Its another season of Call of Duty. This year brings us Call of Duty Ghosts. Infinity Ward and Activision said that they were starting from the ground up and re-doing Call of Duty like never before. Did they make good on their promises or did the fall short of the mark. This is my game review for Call of Duty Ghosts where I pick it apart and ultimately let you decide.
The Call of Duty franchise has been around for a long time now. I’ve been playing since World at War (Missed out on Cod 4 the ‘holy grail’) and I love the series. I like online shooters and have been playing them ever since you could play Doom on dialup. So I tend to take them pretty seriously. When a new game for Call of Duty comes out I have high hopes that they will fix the bugs and figure out ways to improve the game.
With Call of Duty Ghosts Infinity Ward boasted about a lot of new features:
Improved Graphics and Sound
Improved AI
Improvements with Network Connectivity through Dedicated Hosts
Improved Gameplay
Completely re-designed Weapons, Classes, Perks etc.
Read More: Call of Duty Ghosts Multiplayer Reveal Notes
So how did it all pan out now that the game has been released? Lets take a look:
Campaign
The campaign is pretty short. If you put it on Easy you can burn through it in just about 5 hours. The story line is that the Federation hijacks the Odin Satellite in space and pretty much blows the U.S.A. to pieces. Its now up to you and your rag tag team of ‘Ghosts’ to stop them. Its your typical corridor point to point missions that seem pretty disjointed. One minute your in San Diego when it all goes to hell, the next your up in Space, then your back down on the ground with Riley the Guard Dog.
Yes, Riley the Guard Dog. They showed us how we would become one with the doggie. In reality although they did an awesome job in motion capturing him? You only get to play with Riley for a few levels, then he’s sort of hangs out in the background. For as much as they marketed the poor guy you’d think he would have his own TV show and dog food brand by now.
It isn’t completely horrible – but nowhere near other Campaigns in past games like you had in World at War or Modern Warfare 2. You never feel quite immersed in the game or even like you’re really doing anything except going through the motions. Sure it was neat to be able to float out in space or dodge bullets underwater. It just felt cobbled together like it was more of a showcase of “look what we can do” instead of actually working on a story line.
At least with Black Ops II you had choices even if some of them sucked :)
Squads
Squads and Squad Points
Before in Modern Warfare 3 it was Spec-Ops. Now we get Squads. You can decide to do all sorts of different types of game play options with it. You get your basic 4 player co-op to stop the hordes of oncoming troops. Or you can setup game where you go up against other players squads that have been setup. I haven’t spent much time in playing with it as I don’t have my own squads built (more on this in a minute) but the 4 player co-op was fun although repetitive after playing a few rounds.
Squad Points
Taken from Call of Duty Black Ops you now have to earn Squad Points to unlock weapons, attachments, new slots, characters, and score streaks. It is important that you work on the Operations offered in the game and of course Win in order to gain Squad Points quickly. It is slow going at first but then they start racking up the more you play the game.
Extinction
Fight off waves of Aliens
This one is more for the Zombies fans. Instead of fighting of the undead you have to stop the extinction of mankind and the alien invasion. I only played a round or two but it seemed like it would be fun for a bit. Unfortunately it looks like there is currently only the one level to play in. Hopefully they will expand on this more as DLC is released.
Mutliplayer
This is where most people go to. I know its pretty much the first thing I do. Setup my options and set the menu to go directly to Multiplayer only. With Ghosts I had pretty high expectations on how it was going to perform. From the Multiplayer Reveal we were promised a lot of stuff. The reality of it is something less than desired. Overall the game feels more like Modern Warfare 3.5 with some general improvements rather than a whole new experience.
The Good
Let me say though that it isn’t a complete write off. There are some positives that have been done with the game:
Overall Performance – By this I mean that the game doesn’t hang, freeze, or take forever to load into. Unfortunately with Black Ops II it took forever to get into the game, and if you had to use anything outside of the game – like say check your messenger? Forget it. The game itself runs great!
Weapons – I have to say I really like the weapons in the game. They look, sound, and ‘feel’ great. No more outrageous swaying when you pull up the sites. Although weapon balance could be better as people have already found the ‘OP’ weapons.
Sound – The sound is pretty amazing in the game. When you hear a sniper rifle firing it gives a big satisfying BOOM sound. When you are running around the map the movement sounds are fantastic. If you own a gaming headset? It will definitely give you a HUGE advantage over players who don’t use one.
Player Movement – They have greatly improved the way you move in the game. No more getting stuck on a tin can or a chicken while moving around on the map. Going over obstacles running and jumping are pretty smooth now. Even the annoying knee slide that makes me feel like I’m sliding into home plate is fluid and thankfully very short in its animation.
Network Connectivity – Sure there are still the occasional lag and “Host Advantage” issues as in past games. On the other hand I’ve been in more lobbies where that isn’t the case. I’ve only seen a few Host Migrations issues and even they have been a lot less than in past games.
Improved Hit Detection – With the better network connectivity it seems like the hit detection has improved quite a bit as well. When everything is running great I no longer think bullets are bending around corners quite as much. It does still happen – just not as bad as in MW3.
The Bad
Although I already bitched about what sucks about Call of Duty Ghosts, there are a lot of things that will annoy the hell out of you.
Collision Detection – You know when you bump into your buddy when you start a new map? It drives me nuts! Or getting bumped right when you get a bead on an enemy team member?
Spawns – I don’t know what they were thinking with the spawn system. The spawn system in Ghosts is beyond horrible. I have spawned right in the middle of the enemy, right next to an enemy player, right where I died so I could get shot again. There doesn’t seem to be any type of rhyme or reason to the way they decided to do the spawn system in the game. I can understand why they don’t want scenarios to where teams could get ‘spawn trapped’ in the game. But this is beyond ridiculous. Right now I don’t even want to play with my fellow clan members as I tend to do better solo because of it.
The UI – Now its not the entire User Interface. Just aspects of it that make it terrible. They moved the scoreboard up to the upper right for some reason. And you cannot do anything with it while in a match. So much for being able to mute someone while in the middle of a game. Speaking of Muting Players….
Muting Players – It is almost impossible to mute players in a lobby without quickly going through the player list and muting them individually. I really miss the “Mute all Except Party” option from Black Ops II. This not only helped keep the chatter down. I quickly grow tired of how much someone sucks or did something unmentionable to someones mother.
Map Design – I have already touched on this in my other article already. Its not that they are poorly designed. Its just that they are HUGE for only being able to have 12 players in them. I really hope that their DLC packs will include smaller maps.
In Game Callouts – This is where you here such helpful tips such as “Enemy out in the Open!” I wish this were an option I could toggle on or off. Most of the time it is a distraction rather than helpful. Plus…. I have a Clan and they do a better job of providing useful callouts.
Now I could add a few more things but I already mentioned them in another article and I’d just be repeating myself:
Read More: 6 Reasons Why Call of Duty Ghosts Sucks
New Game Modes
At Least the Game Modes don’t Suck?
Although they removed Demolition, Headquarters, and Capture the Flag. They did introduce a few new game modes that are fun to play.
Cranked – this has to be my favorite new game mode. You earn perks and extra points with every kill you make. The bad news? You have to do it on a 30 second timer after you make the kill or you blow up. It is fast paced and keeps the campers down quite a bit.
Search & Rescue – This take on the original S&D is still the same objective. The difference is you have to collect tags to either keep your team in the game or keep other the other team out.
Blitz – This replaced Capture the Flag. Same concept except that the objective is run to your enemies base to capture the point. Most points win. It is fun and a bit frustrating since the enemy team is defending their capture point heavily. Knowing your maps and how to flank around helps a lot!
Infected – Although not a new game mode. This is a favorite game brought back from MW3 that is now in the official playlist. Kill the Infected or Infect everyone to win the game.
Hunted – Start out with minimal with your pistol and a knife. Work as a team to capture the different zones as they appear to get weapon upgrades and earn points. Its not as easy as it sounds though!
Working on Prestige
In the past you had one character. You went through the levels and hit the Prestige button and BAM! Everything resets back to level one and you rinse and repeat for however as many times as they want you to until your maxxed out. Now with Ghosts – you have 10 Character slots. And each one of those start out at Level 1 and you work your way up until you Prestige that character and move onto the next one. Why did they do this? Just to mix things up? No – it is important to work on your Squad so you when you go up against other Squads you have your characters built out the way you want them to perform specific roles in the game.
Whats Missing?
There are some things that are missing with Call of Duty Ghosts as well.
Theatre Mode – This was removed most likely due to the fact it lagged the network to no end. The more likely reason is that this is coming out on the Next Generation consoles of the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 which both have built in sharing options.
Player Emblems – This was for Black Ops series so no surprise it wasn’t added back. And to be honest I was tired of seeing different versions of genitailia on display on people’s profile to last me a lifetime.
Game Modes – No more Headquarters or Demolition. These were some great team tactical game types that I miss playing.
No More War – Yup no more 18 player matches. Which is sad considering how large the maps are in the game. Then again I don’t miss the lag either.
Conclusion
This is the same Call of Duty you’ve been playing for years. It has some minor improvements that make the game fun. On the other hand it still has the same issues as past games of this series that never seem to be addressed. Overall it seems more of a slight upgrade to Modern Warfare 3 or a giant DLC Expansion Pack rather than a whole new game. So unless your a die hard Call of Duty player? I wouldn’t recommend purchasing the game. The Campaign is too short, Squads gets repetitive, and although Extinction has some promise it doesn’t seem quite finished yet.
What Do You Think of Call of Duty Ghosts?
What do you think of the game though? Do you like it? Hate it? Leave a comment below on what you think about the game.
Related Posts:
Call of Duty Ghosts | The Next Official Call of Duty Game
Call of Duty Elite App – Now for iOS (Coming Soon for Android)
Call of Duty Black Ops 2 Updates | Apocalypse DLC & Double XP
Call of Duty MW3 – Week in Review for 3/30/2012
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