Call Of Duty 5: World At War - Update

This weekend I've been playing more Call of Duty 5: World At War on the PS3.

It's double XP weekend and they have unlocked the Zombie Nazi co-op level which was previously locked until you completed the solo mission.

So far I've played the game for 17 hours. I've leveled up to Major III. My best kill streak is 22, one better than my COD4 best. I've learned the levels a little bit more, seen some bugs, and become more used to the game. So I thought I'd write about what I think of the game so far.

For me the biggest issue I have with the game is the crappy guns. Yeah, sure, it's WWII, and they had crappy guns. But seriously, it just ruins the game for me. In fact this weekend I switched to playing hardcore mode just so I could make the weapons a bit more potent. This was a little better, but tough to do when you are still a bit of a noob on the maps.

My Issues With COD 5

1. The shitty guns. They are just very limited, and it seems to take forever to get the good ones, and even the good ones suck.
2. It takes too long to level up. Sure, maybe I suck, but 17 hours to get to level 44? I imagine it will take at least another 10 to hit 65.
3. The guns at the low levels REALLY suck for the most part. For that reason I can't imagine going prestige on this game. I said I wouldn't on COD4, but eventually did anyway. But I really can't imagine spending this much time working on it. Especially as some of the cool looking weapons are only available right near the end. This means that if I do go prestige, I'll have to spend hours playing with crap guns all over again.
4. Error 33. For me I get this error every time I log in. It can take 5-15 minutes to login sometimes, with repeated Error 33s. It's tedious and annoying, and many times I've just given up playing because I can't be bothered to wait for the game to decide to log in.
5. Trophies are a new PS3 thing, and there are plenty to win on COD5. But sadly most of them are for single player achievements. That doesn't make any sense for a game that is predominantly played online.
6. The grenades annoy me. They are not as powerful as COD4, and I understand the reason why they did that, but it still annoys me.
   

The Good Stuff

1. I love the dogs. That's just a great aspect to the game, and far more fun than the COD4 equivalent of calling in a helicopter.
2. Much of the achievements are the same as COD4.
3. Most of the levels are very good. Interesting layouts, wonderful attention to detail, a lot more space to play than COD4.
4. Vehicles. The tanks are fun, and add another dimension to the game. On some levels that include vehicles it can really shift the balance of power in the game.
5. Guns with grenades. I do enjoy the COD5 equivalent of the noob tube. Sometimes when the enemy team groups together this can be a really nice way to wipe out of bunch of them at the same time.
6. Nazi Zombies. I've only played the co-op level once, and it seemed like a cool idea. Although it didn't seem to earn me much in the way of XP or weapon experience, which sucks.
   

In conclusion, I still like COD5. It's a good game, but it lacks some of the magic of COD4 for me. When you have a shooting game, the guns are important. Sadly I'm just not seeing anything too exciting yet. Now I am admittedly only about half way to top rank, but that said the crappy guns will make it impossible for me to justify giving up the good stuff only to spend hours grappling with the crappy guns again, should I choose to go prestige.

As for the single player game, it has its moments, but it is only as good as the COD4 single player in my opinion.

Call Of Duty 5: World At War - First Impressions

In April of 2008 I decided to treat myself to a Sony PS3. The price had finally come down to a reasonable level, GTA:IV was about to be released, and Bluray seemed like a nice addition to my HDTV.

I purchased the PS3 a few weeks before Grand Theft Auto came out, so found myself with a cool new games console and no games.

I took a trip to a local game store and asked the geek behind the counter to recommend a game. He instantly began a torrent of enthusiasm about Call of Duty 4, claiming it to be last years game of the year, blah blah. And I have to say, he was right. I've logged a fair few hours online reaching the gold cross level, and more recently getting my gold AK-47.

This fall Call of Duty 5 came out, and I decided to put a copy on my Amazon.com wish list. A relative purchased it for me, and on Christmas day I was able to try it for the first time.

Apparently this was a popular game for Christmas because I've never seen fewer than 70,000 people logged in at any time of the day or night. I also keep getting the unbelievably annoying Activision Error 33, which is basically some kind of overload when too many people are trying to play. This annoying error makes it impossible to play online, and as far as I know, the only fix is to wait and try again later.

I've not played the game a lot, maybe a few hours. But I have a few initial observations.

The single player game is a good way to pass time when the Activision Error 33 prevents you from playing online. Although frankly, if it were not for the multiplayer option I would not own the game.

The multiplayer option (when working) does seem a shade smoother than Call of Duty 4, although the makers have made a number of changes I am not especially thrilled about.

I don't like the lighting of the game. I can see what they are trying to do, recreate the washed out color look of old movies or something. But I suspect that for the people who were actually fighting in World War II, the sun looked pretty much the same as it does now.

The maps are big and detailed, probably twice the size of the COD4 maps, although my unfamiliarity of them may make them seem bigger than they actually are.

Much of the features COD4 players know and love are still there. UAV is replaced with a recognisance plane. The air strike is now a mortar attack. The helicopter attacks are now rather amusingly replaced with attack dogs that you can shoot.

But I think one of my biggest issues with the game is the weapons. Certainly in the lower ranks the choice of weapons seems limited. It is harder to get the equivalent of the red dot sights. There are fewer automatic weapons and a lot more slow loading bolt action things. I guess they have to remain true to the era, which is why I am not convinced they should have gone back to WWII.

It appears they still have ten levels of prestige, but have also added ten more ranks, so now you have to get to level 65 (not 55) before you can prestige up.

You can still get bonus experience (XP) points for head shots, but I don't think you can get different weapon designs (blue tiger, red tiger, gold etc) like you can on COD4.

It is now possible to drive a tank, or operate the machine gun on a tank, which is new (COD4 had no vehicles).

I guess my biggest concern at this stage is whether the weapons I have yet to unlock will make up for the general suckiness of the weapons I have already tried. This in turn has another point of concern attached. Even if the later weapons are as cool as they should be, it looks like I will have to play the game for long portions of time with sucky weapons each time I prestige (assuming that the good weapons are locked again, once you level up).

At least with COD4 you could get a nice LMG, and quickly level up to the good assault rifles nice and quick. But with COD5 you have to get 75 kills with a single gun (not 25 like in COD4) to unlock the optical sights (the red dot equivalent).

I'll need quite a few more hours to figure out if I really like the game or not. To me it all hinges on how much more effort is needed to unlock the later weapons, and how good they are.

Most importantly, I need them to fix the Error 33 that prevents me from actually playing the game at least 50% of the times I have tried to.

In the meantime I'll be playing COD4 (decided to get my gold LMG), and Tiger Woods 09, which is very good. I'm not a golfer, but I've always enjoyed that game, and I have not purchased a new version since the 2005 version I had for the PS2. So far the changes and improvements have been quite impressive, but that's probably another post at some point.

Finally Got My Gold AK47!

I got my Playstation 3 in April of this year. Since then, with just a brief break to complete Grand Theft Auto: IV, I've been playing Call of Duty 4. After lots of hard 'work' I ranked up to a Gold Cross Commander, and finally got my gold AK47 tonight.

It's a pain to get. You need 150 head shots with each weapon from the assault class before you are granted access to the gold AK. And that takes some time.

I never bothered to go for gold weapons once I started going prestige because I knew I would just lose them again. Although before I went prestige for the first time I did get a gold light machine gun, which is pretty easy to get. Once I got my gold cross, I decided a gold AK47 was a much needed accessory.

Now I am an 'expert' on the assault rifles, I thought I'd give them a run down. My comments are based on using stopping power, and playing Mercenary Team Deathmatch, which is my game of choice. I also use the red dot sight on all these weapons, when available.

M16A4

Fires in three round bursts. Very powerful and deadly. Quite accurate too. I set my personal record of 41 confirmed kills (and one assist) on Countdown, using this weapon.

AK-47

Fully automatic, and although it has a little up and down recoil, it is very powerful and pretty accurate. It's probably my favorite weapon, especially since you can get it in gold.

G3

This is a nasty little single shot gun. It's pretty accurate, but it lacks power, so you can end up getting killed before you can down your opponent. I really hated this gun by the time I had reached my red tiger.

G36C

I really love this gun. It fires automatic and very fast with negligible recoil. It's a pretty deadly thing. My only real beef with it is that without the red dot sight I find it hard to use. The iron sights block a lot of what you are trying to shoot, so this weapon with a silencer is no use to me.

M4 Carbine

Basically just like the M16 but on full auto, and little less powerful. Another favorite of mine, a joy to use. No real recoil, accurate, not too noisy, smooth, clean, other words ;)

M14

I wasn't looking forward to using this one, as I don't much like single shot weapons. But I was surprised by the power of this thing. It is actually the most dangerous round for round of any of the assault rifles. Of course an automatic weapon tends to have the advantage of hitting the target multiple times, whereas this requires you to manually make that happen. But that said, I leveled up with this gun much quicker than I expected, and really quite enjoyed it. It's much like the G3, only bigger and far more powerful.

MP44

Hate is a strong word, but it is appropriate here. I hate this fucking gun. It is slow to load, inaccurate, weak, ugly, and just to be evil Infinity Ward ensured that you cannot put a scope or sights of any kind on it. I've read it is some throwback to WWII and earlier COD games. It needs to stay there, and if this is the kind of shit I'm going to have to use in COD5, I might just be taking the game back to the store!

Once you aim the gun, the crappy iron sights obscure a lot of what you are trying to see. Once you fire it, the muzzle flash and recoil means that you are basically shooting blind and just hoping to hit something. If you are lucky enough to kill someone with it, you are likely to die while taking forever to reload this thing.

I am so glad to see the back of this evil bastard of a gun.

I've now taken the game about as far as I intend to. I wanted a gold cross and gold AK, and now I have them. I don't intend to get a gold sub machine gun, because they give you the Uzi, which is not a gun I like. I doubt I will bother with trying to get a gold sniper rifle, because I'm not a great sniper. I'm not far off red tiger on the M21 though.

Ultimately though, I have to say, this is truly an excellent game. It really represents value for money. The multi-player game just keeps on giving and will easily gobble up a few hundred hours of game play if you let it. But that's fair enough. PS3 games are not cheap, so they should last a while. I can definitely say I've gotten my money's worth with this game. In fact I have not played a game as much as this since I bough San Andreas for the PS2. I played though that game twice it was so good.

I am going to get COD5 this Christmas, so time will tell if it can live up to COD4. If the multi player is similarly absorbing, I suspect I'll be playing it a lot. In the mean time, I'm going to enjoy showing off my golden gun.

Call Of Duty 4: My Gold Cross

Anyone who plays Call Of Duty 4: Modern Warfare multiplayer will be familiar with the coveted Gold Cross.

In the multiplayer game there are 55 ranks, after which you can give up some of your achievements and unlocked weapons to return to the lowest rank. Each time you do this, you get a new prestige medal, the tenth and highest of which is the gold cross, based upon the Navy medal shown above.

Well I got my gold cross this week. All it cost me was hours of my life, and killing over 45,000 people.

But I decided to post my suggestions for leveling up to the Gold Cross as quickly as possible. These are just my opinions, and I'm sure there are better ways of doing things out there. I personally like to play mainly mercenary team deathmatches, although I've heard arguments that there are faster ways to level up.

• During ranks 1-4 the goal is to pick one of the available weapons (MP5, M16 or SAW), and just kill away. Use whatever weapon works for you (or any weapon you find). Your goal should be to kill as many people as you can. It shouldn't take very much effort to get these early promotions.
• At rank 5, you get to create a class, so you now have access to a few more weapons. Again it doesn't really matter what you choose. Just pick something you feel comfortable with and kill.
• Pay special attention to the barracks. Once this opens up you will start earning eXPerience points for certain achievements. Specifically one of the easiest ways to earn XP is to simply shoot 150 people with each weapon. I'm talking only SMG, LMG, and Assault weapons. Shotguns and sniper rifles have different rules, and I'm not much of a sniper, or shotgun player. Although when I do snipe I like the M21.
  
• Since you are aiming to level up to Gold Cross, there is little point in worrying about 'expert' ratings on weapons (head shots). Unless you are an amazing shot, the goal is to really just kill people thus leveling up your marksman stats. 150 kills earns you 1,500 XP points, but by killing that many people with the same gun you will also get 1,600 XP along the way too. The biggest award being 1,000 XP when you hit 150 kills.
• In the early levels I recommend use of stun grenades, stopping power, and extreme conditioning. These are the perks I like to use. Extreme conditioning lets you run around very fast for a long time, which fits with my default style of play. I think stopping power is a must for all classes, pretty much all the time. There is nothing more annoying than spraying someone with a machine gun, and they just turn around and kill you before you can kill them.
• As soon as you get marksman III on a weapon, move to another. Just pick the easy weapons like the LMGs, SMGs, AK47, M16, G36c, and M4. For now, don't worry about head shots. The goal is to get as many promotions as you can as quickly as possible.
• When you reach level 17, Martyrdom becomes available, I have this on every class. Yes I've heard it's a noob thing, but I don't give a shit. It is a great way of picking up extra kills, and quite a few barracks achievements (like car bomb, dominoes, grenade kill etc.)
  
• Speaking of noobs, don't use a noob tube (AKA a rifle mounted grenade launcher). You are getting points for marksman on your guns, noob tubes don't get you anything except the kill.
  
• At level 41, I switch out my special grenades for three frags. This can get you a lot of kills and be a real pain in the ass for enemies on fairly open maps like Countdown and Waterworks. My record in COD4 on Countdown is 41 confirmed kills and one assist, using a combination of an M16 with a red dot sight and frags.
• Speaking of red dot sights, I think these are a must have unless you are an exceptional aimer. I'm no fan of the ACOG. Although on some weapons like the RPD, I'll maybe take a grip.
  
• Keep an eye on what challenges are available in the barracks. Many of them will take care of themselves, but there are some that need special attention. Things like Misery Loves Company and Goodbye are ones that require some thought. If you get a chance, always complete as many of these challenges as you can, but don't get too obsessed with them, you are going to lose them each time you go prestige.
• There is a challenge for using a silencer which is worth a few points. If you are okay with a silenced weapon it's worth switching to a silenced weapon for a little while to get all the points from this.
• Just in case you didn't realize, you can hold two weapons. You don't have to lose your primary weapon when you pick up a new weapon. If you switch to your pistol and THEN pick up a weapon, you will now have two nice weapons. If I have time, I will always switch out the pistol if I want to pick up another weapon.
• Speaking of other weapons, keep in mind that if you pick up a weapon that you have yet to unlock you will not be working towards a marksman or expert rating in that weapon, so it is largely pointless because you are giving up XP.
• As new weapons like the P90 become available I go back to my stratergy of just going for 150 straight kills with them. While tiger stripes are cool, it can take too long to get them. And once you hit 150 kills, spending more time with that weapon to earn your tiger stripes is depriving you of marksman points for another weapon, thus potentially slowing your promotions.
  
• Once I have achieved marksman III in every weapon I like, I return to my favorite weapons and use them until I go prestige. This will usually get me at least a couple of red tigers along the way before Commander.
• I like to 'cheat' when it comes to survival challenges right near the end (level 54). I'll create a class with a silenced weapon like P90 or AK47. I'll give it UAV jammer, some claymores, and dead silence. When the Bloc level comes up, or maybe Downpour, I'll sneak off to a quiet corner and hide behind some claymores. 5 minutes later you get 250 XP for Survivalist and at the end you'll get 250 more XP for Flawless. On Downpour I'll hide in or behind a barn. On Block, I'll hide in the swimming pool.

And that's about it. Stick to that game plan and level 55 will come up pretty quick. As soon as you unlock presige mode, just do it. There is no sense in wasting kills that could be used to level up on the next level.

Once you get a Gold Cross, that's when you can start concentrating on the gold guns. I used to have a gold LMG back before I ever went prestige. It got me a 21 kill streak on Creek. But as I once read on a forum, gold guns are for retirement. If you plan on working your way up to Gold Cross it seems largly pointless to put in the kind of effort needed to get them (Expert III on all weapons in that class).

That's about all I have. You'll find me on the PS3 version playing as ZCT808.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Prestige)

Well I nearly made it. I am just one level up away from that coveted Gold Cross.

Prepare to die.