Call of Duty

I am an avid call of duty player and have been since number 2 came out in 2005 for the PC. After playing call of duty 4 for well over 10 days playtime in  2007-2008 I felt that it was the best multiplayer franchise ever created and that I would continue to buy their products forever. That was not to be the case.

I was crushingly disappointed by Call of Duty: World at War; the 'Last Stand' perk coupled with the fact that only a handful of weapons were usable meant that I was more angry than I was entertained whenever I played it, and so it took weeks to go back to modern warfare. I was still hopeful, however, that activision would listen to the feedback and make the next game, the inventively named Modern Warfare: 2, less frustrating.

This was not to be the case, with new perks like 'Commando', 'One Man Army' and the tactical insertion making it even easier for players to play the game in a way where nobody is having fun. 'Commando' was the one which made me ragequit (turning off my xbox in disgust) the most frequently. Infinity ward staunchly refused to patch any balance-related parts of the game, like these perks, losing my customer loyalty and respect and leaving me to feel like I am being milked for my money (paying £40 per game and £5 per month exclusively for call of duty games).


With the dawn of the long-awaited Call of Duty: Black Ops, I fear that  they have made another frustrating buzzkill of a sequel. In the multiplayer trailer below we see that nothing much has changed with the multiplayer gameplay, with the same controls and weapons layouts. This is fine, if a little boring, but it is the alarming prospect of more annoying things like the exploding cars (seen at 0:56 in the video) that makes me think I do not want to play this game in fear of getting extremely wound up.

On a positive note I definitely will rate the game for the single-player campaign which looks fantastic and original in the time setting of Vietnam, which is wholly unexplored in first person shooters.

Check it out for yourselves below and tell me what you think, cheers, Rob.