Call of Duty WWII’s Biggest Problem
The biggest problem with the upcoming Call of Duty iteration isn’t even the game itself, it’s the one that came before it.
A little over a year ago I wrote about how Battlefield 1 successfully revisited the past. It was just after the beta came out and I was riding high on the game. Fast forward to now and I still pretty much feel the same way about Battlefield 1. I’ve greatly enjoyed the game and still play from time to time, or whenever I crave a gorgeous first-person shooter.
Ever since Call of Duty decided to stick with their futuristic spin on every single one of their shooters, I’ve been waiting for an old school war game. Not a war game that shoves me in a robot or a drone. A game that puts me in a tank in gorgeous parts of Europe. A game that lets me use the weapons that don’t have three laser sights and a grenade launcher. Call of Duty kept pushing for the future, Battlefield did the smart thing and reached for the past….(Read More)
Battlefield indeed made a smart move and reached for the past in their game. Call of Duty apparently decided it was smart as well so they’re releasing their own iteration of an old school war game. Imitation is the more sincere form of flattery, and I’m sure Electronic Arts appreciates the gesture by Sledgehammer.
Call of Duty has gone through a plethora of changes over the last ten years. The latter half of the last decade they’ve made changes I’ve mostly ignored. I personally haven’t enjoyed a Call of Duty since Modern Warfare 3. Before that, I was a pretty big supporter of most of their games. Some of my best memories gaming are with my friends on Modern Warfare 2, Black Ops 1, and Modern Warfare 3. Those games were flawed, yet had a kick to them that made them addicting.
The last few years haven’t had the same reception as previous CODs. They tried going so far into the future — and out of the scope of what a normal Call of Duty is — that they set themselves back with some fans of the game. I suppose that’s why we are where we are today, with COD World War II on the horizon in November.
Fortunately, they did release a beta. It was closed to people who had pre-ordered the game, and I had to wiggle my way in. There was no way I was paying for this game without putting it through some serious tests. I had been burned by too many Call of Duty games in a row to blindly purchase this one. I needed to see with my own eyes there weren’t any jetpacks.
The beta went well from my perspective. In terms of gunplay, the game felt like a classic COD game. The guns felt balanced, and while there was still times where I felt I shouldn’t have died, it was a solid experience from a gun-on-gun perspective.
Another positive were the maps in the beta. Most of them felt well thought out and easy to play. None of them felt larger than they should be for six on six game types, and the visuals weren’t bad at all.
Frankly the biggest problem I had with the game from a playing perspective was the killstreaks. They seemed weak and underwhelming in my opinion. But it was a beta, so the killstreaks in the full game may be more rewarding.
The biggest problem with this iteration of Call of Duty is that Battlefield 1 is simply a better World War game in my opinion. To make matters worse, it came out the year before COD’s iteration and still looks, plays, and sounds better.
I was never a fan of Battlefield games till their most recent game. I despised the gunplay and the large maps overwhelmed me and made the gameplay far slower than I desired. That all changed with the gorgeous iteration that is Battlefield 1.
When I was in the COD WWII beta, all I wanted was a gun battle that didn’t end with me feeling as if I shouldn’t have died. Battlefield just doesn’t have those moments. When you’re around the wall, you’re around it. I wanted the maps in COD WWII to be beautiful and feel less arcade-like, but, frankly, they fell flat.
This COD still seems less visually appealing and satisfying in gunplay than Battlefield. While Sledgehammer is reaching into the past just as Battlefield did, they’re reaching back only a year after EA did so; and in the end, arriving second may be the biggest obstacle COD WWII is facing.
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