Call of Duty: World at War

Review from Starks, Starks and Starks - Tuesday, 17 February 2009 @ 9:40am

World War II is often remembered for the European conflict; The battle to get to Berlin, pushing the Nazi’s back and D-Day. The Call of Duty series has been the shining light in the FPS market for depicting accurate war time combat. Whilst other developers have released games in the time frame, none have captured the World War II theme as well as both Infinity Ward and Treyarch have.

The latest instalment to the ongoing series, World at War, is one that I have had difficulty in playing due to my Xbox’s suffering from cases of Red Ring. Yet on Sunday I managed to finally sit down and give it a while whilst at Game On Interactive. World at War splits its focus between the Eastern Front, and the Red Army, to the Pacific conflict; An area that I don't think has been explored by WWII FPS's before. Historically, I find that Treyarch have done a reasonable job in giving the player a fairly good insight into the war that was almost on our doorstep.

By way of background, the Imperial Japanese Army was one of the most regimented, focussed and tactically brilliant the world has seen. Their lightning advance down through South East Asia, to the point where they threatened the north coast of Australia, was stalled only by the desperate efforts of the Americans before the Battle of Midway saw the shift in momentum swing to the United States military.

The waterside beach resort nobody told you about

One of the ‘hush hush’ topics of the war has been the brutality of the Japanese. The Burma Railway and Changi Prisoner of War camps are two of the black marks they have left on history. Whilst Treyarch have not gone so far as to depict these aspects of the Pacific War, they have done a fantastic job of depicting the Japanese army as they truly were in World War II; Fanatical, proud fighters who were brutal towards their enemy, prisoners of war and civilians alike.

The campaign for World at War starts the game off with quite a shocking scene; That of a Japanese officer torturing and then killing several captured Marines. Frankly, this isn’t a side of the war that is generally shown by developers, and it sets the tone for the game. You play the role of Private Miller of the United States Marine Corps’ 1st Division in the Pacific and swap over at intervals with Private Dimitri Petrenko of the Soviet Red Army.

YOU SHALL NOT PASS!

It’s about at this point that I find myself struggling to speak at any great length on the games single player mode. The Russian campaign is very similar, I found, to Call of Duty 2. Well, there are differences. Enhanced engine, better graphics and the ability to use vehicles; an already aspect explored by Treyarch in Call of Duty 3.

Yet in reality this is about the extent of the differences. As a Russian, you’re still killing Germans on the Eastern Front and making your way to Berlin. This is where, in my opinion, the series falls down a lot. The constant rehash of WWII time frames is so done to death that I would claim every new title in this time frame is committing an act of necromancy. I cannot understand why Activision doesn’t request Treyarch or Infinity Ward to mix it up a little more.

Sure, Modern Warfare was the breath of fresh air the series needed and it was recognised as such. But why not a World War I time slot? What about Desert Storm? What about the Korean War, or Vietnam? How about an American War of Independence time frame, with muskets? Why not look at the Boer War, and give that a go?

The proverbial belting of a cash cow by these companies is frustrating for gamers. I myself was incredibly happy with the improvements and step forward that Modern Warfare offered. Resorting back to the World War II era seems more like a grab for cash than an actual desire to release a game that will add to the genre, instead of adding ‘more of the same’. Whilst I will agree that the Pacific conflict is a breath of fresh air, it is simply not enough to rid the room of its stale smell. If you follow my meaning.

The multiplayer side of the game is a hybrid of Call of Duty 3 and Modern Warfare. The use of Infinity Wards engine, barring some small improvements to the physics model that I myself only barely noticed, and highlight the fact that the Treyarch CoD 3 engine was simply unacceptable to fans of the series. Even though this is the case, the game still plays like CoD 3 in many ways, with giant maps, the use of vehicles and shocking hit boxes immediately destroying the games chances of being played competitively.

Say hello to my leetle friend!

A slight aside – I requested to review this game primarily because I thought it would be the competitive alternative to CoD4 for the majority of 2009. I was quite let down when I rocked into a lobby to find that, whilst a huge element of CoD4 had made the transition across, problems with the hit boxes, the use of vehicles and maps that were the comparative size of Halo 2’s Coagulation (And some of them even bigger) meant that the building to building, short to mid range combat found in Modern Warfare was not to be seen in this instalment. Instead, larger and more open maps with what I believe to be less tactical requirement and more dominance of the vehicles present is the approach that the multiplayer seems to push.

Suffice to say I was a sad panda at the discovery.

The LAG within the game itself, when online, was fairly reasonable. I found the Xbox Live system of searching for open games to be pretty quick, and was finding consistent games with good pings in approximately 45 seconds. One of the highlights of the game, really.

After playing a few games, I found myself enjoying the game quite a lot. Frankly, it is a lot of fun to play. Mind you, I got seriously frustrated at the hit boxes, however. Whatever Treyarch did to prevent shots from registering when you hit a guy square in the chest is beyond me. But I did enjoy my time playing through it, and also the War gametype; A personal favourite of mine.

This picture seriously reminds me of Tropic Thunder for some reason...

Anyway, I’m going to close by making a pretty honest statement. This has been one of the hardest reviews for me to write. For various reasons that I’ll list. The game is boring. Honestly, it is. It’s seriously no different to playing Call of Duty 2 with the exception of perks, weapon configurations and taking a few tanks for a spin. Sure, I enjoyed playing it. It’s genuinely entertaining to play for a while. But it really is a forgettable experience and when I got up to walk away, I didn’t feel like there was anything to draw me back to have another game. No pull, no pizzaz like Modern Warfare had. Where I was having to literally drag myself away from playing Call of Duty 4, World at War simply doesn’t posses the addictive element last years Game of the Year held.

Given I was trying to review it with a competitive perspective in mind, I constantly found myself drawing parallels to previous games of the series, and in most cases how predecessors did things better. It seemed more like a mish mash and hybrid of previous Call of Duty’s than anything new. More like… Call of Duty 3.5. Whilst I find it hard to make this statement given I didn’t necessarily dislike the game, I’m struggling to find something in the game to recommend it to people who have owned previous instalments of the series.

Pros

Fun to play
Uses the same engine as Modern Warfare, so it will be an easy transition for players familiar with the series
It has tanks - That always counts for something

Cons

Another stale entry to the World War II genre
Massive hitbox issues; If I shoot someone in the head, I expect to see them drop and bleed, not continue to run and then shoot me
Treyarch simply don't produce the 'X' factor Infinity Ward manage to ingrain in their games