Duty Is A Dish Best Served Chunky

By Will Barker

I answer the call of duty twice daily, sometimes more if I've eaten pickled cabbage kimchi. I also answered the call of duty with my trousers on back in 1986, which resulted in a stern talking-to by my then legal guardian, the prophet Benny Hinn.

To be frank, the Call of Duty videogames were not what I would have expected when the original game blasted onto screens in 2003. I thought it'd be more like a juvenile, toilet-humour version of The Sims. 

It would have been a perfect for the Wii. 

*cough*

But no, this best-selling series is a first-person shooter that has - until now - been set in the 1940s. This is what makes Call of Duty 4 so spectacularly good if you ask me.

The World War II shooter has been done to death, and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is a breath of fresh air for the franchise. Not only are the graphics superb with an incredible attention to detail, but the gameplay feels far more involving than the WWII games. 

But let's take it from the top.

As the name suggests, Modern Warfare has a modern day setting. We're talking tactical nukes, laser sights, night vision goggles, armour piercing depleted uranium rounds, freeze dried icecream, kevlar armour and permeable licorice hiking boots.

The game kicks off with a nice little intro - all the cut scenes use the game engine and they look excellent - that sets the scene the game's progression. 

A Middle Eastern war monger (he used to be the fish monger) is amassing power and is on the verge of attaining a nuclear warhead and as trooper 'Soap' McTavish you've just been assigned to a new rapid-response special operations group who are tasked with getting to the bottom of this nefarious and plot.

The first level takes place under the cover of darkness, and sees players rappel out of helicopter onto the deck of a container ship amid the heaving ocean.

About five and a half seconds after you land on the deck of the ship and watch several of your squad mates fan out and whisper terse orders to you, the lightning storm illuminates the scene - huge seas, wind, spray, bitter cold - and you realise that Infinity Ward have succeeded in creating not only one of the best looking videogames ever, but also one of the most atmospheric.

There's so much atmosphere in Call of Duty 4 you can almost smell ozone.

Throughout the game and during almost every level you'll gasp at the grandiosity of the level design, the audacity of the environmental features, the magnificence of the dynamic lighting and shading.

As I mentioned before, the first three Call of Duty games were very good, but for me they never quite hooked me in. But this game is different. It's better. 

I've started playing through the game on the hardest difficulty level after beating it on medium because the single player campaign is so incredibly engrossing.

There's so much to see and do, and whether playing as the US Marine or the British SAS covert operative, it's hard not to get sucked into the theatre of war. 

Progression through levels is helped by the-now-familiar Call of Duty nav point indicator on your compass - just follow the yellow indicator and you'll find the action.

As well as some of the unforgettable moments that include blasting enemies from the backseat of a gunship at night time, snapping the necks of rabid attack dogs, and stabbing enemies rambo style, there's a lot of guns in this game.

Best of all, the weapons look and feel really meaty. There's a perceptible weight to them that is conveyed in how they are carried and also how they sound.

There's some very satisfying parts of the game where realistic ballistics come into play as well. For instance there's one level where you get to use a 50 cal sniper rifle and have to take into account the strong winds when lining up targets. Very cool.

There's no flamethrower which was a disappointment after Halo 3 added it, and the only minigun you can use is out the back of a chopper.

But I'm nitpicking here. This game is very well presented, the pacing in the single player game is excellent (few levels ever drag on or are too short) with enough variety and depth to keep even the most jaded and grizzled gamers happy for hours on end.

Controlling your soldier is typical first-person shooter fare on the consoles - trigger buttons shoot and zoom, left stick controls movement, and right stick controls your aim. 

Obviously the PC is keyboard and mouse, but whatever system you play it on - PC, PS3, Xbox 360 - know that the gameplay is awesome.

Most levels in the single player campaign involve at least a couple - and quite often a whole platoon - of fellow soldiers, and you come across scores of enemies at a time which can make for blistering gun fights.

Your spacial awareness needs to be very keen on some levels as you'll be assailed with gunfire, RPGs, and all manner of ordnance from every direction, above and below you.

The gun fights and skirmishes that you'll be party to are hard to beat for sheer thrills. Truly, I've never felt so involved in a first-person shooter as this one. The heart begins to hammer, and you really feel a sense of urgency to make sure you fellow troopers don't perish.

The action is so visceral and realistic that I cannot think of another game that even comes close to levels of involvement Call of Duty 4 provides. You can hear bullets whiz pass your head, see them splinter into masonry in a puff of grout, plus your squad mates are constantly informing you of their movements (and often yelling when things heat up) and it all feels so incredibly realistic.

I loved Halo 3, don't get me wrong, but this game has a far more intense campaign rooted firmly in 21st century warfare.

I can't go any further without at least mentioning the visuals - they are a league of their own. It's a seriously detailed game and so smooth too - the frame rate barely drops below 60fps even when there's Cobra attack choppers circling and enemy combatants showering the area with gun fire.

The particle effects are awesome, the polygon count and overall gameworld detail is astonishing, and everything animates very realistically. There's even the inclusion of a graphical effect called rim-lighting. Awesome.

Bad bits? Well, the single player game is over in about 6-8 hours if you really push it without taking a break, but playing the game on the hardest difficulty will extend the single-player aspect of the game because it's effing tough.

Pop your head round a corner for more than half a second on the toughest difficulty setting and you'll have it blown clean off. The enemy AI is average on the middle levels but becomes devilish on the hardest difficulty. But this is what makes it incredibly rewarding when you do finally reach a checkpoint and pass an objective, the fact that it's so damnably difficult.

What kept me coming back to this game was the authenticity, the gritty realism, and the balanced pacing and variety of the single player campaign. There's rarely a moment when you get bored and want to switch it off or pour a glass of milk over your TV or smash your neighbours windows.

I liken it to a brilliant book, where you always seem to stay up later and later reading it each night because it's such a page turner. This game has a similar feel - you really want to keep playing not only to find out what happens in the story but also because the levels, the objectives, and the gameplay are so creative.

While the single-player campaign game was the highlight for me, and reason enough to keep playing into the wee hours, the multiplayer aspect boosts Call of Duty 4's longevity by a considerable amount.

Like any first-person shooter multiplayer game, you can play deathmatch, or team games. Thankfully the physics, the realism, and the visceral nature of this digital theatre of war is retained in multiplayer games. On it's own, this would have constituted a very playable and indeed addictive online aspect to the game.

But there's more Call of Duty 4's multiplayer element than most shooters. For starters, you get to create your own 'class' of soldier, which basically allows you to outfit your character with the equipment and weapons that you like the best.

There are more weapons in the single player game, each of which has been painstakingly visually and physically recreated, but a few of the multiplayer tools include the Desert Eagle, Dragunov, M60E4, MP5, AW50 plus there's even an air strike and you can even call in the Lockheed AC-130 attack craft to lay down the mother of all suppression fire.

While I mentioned that you can create your own quasi-character class for your multiplayer avatar, you can also progress through almost 60 levels of promotion as you achieve various combat milestones after extended play. Impressively, these promotions add an RPG-inspired element to the multiplayer game by unlocking features such as new weapons and abilities like highly penetrative bullets that pass through almost any walls. 

This 'bonus' element in the multiplayer part of the game makes it all the more addictive and kept me coming back for more as there's something to work towards, not just pure violence - as enjoyable as it is. When you finally max out your player the extra weapons and abilities really can make a difference in tight games, so it's good to see they're not just token gifts for the veteran grinders.

Personally, I like this game better than Halo 3. I found the single player campaign to be more satisfying and more involving. There's tonnes of weapons and a handful of vehicles and plenty of destruction to be had. The icing on the cake is the in-depth multiplayer aspect that was far more enjoyable that I had ever anticipated.

To be succinct, this is the best Call of Duty game ever made, and arguably one of the best first-person shooters at that. I've learned a lot about answering the call of duty in recent weeks, but most of all I've learned that it doesn't always have to be a sloppy (and pungent) experience. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is rock solid - highly recommended.

Game: Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
System: Xbox 360
Players: 1-multi
Online: Yes
Developer: Activision
Distributor: Infinity Ward

Rating: 90%

(Ratings Key/Explanation)