With the recent release of Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 and the ever increasing need for the reactions of a cat on speed, I feel I have to address something that a lot of Call of Duty fans have been yearning for in recent years. That something is a trip back to the 1940’s and World War Two, the time period that started the whole Call of Duty saga.
I should start this off by saying Black Ops 3 is a vast improvement on the two games that came before but in all honesty that wasn’t to tall an order.
Call of Duty: Ghosts was the first big misstep in the series with the multiplayer map design being it’s biggest down fall. Map flow was non-existent due to too much verticality which also in turn created too many routes for enemies to come from making the tactical side of gameplay an absolute nightmare. The one thing Ghosts did do right however was keeping your two feet on the ground, unfortunately that was something that couldn’t be said about Advanced Warfare.
Whilst many people liked Advance Warfare it had it’s glaring faults. Developer Sledgehammer Games completely removed any tactical gameplay or map control from the battlefield. Being successful on the game relied on twitch reactions, only rewarding those who could jump and shoot fastest. Now don’t get me wrong, I know some people enjoyed that aspect of the game but to me this wasn’t why I fell in love with the games multiplayer originally , well not entirely. The Modern Warfare series, with all its flaws, captured perfectly what the game was about, map control, tactics, use of cover, cooperation, learning routes and traffic patterns and of course the right amount of twitch reaction; where as Advanced Warfare relied completely on the latter.
Black Ops 3 reeled the game back in to a certain point with the movement system being nerfed. Unfortunately with the addition of wall running, boost jumping and boost slides it still isn’t ideal. Cover is negated with a simple jump over a wall, trip mines are rendered useless with a swift boost slide and trying to shoot someone who boost jumps round a corner is nigh on impossible. Again, granted it’s an improvement over the twitch fest that is Advanced Warfare but twitch reactions are again at the forefront of gameplay. I should state reaction speed has always been one of the driving forces behind the Call of Duty franchise but this was always balanced out by players that could play smart and still be successful. You didn’t have to have lightning quick reactions to win a gun fight. You could predict where a player would come from (with enough practice) and use cover effectively and to your advantage. But this is no longer viable with a wall no longer being something you go around but something you jump over.
With the introduction of these new movement mechanics I have heard many people discuss how Call of Duty can’t return to the regular movement system but my question is, why?
So with my initial rant/moan out of the way, why do we need to go back to WW2?
It’s simple, lets start with the basics again. You, your gun and a map. No teleporting, no twenty foot jumps. Lets make the game about gun fights and gun skill. Let’s make cover relevant again. Let’s give those of us who prefer to play smart, over fast, a chance. Let’s stop rewarding the 10 year olds dosed up on E numbers who shouldn’t even be playing the game. Let’s have guns that don’t have the fire rate of a mini-gun but actually require some skill. World War 2 is perfect for this. The guns are dated and don’t have these insane fire rates (which may actually give you a chance to shoot back at someone.) There’ll no longer be any boost jumping. A wall will be a wall and not a hurdle. A door will be something you walk through and not fly through. Tactical gameplay will again be at the forefront while still catering to those who prefer to run and gun. It’s not a case of we shouldn’t go back, it’s a case of we need to go back. Call of Duty is heading into Halo territory fast, some may even say we are already there and I feel it’s time to take a step back, regroup, and go back to what invested us in the game in the first place. It’s important that Call of Duty caters to every play style and not just to those with the fastest twitch reaction on the controller.
I have my fingers crossed that Call of Duty will return to it’s roots sometime in the near future and I get the Call of Duty game I’ve be wanting for the past two or three years.
Thank you for reading and let me know what you think below.
