Modern Warfare 2
Well, the long awaited and possibly the most anticipated release of 2009, Modern Warfare 2 is here. Is the game as fresh, exciting and as great as the COD4?
Single-Player Campaign
The campaign, in short, was terrible. The story was seemingly mashed together, without much flow. As if it they had all these ideas for locations to place the missions, put them in the game and then tacked a story on to string these events together. It was confusing because of this, and the way the story advanced in loading screens with absence of cut scenes only made matters worse. It was as if the story was more and an 'after thought'. The length was also a large issue. Taking only approximately 5 hours to beat on a normal difficulty, it simply just does not cut it for a full priced game.
However, there was a lot of a lot of variety in the gameplay, and you never felt as if you were doing one thing to long. The game also showcased many areas and environments, from South America, Afghanistan and even the US capital, Washington DC. Some of the environments provided a 'unforgettable' scene, such as the war-torn DC.
But with a far to short campaign accompanied by a seemingly tacked on story, it's was hard to really enjoy the single player mode of this installment.
Single-Player Campaign - 2/5
Gameplay
It's no doubting that IW kept to it's fast-paced, action style run 'n gun formula from the first Modern Warfare. If you're looking for a realistic and tactical shooter, this is not the game for you. Fast-paced action, with a tonne of shooting bad guys will keep you on your toes with very few dulls in the action. The game doesn't really allow planning, or any tactical attacks with it's linear levels and to be successful you have to keep moving, and pretty much stick to a run 'n gun formula.
The enemy AI is somewhat stupid. They don't do anything really 'smart' military wise. They don't flank, fall back, or make any real tactical maneuvers. The only other thing they seem to do besides take cover and shoot, is make suicidal charges on your position, where you can just cut them down easily. The difficulty of the enemy doesn't stem from a tactical military standpoint, but from the sheer quantity you will have to take on. Only their aiming will get better at the higher levels.
Overall, I think the core gameplay remains the same from COD4. Which isn't necessarily bad thing. The gameplay was good, lots of action and you'll never get bored. But I also feel there were too fewer new additions to the gameplay experience. It just felt like COD4 again. Therefore, it's score is lowered.
Gameplay - 3/5
Multiplayer
There is no doubting the greatness of Modern Warfare 2's multilayer. Infinity Ward made a few additions, such as call signs and new kill streak options. It's still the fun multiplayer from COD4, just with the new maps, perks and weapons. This is certainly no bad thing. I'm sure people will still conjure up countless hours of gameplay with MW2 online. But how long can people find the same thing fun? It's seems like quite a while for Modern Warfare's case. It's multiplayer is matched by very, very few, and not many remain as fun as this for such a long time.
Spec Ops is another good addition. It's always nice to have co-op games with your friends, and spec ops delivers well, despite only supporting two players. It's a solid co-op mode.
Multiplayer - 4.5/5
Overall
Overall, Modern Warfare 2 is okay. It just lacks innovation and new features, and a decent and long enough campaign. Sure the multiplayer is great, but it's hard to believe this is a full-fledged stand alone game. With an extremely short, tacky campaign along with multiplayer which is just basically just new maps, weapons and perks, this honestly feels to much like a DLC or expansion for Modern Warfare to me.
OVERALL SCORE: 3/5.