Generic execution drags down an otherwise great shooter.
The newest Call of Duty game has a lot to offer to shooter fans. The single player campaign, which is purported to last around 6-7 hours, never lets up on the intensity, and the multiplayer package is one of the most well rounded and well executed in any shooter. The graphics and sound do not disappoint, the controls are well mapped and will be instantly familiar to anyone who has played a CoD game, and the weapons feel good. However, no amount of praise that I can (and will) lay on the game could divert my attention from the fact that everything in WaW has been done before. This creates the feeling that, despite the fact that I've only played five to six hours, I have already seen just about everything that the game could throw at me.
Usually I try to go in depth about the mechanics of the games that I review, but for WaW this is simply uneccesary. Treyarch's latest shooter feels like a mod of CoD4, adding a few cool weapons and game modes and shifting up the setting a bit, but never really changing the core gameplay. That said, the new weapons such as the flamethrower and bayonnette-equipped rifles are sick fun to use against the mostly intelligent enemies (burning entrenched Japanese soldiers out of trees is especially cool), and the new multiplayer modes are great. It's just a shame that players must reach rank 14 in order to access anything besides TDM and DM. I love a good TDM game, but can I really put up with it until I reach rank 14? I'm not sure. Finally, vehicles have been added to four of the thirteen multiplayer maps, and while they do add a bit of variety, in the end they feel like a distraction from the core on-foot action.
The graphical package in WaW packs a big whallop thanks to the amazing CoD4 engine, but it does not quite seem the equal of CoD4. Maybe it's just because I've been staring at CoD4 all year and have become accustomed to the great graphics, or maybe it's because so many other great looking titles have come out since CoD4. Maybe it's just my imagination, but WaW seems to look very slightly less sharp than the last entry in the series. Regardless of my obsessive graphical nitpicking, this is an amazing looking video game. Character and gun models as well as the environments look just as good as any other multiplatform game out there.
WaW's musical score delivers for the most part, but occasionally seems a bit childish. Replacing the orchestral score in some particularly intense sections of the game are squealing guitar riffs, which feel more than a little out of place when accompanying WWII action. This quirk is made up for by the excellent voice acting, particularly from Keifer Sutherland. Sutherland makes for a perfect commander; his voice radiates passion and urgency. A weird side effect of hearing him bark orders at me is having sudden flashbacks to the hit Fox show 24, of which Sutherland is the star.
By now, WaW should sound like a pretty great game, and it is. I would love to have given it a 9/10, but as mentioned before the generic setting and same-y, me-too gameplay come back to bite it in the butt like an angry attack dog. Maybe I've just been spoiled by Valkyria Chronicle's totally unique approach to 1940s era combat (great game, by the way,) but really I think it's more than that. Gamers have been buying WWII shooters since the original Playstation was out, and the sub-genre has made little attempt to change since then. It's just starting to get old. It's like Treyach is afraid of messing too much with the CoD formula established by Infinity Ward for fear of screwing something up. Yeah, they added a co-op mode and a zombie uprising mode, both of which are great fun, but we've been playing those in other shooters for years. At this point, the CoD series doesn't need more new modes; it needs a few new gameplay mechanics to keep fans hooked. Don't get me wrong, I love WaW and will remain addicted to it for at least a few months, but sometime in the near future, something in the CoD universe will need to change in order to keep me buying, and I'm not just talking about setting.
Graphics: 9.75/10: About as great as CoD 4.
Sound: 9/10: Great voice overs complemented by out of place sounding guitar riffs.
Gameplay: 8/10: Fun, but feels a bit empty or generic by this point.
Entertainment: 8.75/10: Still a very entertaining game, but I don't know how much longer Treyarch/Infinity Ward can keep this up without changing a few gameplay mechanics.
