the basic mission structure to the combat, there is a ton of similarities between the two games, except Call of Duty 3 focuses on being much more interactive. When you plant explosives you may have to do basic movements with the control sticks and press buttons at a certain time, kind of like the quick-time events in Resident Evil 4. There are instances where you control an oar with the right analog stick and there are also quick-time events involving intense battles with enemy soldiers that will even take you by surprise a couple of times.

If you are familiar at all with Call of Duty 3's predecessor you are aware of the grenade danger icon that appears on the screen when a grenade is lobbed in your vicinity. In that game, your only defense against the grenades were to bolt, but now you can pick up enemy grenades and chuck them back to enemy lines, which can definitely be helpful in some situations.

There is also a larger focus on vehicles than there was in the previous game, but what could have been pretty cool, the developers kind of ruined by adding really funky controls. Instead of the usual RT makes you go forward and LT makes you go backward, we are treated to a very strange control scheme where RT is still acceleration, but the B button is reverse. It's very awkward, even after you get used to it, and some of the vehicle missions are pretty dull, like simply driving house-to-house.

On the bright side, you get to control tanks, motorcycles, and jeeps, and some of the other vehicle missions, like the ones where you control a gun on top of the vehicle, are loads of fun and feel pretty fresh. The tank missions are vastly improved from Call of Duty 2 and are simply more fun to do as you roll around blasting the hell out of enemy armor. Sadly, tanks aren't controllable in the various multiplayer modes, which is a big disappointment.

Like I said earlier, the Call of Duty gameplay is very much intact and you will be treated to your various difficulties ranging from easy to veteran, plus you will have the chance to play as soldiers from the U.S. Army, the Polish Army, the Canadian Army, and the British Army so you get many different perspectives of the last great war.

Luckily though, we aren't fed the same garbage that was the multiplayer of Call of Duty 2. The maps were much too large and the gameplay often dragged on, but in Call of Duty 3, the maps have been scaled down a bit and the action is much more intense. While the multiplayer doesn't have the lasting power of other shooter games available on the 360, it is still worth checking out and you'll still be able to get some fun out of it. Not only does it have four-player split-screen, but the online community is still active even after the multiplayer behemoths like Halo 3, Gears of War, and, of course, Call of Duty 4.

One of the main quips with Call of Duty 2 is that the story, while it had its moments, definitely wasn't all that epic. To be honest, for the first few hours of Call of Duty 3 aren't really all that exciting either but the larger focus on the plot is apparent right from the beginning. You will actually care about the characters and the game hits home on a much more personal level than its predecessor did. Shocking and eye-popping surprises are practically a staple of the series and Call of Duty 3 will, just like the other games in the series, have your jaw hanging open in pure amazement at what you just witnessed. You play as various soldiers from armies involved with World War II as you try to liberate Europe from the Nazi war machine. Sometimes they game felt a little cliché, and a little too much like Saving Private Ryan, but things just get more and more exciting as the game builds up to a pretty empowering and involving storyline that will keep anyone hooked.

While this game is definitely prettier than Call of Duty 2 in areas like character models, particle effects, and explosions, it does fall short in some other areas. Textures are just horrendous sometimes and the physics are equally awful. There are some issues with the frame rate and the animation is disappointingly poor. Hands will move through people's bodies and characters will literally roll through barricades. Enemies will re-spawn right in front of your face and other times they will disappear without any rhyme or reason to it.

Where it fails in the graphics department, Call of Duty 3 excels in the audio department. With more focus on the story, characters are given more time to be fleshed out, and as a result, the voice-acting is much improved. On top of that, the score is great and very worthy of having the Call of Duty name. Guns are load and explosions are even louder, helping you feel like you're right on the battlefield. Overall, the audio experience presented in Call of Duty 3 is beyond exceptional and is one of the best soundtracks found in any game to date.

Boasting a surprisingly lengthy (this game is just full of surprises, isn't it?) single-player campaign that can last ten to fifteen hours as well as plenty of achievements to unlock, plus offline and online multiplayer functions, Call of Duty 3 is definitely a great shooter if you like replayability.

Call of Duty 3 is definitely a great game and while a lot of fans of the series may criticize it for being developed by a different team than Infinity Ward (the team is Treyarch; the people behind Spider-Man 2), it definitely is worthy of the Call of Duty name. Featuring improved multiplayer and a more exciting single-player campaign, Call of Duty 3 is a vast improvement over its predecessor in nearly every area. If some minor graphical problems were fixed and the game moved along at a slightly faster pace, then this would be the perfect first-person shooter, and I have high hopes for the series' future, especially after the great game that was Call of Duty 4.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 09/15/08

Game Release: Call of Duty 3 (US, 11/07/06)