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Call Of Duty Advanced Warfare Review

Updated: Feb 21, 2021


Call of Duty. The game people love to hate. The Michael Bay movie of the gaming world, everyone will complain about it but everyone will play. This years addition to the franchise Advanced Warfare is brought to us by Call Of Duty new comers Sledgehammer games (not including their help on Modern Warfare 3). In this Call Of Duty Sledgehammer have brought the franchise to the future. Exo skeletons and Minority Report stylization galore. From the offset you can be sure: this ain’t your daddy’s COD. The introduction of the double jump alone has created a whole new beast, let’s take a look shall we?

The campaign mode, while not any different from any previous years campaign weighs in at around 6 hours gameplay (for the average gamer) and this is what we have come to expect from the Activision shooter franchise. However this time more than applicable to any previous iteration it is advisable to play through the campaign first before delving into multiplayer as Sledgehammer have shaken the very foundations of the Call Of Duty series that have remained relatively unchanged since the first major shake-up in Call Of Duty 4: Modern Warfare.

Story wise it is more or less the same as previous entries in the franchise, you have your team, you have your buddies and you have your mission. While not quite as engaging as perhaps the Ghosts campaign, the jump to the future certainly changes the game significantly in location settings and looks, and also the equipment available. While playing the story, even in the opening chapter, you are witness to a Matrix-esque swarm of drones and walkers that look as if they have been plucked straight out of Metal Gear Solid 4. A standard tale of power and corruption helmed by Kevin Spacey himself is enjoyable, but it won’t take the whole weekend to complete.

In campaign mode visiting the pause menu will greet you with a set of EXO challenges such as, get 50 kills or collect 5 pieces of Intel. This gifts to the game a set of side quests to accomplish alongside your main objective. The introduction of the new arsenal such as the threat detector grenade, gives Advanced Warfare’s campaign even more reason to be played as it gets the player fully comfortable with the changes this time round. A short stealth section aside and some ninja like grappling, the campaign is an easy 6 hour blast, needed this time before hitting the multiplayer. While short and sweet like most COD campaigns, the main story proves more as a necessary training ground for the COD elite.

Controls are shaken up a tad with the dodge mechanic, clicking L3 down and flicking down, left or right will make your character dodge in the corresponding direction. While a nice touch, having it in the multi-player is quite redundant giving the fast paced antics you find in there. Clicking R3, knife kills are replaced with insta-death punches which feels immensely more satisfying than knifing. Finding the beam weapon instantly brings the Ghostbusters themselves to your head and is gratifying to use to cause more devastation.

Weapons are much more fun to handle, the aiming and feedback are a whole ton better than we had in Ghosts last year. Bringing the franchise to the future has seemingly brought the fun back to Call Of Duty. Getting used to the new mechanics and the level layouts is a breath of fresh air to the series and something that needs to be recognised by the teams making next year’s iteration.

Onto multiplayer, while it’s always nice to play your favourite Call Of Duty map (Nuke Town right?) having a complete fresh feeling set is always better. Yeah sure most new Call Of Duty games have their own set of maps, but never before has such as sense of freshness occurred in venturing into online multiplayer. Thanks to the ingenious (and about 5-10 years overdue) double jump mechanic, playing Advanced Warfare online is a very different game from any game previous. Maps have suddenly become much more open as reaching high places is as simple as a double tap of X. That one guy who used to be carefully placed in an unapproachable nesting spot can be quickly dealt with by a few timed double jumps.

Multiplayer seems a lot more frantic this time around. While standing pumping rounds into the guy in front, his buddy is generally only a corner away with a loaded fist. Fast paced has never been a more astute phrase, but this time you will need your wits about you on the multi layered levels. As granting players to leap buildings and walls means you are never a minute away from the action.

For the old hard-core, online mode does feature a classics section, where you can play online with all the new-fangled young kids double jumping is negated for good old fashioned shooting and being shot at. The extra mile has certainly gone into making Advanced Warfare feel as different while familiar as possible.

On to the not so goods – graphically the character models in the cut scenes and in game are absolutely superb. Kevin Spacey being a natural highlight in the story but, every characters facial expressions have had some amount of work put into them. Hats off to Sledgehammers talented studio for that. However the downside is while looking very nice in cut scenes, when the game actually hits the backgrounds just can’t match that cut scene quality and somewhat detracts from the immersion. Getting new items and equipment this time around sadly is not up to the player and is assigned automatically after each online match. This leads to a sense of less customisation than the previous instalments that have allowed the player to pick their rewards after matches.

All in all Call Of Duty: Advanced Warfare is a great package, it’s a big shake up in the way the game is played and is visually impressive despite the shortfalls in the way the backgrounds look in gameplay. This is the game to bring back the Call Of Duty doubters and is the game for any Kevin Freaking Spacey fan to play as he is fantastic in the campaign mode. It’s big dumb fun, but this time, it’s futuristic big dumb fun that might require some getting used to. For more on COD Advanced Warfare, check out 42 Level One live every Tuesday at 9:30pm GMT on AllGames.com

Alister Kennedy 42 Level One

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