Despite Jeff and Ryan's obvious lack of interest in zombies, the last 6 minutes of this Quicklook looked more exciting than everything leading up to it.

Admittedly I haven't ever played any previous zombies modes, so maybe this is old stuff to the regular Black Ops crowd?

The rest looks like some competent but not particularly revolutionary first person shooting.

@sear said:

Are they still making these? And people buy them? With money? What the fuck? Fuck you, world.

Here guys, I'll give you a much cheaper alternative to Call of Duty:

1. Go outside
2. Find a traffic light
3. When the traffic light turns green, raise your hand and say "pew pew pew!"
4. Repeat

It's basically the same thing, and you can imagine you're playing a good videogame while you do it.

Also, I have to call Giant Bomb out on this. Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 the same thing all over again, but with new gun models and textures. Gameplay is nearly identical and improvements are minimal at best. If it wasn't for the UI, I wouldn't be able to tell any difference between this game and any other in the series.

Any other franchise you would have torn a new asshole by now for doing the same thing, but Call of Duty is sacred ground. Why? Do you want to avoid pissing off the fans? Do you rely on Activision's support and don't want to bad mouth them? Why do you seemingly refuse to criticize Activision over the fact that this style of gameplay got stale about 5 years ago?

How about the constant subscription and DLC crap? Do you really think paying for the game twice over for a handful of multiplayer maps is good value? Heck, you're even playing the exact same maps as from the previous game, and that's a selling point?

Y'know I hate these games. But even I think you're kinda being a tool here bro.

@sear said:

Are they still making these? And people buy them? With money? What the fuck? Fuck you, world.

Here guys, I'll give you a much cheaper alternative to Call of Duty:

1. Go outside
2. Find a traffic light
3. When the traffic light turns green, raise your hand and say "pew pew pew!"
4. Repeat

It's basically the same thing, and you can imagine you're playing a good videogame while you do it.

Also, I have to call Giant Bomb out on this. Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 the same thing all over again, but with new gun models and textures. Gameplay is nearly identical and improvements are minimal at best. If it wasn't for the UI, I wouldn't be able to tell any difference between this game and any other in the series.

Any other franchise you would have torn a new asshole by now for doing the same thing, but Call of Duty is sacred ground. Why? Do you want to avoid pissing off the fans? Do you rely on Activision's support and don't want to bad mouth them? Why do you seemingly refuse to criticize Activision over the fact that this style of gameplay got stale about 5 years ago?

How about the constant subscription and DLC crap? Do you really think paying for the game twice over for a handful of multiplayer maps is good value? Heck, you're even playing the exact same maps as from the previous game, and that's a selling point?

Then don't play it. But don't be so ignorant to think that your taste in games in the only one that matters.

@HighPriest said:

Despite Jeff and Ryan's obvious lack of interest in zombies, the last 6 minutes of this Quicklook looked more exciting than everything leading up to it.

Admittedly I haven't ever played any previous zombies modes, so maybe this is old stuff to the regular Black Ops crowd?

The rest looks like some competent but not particularly revolutionary first person shooting.

I agree. The zombie portion looked pretty darn cool compared to the previous installments. It's not supposed to be a game seller but rather a nice addition.

@sear said:

@simkas said:

You're forgetting the fact that there are millions of people who still love this kind of gameplay and Black Ops 2 seems like a perfectly decent game if you do like that kind of gameplay.

So review scores are contingent on how popular a game is? Good to know. I'm glad the Giant Bomb community and crew are so sharply critical as to incorporate logical fallacies into review policy.

No? Review scores depend on how much enjoyment you get out of a game and the people who do like this type of gameplay will get plenty of enjoyment. Maybe you could stop just being "I don't like this type of game and it's popular so it's instantly bad" and realize that the world doesn't consist of only you.

Lol, Jeff going "look at this huge open area", while it's in fact still a tiny corridor only restricted by invisible walls instead of the usual rubble and debris.

Somebody mentioned a KNIFE PARTY?

DOwnAndDirty with DirtyJoeDirt90

Oh XBox Live

I don't understand, its too complicated for me.

It was weird to me how Jeff kept saying how "open" that first campaign level was. Call of Duty 4 did that big field bordered by invisible walls/fences/hills. There's nothing to do out at those edges, and they don't actually let you get that far out before there's either a wall or a "return to combat". MW3 really didn't feel that different to me; it was just more obvious about its walls.

Game looks good, but not for full price, just appears to samey to me (an issue most people are having), and as i'm enjoying Halo 4 so much, I will be giving this years CoD a miss.

@sear: A lot of my friends are bought this game, and while playing it with them last night I kind of jokingly made fun of them for paying $60 for the same game that came out two years ago. Then again, some of my friends only buy shooters and sports games, so $60 a year for your anual shooter isn't too much to ask for if you don't play much else.

Also, I understand you're probably kind of angry at the stupid people who buy these games year after year, as well as the "critics" that are supposed to hold companies responsible for this sleazy shit. I feel similarly, so I understand where your post is coming from, but there's no way you could have expected to get intelligent, calm, rational responses from people on the internet with the way you wrote that thing.

I'm never surprised by the idiocy of the average consumer, but I am a little surprised that reviewers and critics are, year after year, okay with a company putting out the same game with a new $60 price tag. However, this is a whole other discussion about the difference between consumer buying advice and real criticism that would take thousands of words to properly discuss.

So, even though your post is on the right track, there's no way that post, or any post of that length, will ever insite anything but ridicule. Especially when it's in the comments section of an internet video.

@ttocs said:

@sear said:

Are they still making these? And people buy them? With money? What the fuck? Fuck you, world.

Here guys, I'll give you a much cheaper alternative to Call of Duty:

1. Go outside
2. Find a traffic light
3. When the traffic light turns green, raise your hand and say "pew pew pew!"
4. Repeat

It's basically the same thing, and you can imagine you're playing a good videogame while you do it.

Also, I have to call Giant Bomb out on this. Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 the same thing all over again, but with new gun models and textures. Gameplay is nearly identical and improvements are minimal at best. If it wasn't for the UI, I wouldn't be able to tell any difference between this game and any other in the series.

Any other franchise you would have torn a new asshole by now for doing the same thing, but Call of Duty is sacred ground. Why? Do you want to avoid pissing off the fans? Do you rely on Activision's support and don't want to bad mouth them? Why do you seemingly refuse to criticize Activision over the fact that this style of gameplay got stale about 5 years ago?

How about the constant subscription and DLC crap? Do you really think paying for the game twice over for a handful of multiplayer maps is good value? Heck, you're even playing the exact same maps as from the previous game, and that's a selling point?

Then don't play it. But don't be so ignorant to think that your taste in games in the only one that matters.

Nah. It is.

Jeffs tone in this video is much more chipper in comparison to the Halo 4 quick look when both games are iterations within a series. Seems like he is much more jaded with Halo. I haven't played either yet so I say iteration with a loose definition; but based on what I've seen out of both videos, I would rather pick this up over Halo 4 given the choice. Probably just personal preference but this looks less bland, but still bland. I won't be getting either game for awhile though; I have a backlog that could fill a whole bookshelf that I need to get to; games that have more uniqueness then another sequel.

@Construc said:

Jeffs tone in this video is much more chipper in comparison to the Halo 4 quick look when both games are iterations within a series. Seems like he is much more jaded with Halo. I haven't played either yet so I say iteration with a loose definition; but based on what I've seen out of both videos, I would rather pick this up over Halo 4 given the choice. Probably just personal preference but this looks less bland, but still bland. I won't be getting either game for awhile though; I have a backlog that could fill a whole bookshelf that I need to get to; games that have more uniqueness then another sequel.

what do you mean by bland.

@Construc said:

Jeffs tone in this video is much more chipper in comparison to the Halo 4 quick look when both games are iterations within a series. Seems like he is much more jaded with Halo. I haven't played either yet so I say iteration with a loose definition; but based on what I've seen out of both videos, I would rather pick this up over Halo 4 given the choice. Probably just personal preference but this looks less bland, but still bland. I won't be getting either game for awhile though; I have a backlog that could fill a whole bookshelf that I need to get to; games that have more uniqueness then another sequel.

Was literally going to comment on that. He's so quick to point out how tired he is of COD, yet still seems to have some enthusiasm in this Quick Look, as opposed to the Halo 4 one. Rubs me the wrong way a bit. Not sure why Halo always gets singled out for that sort of thing, but COD is almost getting a free pass here, but whatever.

Hey yo Vinny and Drew -- remember that 60 fps Quick Look experiment you guys were toying with? What happened with that? Is it ever going to happen again, or was Rage a one-time thing?

Holy crap! the dude that plays Kevin French is in zombies!

...Still don't care about cod, even if they have awesome voice actors.

Great, Alaska-Australian accent is back

COD is so tired at this point.

The last Call of Duty game I played was Call of Duty 2. The game has not evolved that much since then: The core facets remain exactly the same. Nothing wrong with that, it's evidently a winning formula. I want to play Call of Duty 4 and onwards, but they're so expensive, even today.

Lieutenant Colonel North I see. Gameplay-wise that opening mission totally reminds me of the Crossing of the Volga and the Siege of Stalingrad in Call of Duty original. That was and still is in my opinion the greatest thing Call of Duty has ever done, apart from the opening credits execution sequence of Call of Duty 4.

It warms my heart that Jeff is almost as bad as me at multiplayer Call of Duty.

Oh, god, they spell it "unaccessible" in the menu. I'm grinding my teeth over here.

no one has mentioned jonas savimbi was a real person and a notorious war criminal who made millions off of blood diamonds

@gokumane said:

no one has mentioned jonas savimbi was a real person and a notorious war criminal who made millions off of blood diamonds

you'd expect these guys to know that?

Robin from Teen Titans confirmed in zombies.

@doobie: My opinion is based solely on these 2 quick looks and the fact that I've played every game in the series up until these 2, so take it with a grain of salt. When I say bland I mean; lacking interest and trite. When I play games, which I don't get to as much anymore, I want something fresh. Most games borrow at this point and originality from a holistic perspective is hard the execute. The small details can make the difference though.

Currently I'm playing Sleeping Dogs and Mark of the Ninja and although they both borrow from other games, I feel that they add their own originality in the execution and variety.

COD and Halo both did that years ago and brought a lot of originality and freshness to gaming as a whole but both are now in their 5+ iteration in their series and I personally just don't want to spend the little gaming time I have on "more of the same". More of the same is what I've gathered from these quick looks and my experience with the series thus far.

People will defend COD and Halo till they die. I personally am done with both series until I see something that I feel is fresh (not bland). My standpoint is purely subjective, defend away!

I think the fact that dumb nerds get so worked up whenever a new Call of Duty comes out actually makes me like them more.  
 
This looks cool. 

Call of Duty multiplayer does nothing for me anymore. The campaign might be worth some time though.

Campaign seems like something I'd enjoy to blast through. Now if only the price would be somewhere around 20 euros or less...

Odd that they wouldn't show off any of the "future" campaign stuff since that seems like the big change.

@gokumane said:

no one has mentioned jonas savimbi was a real person and a notorious war criminal who made millions off of blood diamonds

Don't forget child soldiers!

The HUD isn't complete fucking garbage on this one, so that's pretty cool.

First game...Nuketown and countless spawns/deaths from dudes behind you. I've seen all I need to see. Pass.

"you equipped woods" - Ryan Davis, 2012

@kishinfoulux said:

He's so quick to point out how tired he is of COD, yet still seems to have some enthusiasm in this Quick Look, as opposed to the Halo 4 one. Rubs me the wrong way a bit. Not sure why Halo always gets singled out for that sort of thing, but COD is almost getting a free pass here, but whatever.

It's probably because he enjoys the gameplay of CoD more. It's much simpler and easier to get into than Halo, you can jump in any CoD after 4 and instantly dominate. That's probably the biggest reason for why it gets so many free passes, because it's so friendly to newer players. Halo isn't at all, the skill gap in Halo is huge. It's not as bad as the skill gap in something like Quake 1 or 3, but it's still really big for a modern shooter.

CoD basically has no skill gap. Since you die so fast a new player can kill a skilled player like it's nothing. In Halo if a new player started attacking a "pro", the pro would have time to turn around and kill that newer person because of the higher health pool and lower lethality that comes with Halo. CoD also rewards you for basically wiping your ass, you get points for everything and casual/modern gamers LOVE to be rewarded. That's why CoD's carrot on a stick system works so well, and why so many other games have adapted it. People fucking love it when there are all kinds of stupid little things to unlock.

I don't agree with Jeff's enthusiasm for CoD, but I'm glad to see he's at least still excited for something because he seems pretty jaded at times.

I just played through the story and enjoyed how much polish that was put into it... Especially compared to Warfighter, which was just plain boring.

It went a lot more over the top this time too and dropped all the tacticool nonsense which is what I really dislike about Modern Warfare, Ghost Recon and the likes.

It's quite finely tuned to what a linear FPS should be, which is exciting, fun and give you a couple of subtle choices.

Nolan North voices the bus driver in Zombies mode.

Rick Ross is in this game? Awesome

@gbrading: http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B0016B28Y8/ref=sr_1_1_olp?ie=UTF8&qid=1352836943&sr=8-1&keywords=call+of+duty+4&condition=used

http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B00269QLI8/ref=sr_1_1_olp?ie=UTF8&qid=1352836959&sr=8-1&keywords=modern+warfare+2&condition=used

http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B00503E8S2/ref=sr_1_1_olp?ie=UTF8&qid=1352836966&sr=8-1&keywords=modern+warfare+3&condition=used

pretty cheap you can make the jump on those games now if you want

geniunely interested in the campaign in this game,

I share their desire to never talk to strangers on the internet ever.

I can sorta understand the appeal of these games, and the campaign looks (slightly) more interesting than anything I've seen of this series.

But the wanton slaughter of dudes while being a complete bullet sponge still weird me out. When you're making a modern, realistic shooter, it seems strange to keep the classic, Doom style, one man army gimmick as far as gameplay goes. Leaning either further away from realism or further away from the mind-numbing shooting would be the only way I'd go near these games; but they're going to keep doing this for as long as it sells.

That guy is Ryan Davis' long lost black brother.

'You know, I really wish we weren't filming this particular helicopter fight.' -Jeff

The multiplayer Pick 10 system doesn't seem to do what Treyarch has promised and Zombies still looks sort of dumb. I'll play through the Campaign, though, to see the story.

Why is Kimbo Slice in this game?

Thank you for doing multiplayer first.

@FZackM said:

@kishinfoulux said:

He's so quick to point out how tired he is of COD, yet still seems to have some enthusiasm in this Quick Look, as opposed to the Halo 4 one. Rubs me the wrong way a bit. Not sure why Halo always gets singled out for that sort of thing, but COD is almost getting a free pass here, but whatever.

It's probably because he enjoys the gameplay of CoD more. It's much simpler and easier to get into than Halo, you can jump in any CoD after 4 and instantly dominate. That's probably the biggest reason for why it gets so many free passes, because it's so friendly to newer players. Halo isn't at all, the skill gap in Halo is huge. It's not as bad as the skill gap in something like Quake 1 or 3, but it's still really big for a modern shooter.

CoD basically has no skill gap. Since you die so fast a new player can kill a skilled player like it's nothing. In Halo if a new player started attacking a "pro", the pro would have time to turn around and kill that newer person because of the higher health pool and lower lethality that comes with Halo. CoD also rewards you for basically wiping your ass, you get points for everything and casual/modern gamers LOVE to be rewarded. That's why CoD's carrot on a stick system works so well, and why so many other games have adapted it. People fucking love it when there are all kinds of stupid little things to unlock.

I don't agree with Jeff's enthusiasm for CoD, but I'm glad to see he's at least still excited for something because he seems pretty jaded at times.

The lethality of the weapons in CoD games along with the importance of killstreaks does not eliminate the skill gap, it simply emphasizes map and match flow knowledge over individual encounter tactics. If being a pro in Halo means being able to effectively pair and use weapons for the situation, then being a pro in CoD means knowing when and where your enemies are likely to be.

It's ridiculous to claim that CoD has no skill gap. You are silly.

You can realy gauge what type of people play these games just by looking at their gamertags.

I don't get Jeff's beef with Zombies Mode. I mean, I understand he doesn't like it, I'm not a fan neither, but why complaining that it's in? It's rich extra content in a video game, instead of being put out as a 60$ boxed title or DLC.

Hey, this game looks to borrow slightly from games like Modern Warfare, and Call of Duty, and Medal of Honor...